What do you think?
Rate this book
Social Studies, Literacy, and Social Justice in the Common Core Classroom: A Guide for Teachers
Inspired by the authors research and work with preservice and beginning teachers, this book present a unique framework to help educators (grades 38) in their efforts to teach for social justice. Grounded in the daily realities of todays public schools, the framework offers a way of planning that takes into account a variety of factors, including pressures related to content coverage, preparing students for high-stakes tests, and the lack of social studies being taught in classrooms. Each chapter explains how teachers can restructure, reshape, and manipulate mandated curriculum materials to teach from a critical perspective. The book also discusses how to meet Language Arts Common Core Standards by teaching language arts and social studies as complementary subjects. This practical resource features teacher strategies, sample lessons, text boxes indicating connections to Common Core Standards, and reflection exercises to help extend concepts into classroom practice.
168 pages, Paperback
First published March 22, 2013
4 people are currently reading
24 people want to read
Ratings & Reviews
Friends & Following
Create a free account to discover what your friends think of this book!
Community Reviews
Displaying 1 - 4 of 4 reviews
February 10, 2023
Many of us go into teaching with the hope of making the world a better place by helping to shape the younger generations. Idealism is common in our profession; we want our students to be happy, healthy, and knowledgeable, and we know that as teachers we have the power to influence. We want to help students find their voices and develop passion about their interests and opinions. We plan to make them aware of situations affecting our communities, nation, and world.
When we finally step out of the cocoon of undergraduate studies and into our own classrooms, we are empowered with expertise in our subject areas, love of learning, and hearts full of empathy for our students. When issues emerge in the classroom such as verbal altercations, name calling, or bullying, we want to make sure justice is served and students come out of these situations with emotional and social growth. Our classrooms become their own mini-societies in which we expect kindness and respect toward self, others, and property.
Then, probably somewhere around or second or third year, it happens. We become discouraged and overwhelmed. Maybe we go in for a data chat with an administrator and we learn that our students scored poorly on a standardized test; maybe we feel overwhelmed by all the requirements we must meet, especially those that seem performative; perhaps we get frustrated about students who we are unable to motivate. At this point, many teachers leave the profession feeling so overwhelmed and discouraged that they never want to set foot in schools again.
But some of us who stay hear that small voice whispering “Hey, aren’t you supposed to be saving the world?” We grow more comfortable with standards-based lessons, mastery grading, and test prep—but we realize something crucial is missing. Social justice! Yes, promoting social justice is one of our most important duties. It is imperative that we use our influence as teachers to guide students toward becoming compassionate and informed citizens. But where to begin? Furthermore, where to find the time?
Richie Agarwal-Rangnath’s 2013 book Social studies, Literacy, and Social Justice in the Common Core Classroom; a Guide for Teachers provides a practical handbook for teachers who understand the importance of social justice but do not have an organized plan or who feel constrained by time limits imposed on social studies curriculum at the elementary level. Agarwal-Rangnath organizes the book into 5 key tenets: inspiring wonder, painting the picture, application, connecting past present, and facilitating change.
Each chapter in this short and very accessible book focuses on one of the five tenants of social justice education. Often issues involving social justice are complex and can be overwhelming, so it helps for teachers to have an organized framework to help them explore issues with their students. Not only does the author provide a rationale and several example classroom scenarios to go along with each tenet, he goes a step further to show how teachers can incorporate Common Core State Standards (CCSS) into lessons on social justice. How is this possible to achieve this with such limited time allocated to social studies? Two words—literacy blocks.
Integration of social studies and language arts is a valuable way to teach social justice issues. The author discusses the way that teachers can meet specific common core state standards that they are required to teach while also addressing social justice issues. The accessibility of this book’s structure lends it to serving as a handbook for both new and experienced teachers. Teachers may be required to work on a certain ELA standard— speaking and listening, vocabulary, comprehension and collaboration, craft and structure, literary analysis, key, ideas, and details, integration of knowledge and ideas, or speaking and listening—within a certain time frame. These standards are highlighted in the book using a gray boxed format which makes them easy to spot.
By following the advice in this book, teachers can build strong social justice lessons by integrating them into language arts. We can have it all—we can change the world and meet the standards, too. If administrators ask where we are finding time to teach so much social studies, we can easily present them with ELA standards being addressed in our lesson.
In final thought, I propose we reclaim the derisive label of “social justice warriors” and make it our own. We teachers are fighting for social justice, and we are on the frontlines preparing students to continue the fight. Maybe we won’t be the ones to save the world, but with our guidance, our students just might. Going in to battle with a copy of this book, we will surely be victorious as social justice warriors.
When we finally step out of the cocoon of undergraduate studies and into our own classrooms, we are empowered with expertise in our subject areas, love of learning, and hearts full of empathy for our students. When issues emerge in the classroom such as verbal altercations, name calling, or bullying, we want to make sure justice is served and students come out of these situations with emotional and social growth. Our classrooms become their own mini-societies in which we expect kindness and respect toward self, others, and property.
Then, probably somewhere around or second or third year, it happens. We become discouraged and overwhelmed. Maybe we go in for a data chat with an administrator and we learn that our students scored poorly on a standardized test; maybe we feel overwhelmed by all the requirements we must meet, especially those that seem performative; perhaps we get frustrated about students who we are unable to motivate. At this point, many teachers leave the profession feeling so overwhelmed and discouraged that they never want to set foot in schools again.
But some of us who stay hear that small voice whispering “Hey, aren’t you supposed to be saving the world?” We grow more comfortable with standards-based lessons, mastery grading, and test prep—but we realize something crucial is missing. Social justice! Yes, promoting social justice is one of our most important duties. It is imperative that we use our influence as teachers to guide students toward becoming compassionate and informed citizens. But where to begin? Furthermore, where to find the time?
Richie Agarwal-Rangnath’s 2013 book Social studies, Literacy, and Social Justice in the Common Core Classroom; a Guide for Teachers provides a practical handbook for teachers who understand the importance of social justice but do not have an organized plan or who feel constrained by time limits imposed on social studies curriculum at the elementary level. Agarwal-Rangnath organizes the book into 5 key tenets: inspiring wonder, painting the picture, application, connecting past present, and facilitating change.
Each chapter in this short and very accessible book focuses on one of the five tenants of social justice education. Often issues involving social justice are complex and can be overwhelming, so it helps for teachers to have an organized framework to help them explore issues with their students. Not only does the author provide a rationale and several example classroom scenarios to go along with each tenet, he goes a step further to show how teachers can incorporate Common Core State Standards (CCSS) into lessons on social justice. How is this possible to achieve this with such limited time allocated to social studies? Two words—literacy blocks.
Integration of social studies and language arts is a valuable way to teach social justice issues. The author discusses the way that teachers can meet specific common core state standards that they are required to teach while also addressing social justice issues. The accessibility of this book’s structure lends it to serving as a handbook for both new and experienced teachers. Teachers may be required to work on a certain ELA standard— speaking and listening, vocabulary, comprehension and collaboration, craft and structure, literary analysis, key, ideas, and details, integration of knowledge and ideas, or speaking and listening—within a certain time frame. These standards are highlighted in the book using a gray boxed format which makes them easy to spot.
By following the advice in this book, teachers can build strong social justice lessons by integrating them into language arts. We can have it all—we can change the world and meet the standards, too. If administrators ask where we are finding time to teach so much social studies, we can easily present them with ELA standards being addressed in our lesson.
In final thought, I propose we reclaim the derisive label of “social justice warriors” and make it our own. We teachers are fighting for social justice, and we are on the frontlines preparing students to continue the fight. Maybe we won’t be the ones to save the world, but with our guidance, our students just might. Going in to battle with a copy of this book, we will surely be victorious as social justice warriors.
December 15, 2023
This book made me learn about social justice in humanities.
This entire review has been hidden because of spoilers.
March 30, 2015
This book walks you through 5 different projects aimed at beginning to teach students to be promoters of social change. The book has a hard literacy focus and many of the projects presented are activities that students do already in their ELA classrooms. Finally, the book uses elementary students for its examples. All of the projects could work at all levels of education though.
Read
May 4, 2013372.83044 A261 2013
Displaying 1 - 4 of 4 reviews