Social movement as civic education: communication activities and understanding of civil disobedience in the Umbrella Movement

Occupy Central, which would later evolve into the Umbrella Movement, was conceived as a civil disobedience campaign when it was first proposed in early 2013. Although the history of civil disobedience in Hong Kong arguably spans decades, the concept was seldom discussed in the public arena, and the practice was not well established in the society's repertoire of contentious actions. The years 2013 and 2014 thus constituted a “critical discourse moment” in which the concept of civil disobedience was intensively discussed and debated. This study seeks to determine whether the Occupy Central campaign and the Umbrella Movement had an educational function that led to increased levels of the public's understanding of civil disobedience. The analysis of the responses to two surveys conducted in September 2013 and October 2014 showed that the public's understanding of civil disobedience increased substantially over the year. After the Umbrella Movement started, attitudinal support for and actual participation in the movement, the political use of social media, and discussions with disagreeing others significantly predicted the understanding of civil disobedience. The theoretical and social implications of the findings are discussed.     

The poverty of social control: explaining power in the historical sociology of the welfare state

The concept ‘social control’ has been criticised from a variety of quarters in recent years, particularly by historians and historical sociologists. However, it remains in common usage in sociological studies of welfare, deviance and social control. This paper shows, first, how this reliance on the concept of social control is rooted in a wider-ranging argument in social and political theory concerning the liberal-democratic fusion between the state and civil society, and that the lack of resolution of this argument is the foundation of the persistence of the concept social control in other areas of social inquiry, despite its repeated ‘falsification’. Second, the paper highlights the main arguments against the use of ‘social control’ in explaining social order, in particular the misunderstanding of class, culture and power which its use encourages, and the paper will conclude with a discussion of alternative ways of conceptualising the operation of power in contemporary societies.     

Social Studies versus Social Science

The authors of this article examine several controversial U.S. monuments and offer teachers a rationale, resources, and suggested activities for incorporating these historical monuments into classroom instruction. The authors discuss why controversial issues should be discussed in the social studies classroom through the critical examination of national monuments. We argue that discussing key social issues through the analysis of contentious monuments will not only provide students with a more complete picture of history but also allow them to develop critical twenty-first-century skills such as visual literacy and understanding multiple perspectives. The focus is to provide secondary social studies teachers with an alternative approach to examining historical monuments and controversial issues through the analysis of contemporary and historical debates regarding the nature of commemoration on the United States’ landscape. A brief rationale for the inclusion of monuments and controversial issues into the social studies curriculum is provided, as well as examples of provocative historic monuments, example activities to teach these monuments, and suggested resources to further examine this topic.     

Game Theory in the Social Studies Classroom

This article explores using game theory in social studies classrooms as a heuristic to aid students in understanding strategic decision making. The authors provide examples of several simple games teachers can use. Next, we address how to help students design their own simple (2 × 2) games.     

Methods Used with a High Ability Group

Teaching for social justice in a standards-driven social studies classroom can be challenging. However, the authors believe that there does not have to be a choice between meeting standards versus meeting the needs of students. Through semistructured interviews with four current social studies practitioners, the authors found similarities in the language the teachers used to describe the role of standards in their classrooms, teachers' perceptions of context as being important to the tension between teaching for social justice and teaching to standards, and the ways that perception impacted how they negotiated that tension. The authors offer social studies teachers an alternate conceptual frame for viewing social justice instruction in terms of methods rather than content.     

What does wellbeing do? An approach to defamiliarize keywords in youth studies

Wellbeing has become a keyword in youth and social policy, a construct deployed as a measure of a good life. Often associated with physical and mental health, wellbeing encompasses numerous indicators, from subjective experiences of happiness and satisfaction to markers of economic prosperity and basic human needs of security. This article examines wellbeing as an organizing concept in discourses on young people and argues for defamiliarizing its truth claims and cultural authority by investigating what wellbeing does. We begin by examining the rise of wellbeing, drawing attention to its conceptual muddiness and ambiguity. Framed by the Foucauldian notion of problematization, the analysis proceeds along two routes: first, through an historical consideration of wellbeing as a relational concept with antecedents, focusing on ‘self-esteem’; and second, through a reading of wellbeing in contemporary educational policy. Informed by Somers' historical sociology of concept formation and Bacchi's critical policy analysis, we illuminate the mixed dimensions of wellbeing's reach, placing it within longer traditions of youth studies and psy-knowledges and showing its transformative promise as well as its individualizing effects. In doing so, we elaborate a methodological approach that can be adapted to examine other keywords in youth studies and social policy discourse.     

Informality and Nonprofits in East Central European Capitalism

This paper presents an analysis of nonprofit organizations—the organizational infrastructure of civil society—in East Central Europe, from one important respect: by placing them in the context of the comparative historical sociology of the region's widespread informality. This involves two steps: (1) summarizing an argument about the role of informality in East Central European capitalism today in order to (2) outline its implications for the study of post-state-socialist nonprofits. Most of the empirical examples come from Hungary. These examples serve illustrative purposes and are intended as devices to provoke new analysis. They are meant to open, rather than close, discussion.     

Achieving Objectives in the Social Studies

To promote content literacy, students have to be actively involved. This article focuses on strategies that stimulate student interest by involving them with the content during pre-reading, during-reading and post-reading activities. these processes provide students with optimal opportunities for comprehension. The authors recommend the use of a variety of materials to supplement the social studies text, recoginizing, however, that the text, because of its breadth of knowledge will always play an important role.

The three instructional activities delineated reinforce the idea that social studies learning is promoted through literacy, just as language acts learning is developed through the social studies. All of the strategies include a form of graphic organizer. They are examples of ways teaches can adapt instruction to promote student interest in social studies. Social studies doesn't have to be boring!     

Powerful Social Studies Teaching With Poetry and Primary Sources

Given the current marginalization of the social studies within elementary classrooms it is vital that elementary educators seek integrative techniques that promote the social studies. This article explores one such example of integration taught by the authors within an elementary classroom. The three-day lesson taught to fifth-grade students aimed to teach a justice-oriented conception of citizenship through the use of historical biographies, found poetry, and primary sources. By the end of the third day, the students had used both general literacy practices (e.g. shared reading, visual literacy, close reading) and disciplinary literacy (e.g. sourcing, contextualizing, corroborating), demonstrating that integration can be a powerful means to teach the social studies while also maintaining the integrity of the disciplines.     

An Integration Project in Civics and English

The intent of this article is to examine the significance of Carter G. Woodson to the historical development of the fields of curriculum and social studies, particularly as they relate to the evolution of the modern multicultural movement. The authors focus on Woodson's contributions through his curriculum and his pedagogical efforts in establishing a more rigorous and historically accurate social studies framework through his community education initiatives, the Negro History Bulletin, and his textbooks. They conclude the article with a discussion of how Woodson's efforts can have direct implications for social studies educators.     

The Changing Vogue of Liberalism

In the current era of high-stakes testing and accountability, many social studies teachers struggle to find creative ways to add depth and authenticity to a broad, shallow curriculum. Teachers can use the time after tests are administered for students to reflect back on the social studies curriculum and select topics they want to study more deeply by digging “postholes,” or inquiries into questions, persons, processes, or events of their choosing. This article describes one teacher's efforts to implement an inquiry project in which she conferred with her students individually to formulate research questions and a research strategy and gave them opportunities to publicly and authentically share their work.     

Student Self-Evaluation in a Core Program

In this historical study, the author reexamines the relationship and role of social efficiency and scientific curriculum making in the early years of the social studies (1916–1929). The author argues that historians have applied the term social efficiency too bluntly to label and ultimately dismiss a variety of educational reformers in the social studies, many of whom offered promising reform agendas. A closer look at scientific curriculum making in the social studies reveals that the movement was not inherently anti-academic, or anti-intellectual—critiques historians commonly associate with the social efficiency and scientific curriculum making—but rather an attempt to update the curriculum to be consistent with its own stated goals.     

Understanding the Impact of Using Oral Histories in the Classroom

Oral histories are a powerful pedagogical tool in developing historical understanding and important learning skills simultaneously. Teachers use firsthand accounts of historical time periods and/or events to help develop students' sense of history. In addition to gaining historical understanding, students are able to bring history alive by capturing personal stories and connecting with individuals to better understand their experiences and point of view. The purpose of this interpretive case study was to explore in depth how classroom teachers can develop knowledge of the social studies by engaging students in collecting oral histories of local residents. In addition, this case study explores how these strategies impact students' perception of learning social studies and their historical understanding.     

Patterns of Early Childhood,Elementary, and Middle-Level Social Studies Teaching: An Interpretation of Illinois Social Studies Teachers’ Practices and Beliefs

Using data from a national social studies survey, the authors examined instructional trends among Illinois elementary and middle school social studies teachers. The authors found that teachers preferred whole-group and teacher-centered instructional strategies over more active, student-centered methods. While surveyed teachers predominately indicated that one of the primary goals of teaching social studies was to improve critical-thinking ability, their pedagogical preferences were more conducive to teaching basic facts. The authors also found that middle-level teachers were more likely to use teaching strategies that promoted critical thinking than were used by their elementary school colleagues.     

Comparing Ourselves to Others: International Knowledge and Attitudes

The authors focus on the collaboration between a university methods professor and two classroom teachers in teaching social studies methods as a way of bridging the gap between university preparation for teaching social studies and putting that preparation into practice in elementary classrooms. The teachers offer recommendations from their own teaching experiences for how preservice teachers can find time for powerful social studies teaching despite pressures to meet the requirements of No Child Left Behind in literacy and mathematics. They integrate social studies with literacy and math, use "teachable moments" and transitions between subjects, and incorporate social studies research with computer and media skills. In addition, they employ class meetings to practice the democratic processes of collectively setting and revising class rules, accepting responsibility for those rules, and working together to solve classroom problems. Informal feedback from the preservice teachers reflects their appreciation of advice from classroom teachers with current experience in addressing the challenge of making time for powerful social studies teaching.     

Revised Historical Viewpoints

The author describes the use of literature circles in a social studies methods course for elementary preservice teachers and analyzes their effectiveness in teaching powerful social studies ideas. Literature circles encourage students to take more of a leadership role in the classroom, expect their active involvement, and challenge them to think more deeply about social studies content within texts. Students can compare different perspectives on the same historical event, such as the encounter between Columbus and the Taino, and reasons for including and omitting important ideas. Students can also note similarities and differences among cultures and current and historical events through literature circle discussions. However, teachers must carefully select texts which focus on powerful social studies ideas, emphasize the goal of thoughtful discussions when introducing literature circles, and be ready to raise significant issues ignored in the literature circle discussions during follow-up class discussions.     

The Manifestation of Campbell's Law: Consequences of Eliminating of Social Studies From the Curriculum

The manifestation of Campbell's Law is examined in light of the current era in American public schools of high stakes testing inclusive of narrowed curriculums and teaching to the test. The decades-long practice of reducing instructional time of non-tested subjects, which includes social studies fundamentals, has resulted in a less informed citizenry. Social studies instruction promotes citizens who are able to make informed decisions that are inclusive of differentiating between facts, generalizations, and opinions without bias. The construction of individual viewpoints through a narrow lens without discrimination between opinions and historical facts is of concern today as Americans form opinions regarding controversial social issues and engage in social activism.     

Indo-China: Storm Center of Southeast Asia

The authors report the findings of a survey study in which they investigated high school social studies teachers' current practices, challenges, and needs in relation to instruction of English language learners (ELLs). Thirty-three high school social studies teachers in six English as a second language (ESL)-centered schools in central Virginia participated in the study. Drawing on the findings, three themes demand particular attention: the challenges that social studies teachers face teaching ELLs; the accommodations teachers currently make for ELLs; and the types of support teachers need to teach ELLs social studies more effectively. The authors include findings from the field of second-language education to raise social studies teachers' consciousness about their ELLs' needs and conclude with a number of practical suggestions related to instruction and differentiation that are crucial for social studies teachers to help ELLs learn effectively. Further dialogues are needed, particularly regarding ESL inclusion and teachers' critical awareness of serving this particular group of students.     

Kashmir and the Kashmir Impasse

Social studies educators are responsible for successfully teaching students the knowledge, skills, and values necessary to be effective citizens. The National Council for the Social Studies urges educators to design technology-enhanced experiences that address social studies content and prepare students for effective citizenship. In this paper, we give examples from a piratical unit designed for a fourth-grade social studies classroom to highlight the role digital technology can play in enhancing social studies teaching and learning. We use Internet workshops as structures for students to meaningfully research social studies content, and we use blogs as technological tools to publish and showcase authentic student work, and ultimately, to develop students' higher order thinking skills and creativity.     

Citizenship Social Work: A Community Environmental Scan of Re-enfranchisement Social Work Supports after Felony Conviction

Alexander (2012) argues that the corrections system relegates African American men to permanent second class status. Although social work has advanced the democratic project, African Americans often have had to forge a parallel social assistance system. In a community environmental scan, the authors apply the Citizenship Social Work framework to assess availability of services, supports, and advocacy efforts to address civil, political, social and economic rights for African American men with felony convictions. The authors find that a number of social work services are available, but the majority focus on social and economic rights, rather than civil and political rights, perhaps emphasizing professional service over social justice.