Using tradebooks to make your life easier and your students smarter

Long time readers know how much I love maps. I don’t really know for sure when the infatuation started but Katy and the Big Snow by Virginia Lee Burton may have had something to do with it.

I ran across Katy recently for the first time in years as I was sorting through bookshelves containing some old books. For those of you too young to have read Katy and the Big Snow as a child, a quick recap.

Katy is “a brave and untiring tractor” who pushes a bulldozer in the summer and a snowplow in the winter, making it possible for the townspeople of Geoppolis to do their jobs. In this particular story, Katy drives around all over the town – north, south, east, and west – with her snow plow, opening up the town so that citizens could complete a variety of different public and private tasks such as delivery the mail, putting out a fire, and shopping at a grocery store.

It’s a great book for a lot of reasons but one big reason is there’s so much to look at, especially in the margins. I loved that book growing up.

The best part of the book, I’m sure we’ll all agree,

Historypalooza 2019 – Google Arts and Culture is more than just a bazillion pretty pictures

It comes but once a year. The National Social Studies Supervisors Association and National Council for the Social Studies combined conference. For a history nerd, it’s the winter holiday break, the Final Four, and fresh out of the oven chocolate chip cookies all rolled into one event.

For three days, it’s about conversations that focus on social studies, tools, resources, evidence, and best practices. So what did I learn?

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Kelsey Pacer and Laura Israelsen are my people. They may be more nuts about Googley stuff than I am and love sharing their favorite tools and ideas. I sat in on part of their My Maps session earlier in the week and this afternoon, they’re sharing some great ideas for using Google Arts and Culture.

If you never had the chance to visit Arts and Culture, you really need to set time aside to do some serious exploring. The site is dedicated to

Historypalooza 2019 – Promoting civic engagement through children’s lit (And links to 1000s of books)

It comes but once a year. The National Social Studies Supervisors Association and National Council for the Social Studies combined conference. For a history nerd, it’s the winter holiday break, the Final Four, and fresh out of the oven chocolate chip cookies all rolled into one event.

For three days, it’s about conversations that focus on social studies, tools, resources, evidence, and best practices. So what did I learn?

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I’ve noticed that I’m on a bit of an early childhood kick today. It’s probably a good thing – there’s so much more I need to learn about social studies in the elementary classroom.

Dr. Christine Beaudry from Nevada State College is sharing ways to encourage civic engagement through ELA and trade books.

She starts the conversation by asking:

Historypalooza 2019 – Inquiry Design Models for the elementary

It comes but once a year. The National Social Studies Supervisors Association and National Council for the Social Studies combined conference. For a history nerd, it’s the winter holiday break, the Final Four, and fresh out of the oven chocolate chip cookies all rolled into one event.

For three days, it’s about conversations that focus on social studies, tools, resources, evidence, and best practices. So what did I learn?

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In the last session of Saturday morning, Brent Tozer is sharing how to use the C3 Teachers Inquiry Design Model structure to integrate more social studies into elementary level instruction.

Get more information about the IDM structure by

Historypalooza 2019 – Using amazing Google tools to create an amazing race

It comes but once a year. The National Social Studies Supervisors Association and National Council for the Social Studies combined conference. For a history nerd, it’s the winter holiday break, the Final Four, and fresh out of the oven chocolate chip cookies all rolled into one event.

For three days, it’s about conversations that focus on social studies, tools, resources, evidence, and best practices. So what did I learn?

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We all know how much I love the Googles. So today I’m gonna focus a bit on Google sessions and using Google to create social studies centric activities. Brooke from FriED is walking us through some strategies organized around the Amazing Race.

Brooke started by sharing her vision of what she called Challenge Based Learning using Google G Suite tools. I agree – our job is not to give kids the answers. Our job is to give our kids problems to solve. She used a combination of different G Suite tools to lead us on a Digital Breakout / Scavenger Hunt / Google Tools Tutorials to highlight what this can look like in the classroom.

Get access to what we did during the session. And then head over to view a 20 minute explainer video that outlines the step by step instructions for making your own classroom specific Amazing race.

 

Historypalooza 2019 – Here’s what I learned today

It comes but once a year. The National Social Studies Supervisors Association and National Council for the Social Studies combined conference. For a history nerd, it’s the winter holiday break, the Final Four, and fresh out of the oven chocolate chip cookies all rolled into one event.

For three days, it’s all about conversations that focus on social studies, tools, resources, evidence, and best practices. So how did I get smarter today?