Texas Social Studies Framework - Department of Geography ...

16
16
technology. Gathering information from the Internet,
using computer software to create graphic organizers,
and preparing multimedia presentations provide students
opportunities to apply the skills they have learned in
technology applications classes to further their understanding
of social studies content and concepts.
The following examples serve to illustrate opportunities
to make curricular connections at the elementary, middle,
and high school levels. Figures 5, 7, 9, and 11 provide
examples of connections across the social studies themes.
Using the same content, Figures 6, 8, 10, and 12 demonstrate
social studies connections with other disciplines.
Grade 3
Communities, past, present, local, and global, provide
focus for social studies instruction in Grade 3. The TEKS
course description specifies that students will learn how
individuals have changed their communities and world.
They will do so by studying the lives of men and women
who made important choices, overcame obstacles,
sacrificed for the betterment of others, and embarked on
journeys that resulted in new ideas, new inventions, and
new communities.
Figure 5 illustrates how instructional planning can
incorporate knowledge and skills from each of the eight
social studies strands to ensure student understanding.
For example, the history strand expects students to gain
an historical perspective on communities by focusing
attention on influential individuals, events, and ideas as
well as the similarities and differences between communities,
past and present. Geography, economics, and
government draw students’ attention to important and
basic ideas about how individuals in communities have
adapted to or modified the physical environment, started
businesses, and served in government. The culture and
science, technology, and society strands expect students
to understand how people and technology (e.g., the
telephone, television, and the Internet) have shaped
communities. The citizenship strand contributes to the
study of communities by focusing on the importance of
individual decisions and actions. The social studies skills
of obtaining and interpreting information from a variety
of sources and creating written and visual materials can
easily be integrated into instructional planning for a unit
on individuals and their effects on the community.
Other content areas contribute to the study of individuals
and their effects on communities. Figure 6 provides
Chapter 3: Making Connections through Social Studies
specific examples from English language arts and
reading, mathematics, art, science, and technology
applications.
Grade 5
One of the instructional units that might be included at
Grade 5 is the migration and settlement of both Americans
and European immigrants to the American West
after the end of the Civil War. This historical movement,
especially that to the Great Plains, is well documented in
the social science literature and appears in the TEKS for
Social Studies. To comprehend the movement, students
must recognize the Great Plains as a region and how
geographic factors affected settlement and human
adaptation. They can grasp the relationship of economics
as a motivation for settlement and the pattern of work
and economic activities in the region. Even more
connections across the social studies exist through which
students can gain a comprehensive understanding of the
relationships of people and their environment in the
United States (see Figure 7).
Figure 8 illustrates how a social studies unit on migration
can provide the focus for the review, practice, and
reinforcement of content and skills from other foundation
and enrichment subjects including mathematics, English
language arts and reading, science, mathematics, fine arts,
and technology applications.
Grade 8
The TEKS for Social Studies for Grade 8 emphasize the
importance of the formation of the system of governance
in the United States. The writing of the U.S. Constitution
in Philadelphia in 1787 was a pivotal event in American
history. Conflict between special interest groups
prompted delegates to convene to deal with economic,
cultural, historical, and governmental issues that previous
officials had not resolved. Delegates created a system of
governance that did not please all, but that provided a
mechanism to balance power and resolve issues that
threatened the new nation.
Instructional planning for a unit on the significance of the
convention at Philadelphia and the continued influence of
the U.S. Constitution should incorporate all strands of the
TEKS for Social Studies. Figure 9 presents some of the
connections possible across the social studies.