This paper provides the National Center for Education Statistics (NCES), National Assessment Governing Board (NAGB), and the National Assessment of Educational Progress (NAEP) community with information that may help maintain the validity and utility of the NAEP assessments for civics and U.S. history as revisions are planned to the NAEP…

There are significant apertures between the history told within historians' scholarship and teachers' curricular resources. The Civil Rights Movement (hereafter, CRM) of the 1950s and 1960s did not start with Rosa Parks' arrest in Montgomery, though it was a spark that inflamed a long-smoldering fire. Nor did it end with Dr. King's dream in…

Students often feel powerless. They feel like passive observers as the tapestry of the world is woven around them. Social studies teachers need to show students examples of individuals who have acted as agents of social change. By focusing on a historical figure's agency, students can see the ripple effects that people's actions can have over…

The 2014-2015 academic year marked the first year that American, preK-12 public school enrollment became majority nonwhite, with Hispanic/Latino as the largest minority. Population shifts have continued to occur, with Latinos now representing 28% of public school students. American public schools are in trouble, with national achievement reaching…

Set amidst an increasingly tense discourse about immigration and substantial pressures on educators, this study examines a three-week fourth-grade social studies unit as taught to a class with a large number of English learners located in a low-income school in the Pacific Northwest. Using ethnographic and sociolinguistic perspectives, we provide…

This three-article dissertation specifically examines one challenging element of teaching history to young children: the representation of historical violence and adversity, using fourth grade curriculum and instruction surrounding the topic of Spanish colonization of California as a case study. This era, known as the Spanish mission period in…

This qualitative study examines students' perceptions of their bilingualism in a school that is attempting to disrupt inequalities through the promotion of social justice through bilingual/bicultural education. In order to understand students' perspectives of their bilingualism in Arizona's restrictive policy context, the researchers apply…

The National Assessment of Educational Progress (NAEP) is an integral measure of academic progress over time. It is the largest nationally representative and continuing assessment of what our nation's students know and can do in various subjects such as civics, mathematics, reading, science, technology and engineering literacy, U.S. history, and…

In this article, the authors introduce a series of interconnected, inquiry-based activities from a fifth grade social studies curriculum, "My Place in Time and Space," which was developed in part through a Library of Congress Teaching with Primary Sources (TPS) Regional Grant Program--Eastern Region. These activities are designed to…

This qualitative case study examines how fifth graders and their teachers participated in critical literacy instruction grounded in systems thinking on the topic of slavery. Systems thinking seeks to discover relationships and patterns in diverse underlying systems; critical literacy examines everyday texts, focuses on social justice and change,…

Integrating unfamiliar technology in the classroom often requires ample technological resources and professional development. However, these resources are often not available. This case study of qualitative data combined with pretest or posttest student data illustrates how one pair of coteachers autonomously planned for and implemented a digital…

All students need to know and understand the origins and evolution of their nation. They also need to understand the development of the nation's democratic institutions and ideals so that they are prepared to take part knowledgeably, as citizens and voters, in shaping America's future. The framework in U.S. history for the 1994-2018 National…

This article describes a fourth grade project involving elementary students, their teachers, elementary preservice teachers, and university faculty. The project focused on a work of juvenile historical fiction, culminating in social studies lessons that were interdisciplinary. This collaboration between educators was made possible by a…

English learners are best supported when they receive culturally relevant content-area instruction in their first language. Numerous studies (e.g., Lindholm-Leary 2001) support this approach, and bilingual and dual language teachers in the community of Austin, Texas, have called for curricular resources. In response, a group of researchers,…

February 2017 marked the 75th anniversary of Executive Order 9066 (EO 9066), issued on February 19, 1942, by President Franklin D. Roosevelt two months after the bombing of Pearl Harbor. While this domestic aspect of World War II is often taught in secondary history classes, it is rarely studied in elementary schools. However, children's…