Sunday, June 5, 2011

2nd Grade Social Studies Ideas?

So we’re not quite through the third nine weeks and we’ll be finished with our social studies books by the end of next week. Now I have to find activities that fit the standards. We have Studies Weekly and Scholastic News Weekly, but we can only do so much. Any ideas? Thanks in advance.

I’ve already done group projects where they invent, map out and advertise their own communities and where they map out and make models of their own island with different specific land forms.

I have specific standards I haven’t met yet like:

*Locates major geography features (e.g. Rocky Mountains, Missouri River, Gulf of Mexico, Kansas City, Wichita, Topeka, Washington D.C.).
*Identifies physical and human changes that have taken place over time in the local region (e.g., physical: tornadoes, drought, Kansas as an inland sea; human: new shopping centers, highways, houses)
*Identifies past and present settlement or development patterns of his/her community or local area
*Describe how physical systems influence people and their activities
*Identifies important innovations made in the past that influence today (e.g., Wright Brothers-airplane; Henry Ford-automobile; Ancient China-irrigation, paper; Inca-highways to connect cities).
*Recognizes the impact of contributions made by leaders past and present.
*Compares and contrasts daily life of an historic Plains Indian family, a pioneer family, and a modern family in Kansas.
I’ve tried to go as in-depth with what extra activities I can find. There are 8 units in the text with 4-5 lessons that are 4 pages long each. All in all, the book is less than 200 pages long. I supplement what I can, but that is why I’m asking for ideas. I’m running out and I can’t really find much at their level online.


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