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[Music] Welcome

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to Student-Driven
Discussions in Social Studies.

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My name is Laurie Erby,

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and I teach seventh-grade social
studies at Saline Middle School.

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It's really important for me
in teaching social studies,

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in particular, to
engage students

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in text discussion
because, as many of us know,

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reading in social studies is
not always high-interest reading

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for students.

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There's a lot of information in
the text, and it's very dense,

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and so you really need
to get them to slow

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down to really start to
understand the concepts

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that are being talked
about in the text.

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A simple question-and-answer
is great for the kids

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who are really engaged in that,
and usually you have a handful

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of students whose hands
are always up wanting

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to answer those questions.

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But the rest of the students
in class, quite often knowing

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that those four or five
students are going to answer,

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will just sit back, and
they'll be disengaged.

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And they're really not getting

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out of the lesson what you want
them to get out of the lesson.

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But if you have a
text discussion,

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you've got every
student involved,

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and that's so critical for us.

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My goal for this lesson was

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to really give the students
a better feel for what it was

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like for survivors of Chernobyl.

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The texts that I used were
different survivor stories

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from Chernobyl.

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In preparing for a lesson
like this, what I'm looking

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for is text that's
differentiated.

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I have a whole variety of
learners in my classroom,

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all reading at different
reading levels,

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from third grade all the way
up through college readers.

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The chapter that we've
been working on is

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on transboundary pollution,
and students get a good idea

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of how one country's pollution
can become another country's

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problem with regard to
acid rain, cyanide spill

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on the Danube, and
also Chernobyl.

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And they do some different
activities, which are great

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to help the kids understand
that, but I felt that at the end

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of the chapter, they
really didn't have a feel

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for the seriousness
of these incidents,

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and in particular Chernobyl.

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And so, on the overhead,
I was going through

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and first we looked at-there's
a little picture on there

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of heroes that were going
into Chernobyl afterward

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to build the tomb
that's on there,

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to put out fires and whatnot.

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And so, we talked about that
and shared our thoughts,

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and then I went to the text and
shared my thoughts and wrote

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that down, and so
they get a picture

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of what I was doing there and
what I was expecting of them.

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I do something called
Talking to the Text,

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and so I'll model my thinking
actually on the overhead.

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I'll have a copy of
the text on there,

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and I will be writing
down my thoughts.

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If I'm not sure about a
certain word or I want

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to emphasize a certain word
to students, I'll talk to them

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about how I'm using
the context clues,

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or I'll model that for them.

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Or if I'm making a connection
with something I'm reading

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to my prior knowledge or some
kind of personal connection,

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or maybe I am kind of
getting a visual on my head,

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I'm visualizing something,

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I'll share that out
loud with students.

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Guidelines that I give
them are pretty specific.

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As they're reading,
they're jotting

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down their notes
over to the side.

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They're underlining
things, maybe circling words

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that they don't understand.

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It's all based on metacognition.

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If they have questions,
you know, "Gee,

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I really didn't get
this," or, you know,

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later on if they did find
their question answered,

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they'll be revisiting that and
answering the question on there.

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So, their paper is really
covered with their thoughts

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by the time they are done.

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Once they have done that, I
have them partner pair-share

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with someone, and they'll
discuss what each of them got

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out of the text, what they
understood about the story.

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If there's a question
that they weren't able

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to answer themselves, hopefully,

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their partner can help
them understand it

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or they'll share their thoughts,
try to figure it out together.

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It gives them a little more
confidence before they share-out

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with the main group then.

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So, once the students
have a solid understanding

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of their survivor story, when
they're ready to share-out

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to their discussion group, the
discussion group gets together,

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and each person takes a turn
sharing their survivor stories.

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In sharing their stories,
they're looking for similarities

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and differences in
their survivor stories,

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so they're really getting a full
feel for what happened to a lot

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of different people and a lot
of different perspectives here.

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The listeners are going to
ask clarifying questions,

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and then the presenter
has a chance to answer them.

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So, if they didn't
understand something

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that the presenter
mentioned, they can ask, "Gee,

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what did you mean by this?"

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or those kinds of questions
that were out there.

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As far as this lesson, when I
am assessing their understanding

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of it, what I asked them to
do was to write a reflection

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where they tied in what they
learned in the textbook along

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with what they learned in these
stories and what they learned

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in their discussion group,
what their understanding was.

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For a unit like this, I'll
have them take a partner quiz.

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So, instead of assessing
each student individually,

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they'll have to take the quiz
together, and they'll have

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to discuss what the questions
in the quiz are asking them

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and decide how they're going
to answer that together.

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So, it's kind of continuing with
the sharing of their thoughts.

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One of the things that I am
really starting to notice was

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that the students who normally
would have just kind of skimmed

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over words that they didn't
understand, get to the end,

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and be okay with the fact

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that they didn't get it are
actually taking the time

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to try to figure it out.

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And students who may have just
automatically raised their hand

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and said, "Well, what does this
word mean?"-now they really are

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trying to figure it

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out themselves using
those context clues,

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using their prior
knowledge of the topic

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that we've been studying,

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and they are really
working themselves

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to try to figure it out.

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[Music] To learn more about
Student-Driven Discussions

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in Social Studies, please
explore the additional resources

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on the Doing What
Works' website.