Social Studies Love

I am on a big science and social studies kick right now...big time. The first few weeks of school I have been focusing on social studies but science is not far behind. I'm so inspired by my friend Jenny who teaches a science lesson everyday to her class but I love social studies too much so I have to switch off from week to week. Just wanted to share two amazing lessons that I have recently taught that turned out amazing and that I feel my students really understood and "got it". For all of you NC readers this lesson goes with the Social Studies essential standard

 

1.E.1.2 Identify examples of goods and services in the home, school and community.

 

I began this lesson with a little vocabulary. First I wrote the word "goods" on a small white board and held it up for students to see. We read it together out loud and I had students turn and talk to an elbow buddy about what they thought the word meant. I let a few of them share what they thought it was and to explain their thinking but I never told them if they were right or wrong, I simply listened. Then I wrote the word "services" on my white board and had students turn and talk about what they thought this word meant and then share their thoughts agian never telling them if they were right or wrong.

 

After this little discussion I told students that I had small posters hanging up around the room with pictures on them. Their next job was to walk around the room with their sticky pads {they each have one in their pencil box} and put a sticky on each picture with either a "G" for goods or an "S" for services. Here are the pictures that I used {click on the picture to download from google docs}:

 

 

After students silently stickied each of the 6 posters we watched a brainpopjr video on goods and services. {If your school doesn't have an account you can sign up for a free trial or you can find a nonfiction book on goods and services that would work just as well.} Next I held up each poster and we checked our answers. If a student missed it I asked them how they know that this picture is either a good or a service. My formative assessment was a ticket out the door where students wrote an example of a good.

 

It rocked ya'll. I mean they reeeeaaaalllly got it. It was a great way to introduce vocabulary that was fun, interactive, and student led.

 

Next I will have students brainstorm in groups examples of goods and services in the home.....the school....and the community. I'm thinking of spreading this out and completing each place on a different day where students present their ideas in front of the class. For examples of goods and services in the school I'm thinking of giving each group a digital camera and having them take pictures for their examples. For goods and services in  the home they can find pictures in magazines and make a collage. For the community, I would love to have a farmer or someone in agriculture talk about the goods in our area and how his/her job is a service. Soo excited!

 

But before I could finish this series of lessons Constituition Day activities overshadowed today. I'm sure you have seen my posts about the unit I created. We played the game today and it was hysterical and perfect. They fell right in to my little plan. {Aren't first graders just so predictable?} It was the perfect hands on approach to get them to understand just what the country was like before the Constitution. Here is our anchor chart from today...too funny!

 

If you have my Constitution Day unit I would love to know how it went today!

 

Love to everyone!