April 30, 2005, 9:00 am - 4:00 pm
Portland State University
Global & Multicultural Resource Center
Smith Center, Room 121
Featured Classroom Materials:

• Social Studies Alive Elementary Grades
• Bring Learning Alive! Middle Level
• World in Transition Series High School

This workshop will provide teachers with effective classroom materials and interactive learning activities. Each workshop strand will give teachers hands-on experiences and classroom applications in the materials presented. A wide range of classroom activities that incorporate multiple intelligences applications, standards based content, and different learning styles are offered. Teachers will also be given useful training on applying the materials to the Oregon Social Science Analysis Scoring Guide.

GRADUATE CREDIT AVAILABLE! I hour of continuing education credit from PSU pending The workshop will be presented in three strands by experienced teachers providing a solid understanding of the programs.

STRAND ONE AND TWO: SOCIAL STUDIES ALIVE! and
BRING LEARNING ALIVE! Elementary and Middle Grades.

The TCI Approach incorporates multiple intelligence teaching strategies, cooperative learning, and the belief that all students can learn. Oregon Social Sciences Standards are woven into each lesson. When social studies is taught through an active, student-centered approach students DO learn and remember important content!

Social Studies Alive! - Elementary Grades:
Learn about engaging diverse learners in a K-2 elementary classroom by participating in a Social Studies Skill Builder (How Do I Make Friends) and Experiential Exercises about ways to get along in school and what it means to be a good consumer.

Discover how people make a difference in their communities through Problem Solving Group Work for grades 3-5, how to apply basic map skills in Exploring Regions of the United States and how to introduce the Revolutionary War to students using a tug-of-war between two unequal opponents.

Bring Learning Alive! - Middle Level
The middle school workshop will focus on effective teaching strategies for grades 6-8. Participate in three lessons: an ancient world lesson which asks students to decide, if ancient Sumer was a civilization; a medieval world lesson touring Florence as the Cradle of the Renaissance; and a US history lesson on the challenges of the rapid rise of industrialization at the turn of the century.
For more information go to http://www.teachtci.com.

STRAND THREE: WORLD IN TRANSITION- High School

World in Transition series - High School Featuring 7 units

• Europe
• Africa
• Russia and the former Soviet Republics
• the Middle East
• Latin America
• East Asia
• the End of the Soviet Union

Materials presented at the workshop are free for participants! Workshop registration fee is $5.00 for teachers and pre-service teaches
Sessions will be held at PSU Smith Center.
For a map of the PSU campus go to http://www.pdx.edu/map.html.
Lunch available on campus and at nearby establishments.

Registration Deadline Extended to April 25th

OCSS is now accepting proposals for presentations at the Fall Conference (Contact Shirley Lomax at ladyatfals@aol.com).

Tracy Faulconer, Ph.D., Pacific University, OCSS Board Member

Gayle Thieman, Portland State University faculty member and OCSS President, is currently standing for the office of NCSS Vice President. In her speech to the NCSS House of Delegates last month, Gayle described her vision of her role as Vice President of NCSS:

"Leadership," she said, "is the art of visioning the impossible and working collaboratively to help individuals and organizations achieve more than they thought possible."

As NCSS Vice President, Gayle would like to help create a more flexible and responsive organization, attract a more diverse membership, and increase NCSS's reputation as a credible information source. She feels it is essential to increase NCSS's effectiveness as an advocate for social studies as a core discipline and as a lobbying institution for resources and professional development opportunities.

Gayle has been an active member of the Oregon, Washington, and Alaska Councils for the Social Studies and served as council president in Alaska and Oregon. Her involvement in NCSS spans more than seventeen years. She has served as chair for the Fund for Advancement of Social Studies Education (FASSE), as a member of both the Executive Committee of the Board of Directors and the Board of Directors, and she has been a representative to the NCSS House of Delegates every year since 1987. Among her successes during her tenure at NCSS, she helped establish active membership goals for NCSS, and effectively increased the FASSE fund by over 50%.

As Vice President, and ultimately, President, Gayle will bring to NCSS a style that is inclusive, collaborative, and visionary. In addition to the goals mentioned above, she will work enthusiastically to expand NCSS membership, provide a forum for dialogue, increase services and collaboration with affiliate councils, create an NCSS endowment, and capitalize on NCSS's outstanding publications and website.

Gayle brings a wealth of experience to her campaign for this position. She has been a high school teacher and administrator in Alaska, Colorado, Illinois, and Washington. Presently, she is a faculty member at Portland State University's Graduate School of Education, specializing in social studies methods and pre-service teacher education. Her scholarly work includes many publications and national presentations related to Social Studies curriculum and instruction, and she has successfully written a number of grants to further her work in these areas.

All Oregon teachers, administrators, and university faculty members who are involved in Social Studies education stand to benefit from Gayle's election to this position. The OCSS board has enthusiastically endorsed Gayle as candidate for NCSS Vice President,and encourages all OCSS members and Social Studies professionals in Oregon to actively lend her their support. In order to vote in this election, it is necessary be an NCSS member. Ballots will be mailed to members in early February.

Watch the excitement as thirty Oregon and SW Washington high school teams compete on Feb. 19 from 2:00-8:00 at Portland State University, Hoffman Hall. Each team is comprised of up to four students, grades 9 through 12; teams compete simultaneously on paper as questions are shown on a large screen and read by an emcee. The ten rounds of questions focus on international culture, current events, history, geography, organizations, flags, and people and places in the news .

The winning team will receive a trophy and the chance to compete in the third annual national WorldQuest competition in Washington, D.C. on April 2, 2005. The WorldQuest event includes multicultural entertainment, ethnic food, and stations where participants will learn about art, music, dance, language, traditional dress and student lead projects, and mingle with PSU International students.

Register now for the OGA spring conference on Saturday, April 2, from 8:30 am - 3:00 pm at Western Oregon University, School of Education, Monmouth. Pre-registration is $10.00 (nonrefundable) and includes lunch, workshops, and materials for those who register by March 18. Walk-in registration on April 2 will be $25.00.

There are workshops and events for all grade levels. Door prizes will be awarded at the end of each session and a grand door prize will be awarded at the end of the day! There will be lots of free materials for teachers, including maps!

Registration begins at 8:30 am. Dr. Teresa Bulman, Professor and Geography Department Head at Portland State University, will present the opening session, "How Geographers See the Land: The Missoula Flood." Sample sessions for pre-school and elementary teachers include: Using Literature to Teach Geography; Using Literature to Teach about Africa; Family Geography. Middle/high school sessions include: Global Geography Alive; GIS in the K-12 classroom; and AP Geography. Teachers of all levels will be interested in Grant Writing for Teachers; Geography of Oregon; and Social Studies Analysis Scoring Guide.

At the closing session, there will be a Grand Prize Drawing--you must be present to win! CPD units will be available for each workshop. Click on the registration link to complete the registration form due March 18.

The tragic events surrounding the tsunami disaster in Asia have brought the question of foreign assistance to the front burner. What kind of aid should be provided and how much are topics discussed on a daily basis as the world moves to cope with this terrible tragedy. This online lesson plan, adapted from the Choices curriculum unit, Dilemmas of Foreign Aid: U.S. Priorities, Policies, and Practices, engages students in consideration of one of the most important issues on the U.S. policy agenda: the role of foreign assistance. This online lesson includes a one-period lesson plan, online handouts, and links to selected online news sources Check Teaching with the News www.choices.edu/curriculum_twtn.cfm for other free online teaching resources designed to engage students in active consideration of a balanced range of views on contested international issues. Each resource includes a framework of policy options, a suggested lesson plan, and links to background readings.

By Tracy Faulconer, OCSS Board Member

What can be done to ensure that children continue their education after a natural disaster or in the aftermath of war? Answering this question was the focus of the Second Global Inter-Agency Consultation on Education in Emergencies and Early Recovery that took place in Cape Town, South Africa.

In December, I attended the Inter-Agency Network for Education in Emergencies (INEE) consultation which included 150 participants from around the world and from a variety of United Nations and NGO agencies and organizations. The topics under discussion included humanitarian advocacy, policy and research, education as a protection tool, education for peace and conflict resolution, literacy and non-formal education, adolescents and youth, HIV/AIDS and gender.

INEE has over 900 members representing many institutions with various mandates. It was established in 2000 to share information and improve the delivery of education in situations of crisis. It is estimated today that there are at least fifty million children in the world today who are out of school as a result of war and natural disasters. Most of these are girls and include children and youths in refugee camps and in countries recovering from conflict.

The consultation was the occasion for the presentation of the just completed set of the INEE Minimum Standards for Education in Emergencies, Chronic Crises and Early Reconstruction, ( MSEE) , Written by an INEE Working Group and involving the participation of over 2,500 people around the world, the MSEE outline a comprehensive set of guidelines for assessing educational needs within affected communities, assuring access to a learning environment, developing appropriate curriculum, designing flexible laws and policies that ensure free, inclusive, nondiscriminatory, and quality education for all.

The standards are broad and inclusive with a strong emphasis on the psycho-social needs of children and adolescents who are in precarious or dangerous situations. "Key indicators," similar to our benchmarks, provide a measure of the success or impact of the methods and processes used to meet the standards.

In addition to the standards, INEE has produced the INEE Technical Kit and a Teaching Training Resource Kit, both on CD. The Technical Kit is an electronic library that provides hundreds of articles, materials, case studies, and instructional guidelines related to designing education for children in crisis. Among the topics included are peace and conflict resolution, HIV/AIDS education, gender issues, environmental education, and inclusive education. Written for school administrators, program managers, and others the Teacher Training Kit includes guidelines for pedagogy, girls' education, psychosocial support and children with special needs, capacity building for administrators, and community participation.

Visit the INEE website at www.ineesite.org to see the standards and to learn more about this network.

NCSS has received a grant from the federal Corporation for National and Community Service (CNCS) to fund a second year of "CiviConnections: Constructing the Past, Creating the Future." The grant will provide an opportunity for teacher teams and students in grades 3-12 to link local historical inquiry with community service-learning activities. Thirty-three teams of teachers will be awarded grants of $7,500 for implementing the program in classrooms and communities all across America .

Teams of three teachers can apply for a $7,500 grant to cover their costs for:

• attending a three day summer workshop
• implementing the program in their classrooms during the fall of 2005
• attending the 2005 NCSS Annual Conference in Kansas City, Kansas (November 18-20)

Download an application from the NCSS website at www.socialstudies.org/civiconnections , or e-mail civiconnections@ncss.org to request an application to be mailed to you. Applications should be post-marked by February 25, 2005. For further information about CiviConnections or the application process, contact Treverne Brown-Thomas at civiconnections@ncss.org.

Greg Timmons, OCSS board member and delegate to NCSS

November - BALTIMORE: Hey, I think I'm getting to like all this conference travel and rubbing elbows with educational colleagues. Attending workshops, being wined and dined by textbook publishers, meeting people from all over the country, eating at banquets and fine local restaurants, getting dizzy at the publishers' exhibition hall... this is pretty exciting stuff! How did I ever have a life before this?

Well, you might think that sums up this year's NCSS National Conference. But as it turns out some serious business was conducted and some very good workshops and internationally renowned speakers appeared. I can't go into the vast list of top-rate workshops presented in this short space, but if you are curious, you can click on http://www.socialstudies.org/conference/ and go to the different days' conference sessions in the "Conference Program Book." Conference attendees were also treated to great presentations by historian Gary Wills, political writer Samantha Power, and NAACP chair Julian Bond among many other speakers.

The House of Delegates met November 19 th and 20 th to discuss and vote on several important resolutions worthy of mentioning:

• The NCSS Board is to encourage Congress to provide more funding for the Teaching American History Grants.
• NCSS is to encourage all state councils to request that the National Assessment of Educational Progress (NAEP) include 12 th grade assessments in Social Studies content areas.
• NCSS commends members of the Minnesota Council of the Social Studies for their brave stand against a renegade Commissioner of Education who wanted to instill an inaccurate and biased agenda into Minnesota's Social Studies standards. (This story was featured in my December column and is also featured in the Nov-Dec edition of Social Education ).
• NCSS Data Gathering Survey.
• An interesting resolution calling for the US to end the occupation of Iraq now.

All resolutions passed with the exception of the resolution calling for an immediate end to US occupation in Iraq. Though there was lively discussion surrounding the 13 point resolution, it was defeated. Many of the delegates were sympathetic to the cause but felt the resolution contained too many articles of political opinion or conjecture.

I will focus on the Data Gathering Survey resolution because it will compliment important issues previously discussed in this column regarding the effects of No Child Left Behind on Social Studies education. I also want to show you how NCSS is working hard to keep the Social Studies as a core curriculum.

Last November at the 2003 NCSS Annual Conference, the House of Delegates voted to address the concern of NCLB through the state councils with a resolution that had the state councils:

• Take a sustained and proactive role in monitoring and disseminating information regarding NCLB;
• Provide NCSS with annual updates on legislation, policy implementation and advocacy regarding NCLB;
• And that NCSS would: Provide a forum at the national convention for discussion and report on the federal impact and status of NCLB for Social Studies.

A good start, to be sure. But the participants at the 2004 NCSS Summer Leadership Institute in July felt more action needed to be taken and it needed to start with NCSS. Many felt last year's resolution did not produce the evidence needed to show that NCLB has caused a decrease in instructional time for the Social Studies. Indeed, many participants at the 2004 Summer Institute reported that legislators they talked to understood the importance of Social Studies education but needed hard data showing a decrease in instructional time due to other priorities (math and science instruction in lieu of studies instruction) to take any action in support of the Social Studies.

Supporters of the resolution were also spurred on by a recent study of the Council for Basic Education entitled "Academic Atrophy: The Condition of Liberal Arts in America's Public Schools," which found solid evidence of an exclusive focus "on mathematic, reading and eventually science [that] is diverting significant time and resources from other academic subjects."

After some strong support from representatives of the state councils sponsoring the resolution and nearly all the candidates running for NCSS offices, the following resolution passed unanimously:

NCSS will explore with the College and University Faculty Assembly (CUFA) and other relevant organizations, mechanisms to develop, distribute, collect, analyze and disseminate findings to support the inclusion of the Social Studies as a core academic area in NCLB. This data will be made available at the 2005 Summer Leadership Institute to be delivered to legislators and request their support for the inclusion of the Social Studies as a core academic area in the 2006 NCLB reauthorization.

The survey will be developed in the next few months and most likely will be implemented through the state councils, hopefully through their websites in the coming year. Teachers will be asked if their instructional time for teaching Social Studies has been reduced and if so, has this been a result of more time scheduled for the instruction of math and language Aarts. The proposed amendment will provide participants to the 2005 Summer Leadership Institute with solid and convincing statistical evidence to have the NCLB Act amended to include the Social Studies in the 2006 reauthorization.

We all hope you all had a great holiday season and a restful winter break... after all the shopping... visiting relatives... and holiday parties.