This article examines the applicability of Tsunesaburo Makiguchi's (1871-1944) educational ideas in what Denzin and Lincoln (2005) call the "fractured future," a time marked by human, environmental, and climatic destabilization, and a time in which the social sciences "are normative disciplines always already embedded in issues of…

Describes how a teacher's journey of documenting everyday literacy events on the streets in her community changes her understanding of what it means to bring the outside world and local literacies into her classroom. Concludes that educators must place value on who students are and where they come from. Suggests that educators and students must…

Describes high school social studies student projects involving a study of local cemeteries. Projects include charting life expectancies, creating slide shows of community grave sites, and collecting tombstone rubbings. (KC)

An emerging secondary school curriculum focus is on the study of the people and places closest to students themselves--their own families and the communities in which they live. These studies are popular because they start with the lives of students; help define students' self-concepts; focus student attention on areas for effective social action;…

This guide will help secondary teachers use the 1984 elections as a tool to teach about American government and politics. Students use their town, county, or city as the classroom. Newspapers, community resources, campaign materials and activities, and the broadcast media are their textbooks. (RM)

This article outlines a conceptual framework for a high school or college level unit on local history and demonstrates use of the framework through a case study of Whitehall, Georgia. Information is presented on planning the unit, selecting a community, teaching methods, collecting data, and identifying likely sources of information on community…

Describes a writing course for undermotivated students which focuses on careful precise observations through the study of other time periods in the history of the town where the school is located. (DD)

Notes the trend toward working with town planning authorities as a part of environmental education classes in the United Kingdom. Provides a teacher workshop designed to prepare secondary geography teachers for making such contacts by having them analyze and modify letters from four hypothetical scenarios. (JDH)

Describes a local history project in which high school students located valuable historic photographs on the local community and reproduced them on 35mm slides. An historic photo archive consisting of the slides accompanied by documentary materials was created. Procedures for creating and suggestions for using a photo archive are included. (KC)

Tools for studying the social and environmental effects of technology include case studies, community-based studies involving real local problems, role playing, cost-benefit analysis, technology assessment, and lab experiments. (SK)

Described are summer economics institutes in which teachers from Pennsylvania learned about local and regional economies through classroom instruction and field experience and then used what they had learned to develop classroom materials. The local community is an excellent vehicle for integrating economics into classroom instruction. (RM)

Outlines a literary study unit on censorship, focusing on issues beyond the classroom. Suggests several student projects which explore the school district's censorship policy and community attitudes toward censorship. (MM)

Described is a community experience activity, utilizing independent study, which was implemented in a secondary alternative school in Canada. As a result of an initial visit to the local community, students had to come up with a product (e.g., an essay, arrange for a guest speaker to come to class). (RM)

Recommends the use of cemeteries as the focus of student research in secondary social studies. Presents methods for initiating such a project and guidance for appropriate student behavior. Includes a list of suggested activities for cemetery studies. (CFR)

An approach for classifying the cognitive levels of social studies teachers' verbalized and written questions is presented. The system can be used by teachers to plan discussions intended to involve students in higher level thinking. (RM)