Hey guys,

First a bit of a background, just got my license teaching in Australia and just been offered a position overseas teaching IB History and IGCSE Geography 9/10. Role doesn't start till August so got a fair bit of time to get used to the curriculum, textbooks. I did IB History myself some 14 years ago, but I'm sure it's changed a little bit since then.

If anyone could point me towards the right direction, specifically in relation to textbooks, even lesson sequences, resources would be great as I'm effectively starting from zero.

Thanks comrades

WAPO featured an article on five cases of parents shutting teachers down for teaching history lessons that dealt with topics parents disapproved: "‘Slavery was wrong’ and 5 other things some educators won’t teach anymore."

The cases took place in Missouri, Arkansas, North Carolina and Virginia. I have never had this happen to me, nor heard of any colleague who was intimidated into withdrawing a lesson. But I live in the Northeast.

Is this common, in our experience? I've had students push back, but never parents.

Anyone have any experience with either one or both of these? Trying to see if there's a digital subscription that might actually work for my district. Special thought to if you need individual student subs or just a teacher one. Thanks!

I teach an 8th grade, American history class. I’d like to be able to get the students more involved and active….I know that’s asking a lot lol.

In other words, I’d like to make my lessons more engaging and maybe even more interesting.

Anyone have any suggestions for lessons, websites, activities?

I will be talking during a class about White Man's Burden and its influence in cinema, mentioning the defense of colonialism in media and criticizing it. Any idea of activities for the class?

I've wrestled a lot with a certain class of mine. They're my only MS civics class I have this year, yet they give me so many problems. They don't follow instructions no matter how i deliver it, they can't handle group work because some have behavior issues. I'm a 1st yr teacher and its my first time teaching Civics, so i'm spending hours prepping for them, just for it all to turn to chaos in an instant. Can't even do lecture without something happening.

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I'm fed up with all that, I want to to transition into a textbook centered class to make it easier on my planning time, their organizational skills, and reading skills. I have a class set, how can I best utilize the textbook? I was thinking they will read a section every day or two outloud and take notes while they read. Then, having them answer the questions at the end of the section. Doing this every day until we finish the chapter, do a chapter quiz, and do this repeat until the unit is done.

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I guess my issue is how can i enforce them actually taking notes while they read? I still care for them and want them to learn. How can I be a textbook teacher while still growing their education?

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Edit: For some context, i've always felt that textbook usage was/is looked down upon where I work and even when I was in college. So i was never properly taught how to use them, and i'm a bit unsure what to do. Any help works!

Hey peoples, I’m currently at the point in student teaching where I’ll be taking over as lead teacher and creating my own lesson plans. I’m going to start taking over after the end of WWI. I honestly just have no idea where to start.

I would just like to know any input or any lessons/activities that you find engaging or fun in your class starting from the 1920s and forward.

Side note that it is 8th grade US history. Thanks!

I’m about a year away from becoming a teacher and was wondering if y’all had any legit advice for ya boy

Long story short, due to some crime near my host school that involved some students, my college is moving my student teaching internship and I feel like I am abandoning my students. The teacher I took over for is on family leave now.

In addition my new cooperating teacher is overwhelmed by mentoring me and I have dealt with serious student behavior issues throughout my internship.

I just feel like I’m failing. Wondering if teaching is for me. Would appreciate some support or advice as I move to a new school to finish my internship….

I’m contemplating becoming a history teacher because I love history, but I want to learn a bit more about it.

-I will more likely than not be teaching in central Florida 😬 -I want to teach my future students HISTORY, even if I’m in a place like central Florida -My degree is gonna be from ASU Online, but I would love any further teaching resources as well as any minors suited for a history teacher (was thinking either anthropology or educational studies)

Hey all, I do 8th grade World part 1. This year, I put India and China off to make sure I had enough time for things like Africa, and so now I am doubling back and just doing a big India and China and Asia in general unit starting with Prehistory and River Valley civs to the year 1500.

I wanted to do a reflection or I guess review type thing this week on the history we have learned up to this point before we do this since its going to kind of incorporate all we have learned, Rivers, trade, governments, religions, etc. into one fat 4ish week unit.

I was wondering if anyone else had done this too and if they had any strats or lessons I could use as inspo. Thanks!

I teach 8th grade US History and I am trying to develop a “throughline”style end of the year project to emphasize how individual events/amendments/reforms continue to impact lives today. My first instinct is to give them a starting point (triangle shirtwaist fire or a Supreme Court decision) and have them explain how it impacts life today. Thoughts? Anyone done something like this? Bad idea? Im having some brain burnout at this point in the year so I’d appreciate any thoughts.

Since the use of smartphones became more widespread, my attitude toward them has evolved. I started out thinking that the best approach would be to help students learn when and how to use them appropriately. That worked for a couple of years. Then admin insisted we collect them, so now they sit in pouches on the wall during class if the students put them there; some won't part with them. I don't fight that battle with them, as long as the phones don't come out without permission

I recently read Johann Hari's book, Stolen Focus, and also an op-ed comparing Big Tech to Big Tobacco, and I am becoming more convinced that companies that profit from students using smartphones are profiting at the expense of students, education -- and educators. I don't consider phone communication itself such a bane, but the access to the Internet and the various apps students can download on smartphones combine to suck away students' attention (and some teachers, too, I find!). The apps and social media are engineered to be addicting, and the companies that make and market them are making billions of dollars. Meanwhile, I'm trying to interest kids in non-addicting material that requires careful thought and attention. I'm at a disadvantage, whatever my skills level.

Parents want to keep in touch with their kids, so they don't want schools to ban the phones. But have any schools banned SMART phones? That is, have any schools or districts banned SMART phones but allowed phones that can only call and text? And what have been the outcomes.

I am teaching a 7th grade world history class and want to cover the Holocaust as we have just wrapped up out ancient Hebrew unit. I am only able to cover it in about 8 hour long class periods to maintain my curriculum schedule. Any suggestions how to cover the topic in a short span for younger students who have very little knowledge of WWII and Nazism?

How far in advance should I apply for the CSET? I wanted to get a general idea of how much time I would have between applying and my test date. Any advise would be greatly appreciated, thank you!

The last couple of posts here have been positive, so here's another one! My American History class is currently learning about Westward Expansion and Manifest Destiny and we had some free time at the end of the period today. So, I went to the Internet Archive and we played Oregon Trail together. They got REALLY into it ("be a banker!" "no, a doctor!"), I had different kids come up and hunt (and then made them feel bad when you realize that you basically leave most of the animals to rot because you can't carry them), and I came up with an on-the-spot short exit ticket question about the way the game treats issues around Native Americans. It was also really funny for me because I also had to explain how millennials played this game in "computer class," that it didn't require the internet to play, and that this was what game graphics used to look like, so it was a 90s history lesson too. The rest of the day a bunch of kids were emailing me screenshots of their winning scores; they had gone off and played the game again during study hall. If you ever have an awkward "lesson ended too early" moment, I highly recommend.

I teach 8th grade American history in a 90%+ black school (mix of Afro-Caribbean and African-American) and we I had sex ed scheduled for all but one of my classes, so I wanted to do something that wasn't really necessary but could be interesting (otherwise we're in the middle of WW2).

I found an article about how Japanese Americans are supporting reparations for African-Americans after they got reparations, because it connected to the previous lesson on Japanese internment during WW2. I then included a video of Candace Owens arguing against reparations to give a Black perspective against reparations. We then discussed the merits of reparations and the various aspects of the topic (e.g. who qualifies, what about biracial people, how much, lump payments or over time, what about race relations, etc.).

It was genuinely the most engaging lesson I taught all year. I had kids who are normally falling asleep in class craning their arms, begging to share their perspective. I plan on doing this again with the other classes that missed out, probably at the end of year or during sometime I need to fill space, and do it every year from now on.

If anyone is interested in my handout/IPP, let me know.

Im trying, and failing miserably, at creating my 3 consecutive, 8th grade, lesson segment for EdTPA

Im struggling planning that far in advance for it, while planning on a daily basis for regular classes and to top attempting to keep up with my college work.

I wrote up 3 lessons on westward expansion but after talking to my host teacher, she doesn’t know when will be hitting that part of history leaving it hard to plan when I can teach it/video it….I have a finite amount of time as my final semester ends in a couple of months.

Most teachers I talk to including my host teacher have no idea what EdTPA is…so I’m not sure the seriousness is being applied when it comes to planning it.

My complaining aside,

I was wondering if anyone had suggestions for 3 consecutive lessons I could teach/film.

I had a really fantastic opportunity today with my students that was profound.

We lost connection to the internet before my third-period class today; of course, its the one time I am relying pretty much totally on technology for a lesson (EdPuzzle)

I notice the internet is down, and after we all try to reconnect for a few minutes, I look at my kids and tell them that we are going 'old school.' I have them all put their computers away; they are starting to get excited and confused, not knowing what is happening.

I tell them I am going to deliver a lesson entirely without technology, just an expo marker and my enthusiasm.

They all complain, tell me it'll be boring, etc.

30 minutes later, I look down at my watch, notice we have less than five minutes left and convey this message to them.

They all get mad! they tell me they want to continue discussing this (Korean War, N.K., S.K., etc.)

No kid was sidetracked, staring off into space, or disengaged. They all made the point to me when they left that we should do this every single day.

We spend so much time discussing technology's benefits in the educational world. Still, we sometimes fail to remember how it all started, with a little over-the-top enthusiasm and curious minds.

I left the day inspired but damn... I'm one tired social studies teacher.

I’ll try to make this short and sweet.

The wife and I currently live in Massachusetts, I graduated in May 2022 with a major in history and a minor in education 5-12.

The licensure requirements in MA is passing the communication and literacy MTEL test as well as your History MTEL to acquire a license. Problem is I’ve taken the History exam 4 times and still haven’t passed which apparently is normal in MA because of how hard that specific test is, although I’ve passed the Comm and lit exam I still can’t get a MA license.

Anyways the wife and I are moving to NC by the summer and I was wondering if I should still be applying for teaching positions even though I’m not licensed in MA. I’m planning on taking the praxis obviously at some point but I wasn’t sure which one(s) I should take since I have passed the com lit MTEL.

Should I be applying for positions? Or try to pass the exams first?

I am going to be testing soon to become an Oklahoma history teacher and was curious if anyone had useful study guides for the test.

Hello! I am from Arizona, and am thinking about moving to Maryland. I was wondering what schools are worth looking into for a secondary education job? I teach currently at a junior high, teaching social studies. What do you guys think?

Anyone have a good website with newspapers students would be able to read?

It has been suggested to me that I may be giving my students too much work and that is why so many of them are failing due to just not turning work in. I am not sure if this is the case so I decided that the logical thing to do was put my trust in strangers on the internet my esteemed fellow history teachers.

For context I teach 10th Grade World History. The School I teach at is a Public Charter School that splits grades into three categories and I am required to give students a certain number of each grade per Nine Week Grading Period.

1. Test Grades (I am required to give 3 ever nine weeks)
2. Major Grades (6 every nine weeks)
3. Minor Grades (8 every nine weeks)

If my math is right that works out to 17 grades every nine weeks meaning that students should be getting an average of about 2 grades per week. I have no choice in the number of assignments I give but I do get some leeway in what sorts of assignments that I give.

Minor grades are mostly meant to be short and easy assignments that the student can probably do in class if they are paying attention to the lesson. Major grades will probably require that some work be done at home. Test grades are done exclusively in class.

One suggestion that was raised to me was that I make a point to ensure that students have a chance to work on all minor grade assignments in class and get feedback on those assignments in class. I can do that by cutting down my lesson time (we teach in 90 minute blocks). In short I have been advised not to give homework at all (or at least don't make the minor grades something that students have to take home).

I am curious how this workload compares with what you give your students and if you also have trouble getting students to turn work in (about a third of my on-level students are currently failing due to zeroes for missing work).

Edit: Some people have asked me for examples of the types of assignments I give. Some examples this quarter for minor grades are things like SAQ (short answer questions) with about a 2 to 3 sentence answer and Lesson work which is usually asking 3 check for understanding questions. As for major grades it ranges from asking students to write a paragraph or two on the impact that Napoleon had on Europe (I have learned not to use the word "Essay" because students hear that and freak out) to having students make a google slides presentation with slides on a variety of different changes caused by the Industrial Revolution.