District 11 Educational Support Services
Social Studies

Kindergarten, Overview of the Year: Self, Others, and Family

 Overview
 The Kindergarten social studies program provides students with opportunities to explore their own world and then broaden their views by considering people in their school, neighborhood and another part of the world. The social studies standards in history, geography, civics, and economics have been used to develop this course. Authentic connections with Literacy, Mathematics, Science, and Technology have been incorporated. Content and concepts on Australia, the country of comparison, are part of each unit.
For Teachers
Quarter 1  2
Quarter 3  4
Next Grade

Quarter 1: All About Me  
Quarter 2: Friends and Family  		Quarter 3: Schools, and Neighborhoods
Quarter 4: The World and Me 

Enduring Understandings - important ideas that students should carry with them years beyond the instruction received this year.

  • Chronology organizes people and events and helps explain historical relationships.
  • Societies are diverse and change over time.
  • Historians use primary and secondary sources to ask and answer questions about the past and present (historical inquiry).
  • Beliefs of individuals and groups have powerful effects on societies.
  • Citizens have rights, roles and responsibilities.
  • People and nations interact politically.
  • Government involves people acquiring and using power and authority.
  • Individuals and groups make, enforce and apply rules and laws
  • Maps, globes and other geographic tools are used to locate information about places.
  • Physical and human characteristics of places define regions.
  • Human activity changes and is affected by the physical environment.
  • People migrate and settle in different places for a variety of reasons.
  • Decisions must be made about the use of scarce resources.
  • Resources are used to produce and distribute goods and services. Decisions must be made regarding reasons for trading.
  • Technology has changed societies throughout history.

Essential Questions - most important “big picture” questions students should be able to answer after completing learning activities.

  • How have I grown and changed over time?
  • How are we alike? How are we different? How am I unique? How am I special?
  • How do you show that you care for other people?
  • What is family? What do families believe in? How do families get along? How do families change?
  • How do friends and families solve problems?
  • What are the roles/jobs of people in the school?
  • Where do people do their jobs in the school building?
  • What regions are found in the school?
  • What is a neighborhood? What is in my neighborhood?
  • Why do people move into and out of neighborhoods? Why do people move to different houses?
  • Where am I on a map? A globe? Where am I in the world?
  • Where is Australia on a map? A globe?
  • How do people live in different parts of the world?
  • How can I help take care of my world?
  • How will a trade benefit me?
  • How do people around the world communicate?

Standards

History 1: Students understand the chronological organization of history and know how to organize events and people into major eras to identify and explain historical relationships.

Benchmark 1A: Students now the general chronological order of events and people in history.

History 2: Students know how to use the processes and resources of historical inquiry.

Benchmark 2A: Students know how to formulate questions and hypotheses regarding what happened in the past and how to obtain and analyze historical data to answer questions and test hypotheses.                                                                                                       

History 3: Students understand that societies are diverse and change over time.

Benchmark  3 B:  Students understand the history of social organization in various societies.

History 4: Students understand how science, technology, and economic activity have developed, changed, and affected societies throughout history.

Benchmark H4A: Students understand the impact of scientific and technological developments on individuals and societies. 

History 5: Students understand political institutions and theories that developed and changed over time.

Benchmark H5C: Students know how political power has been acquired, maintained, used, and/or lost throughout history.

History 6: Students know that religious and philosophical ideas have been powerful forces throughout history.

Benchmark H6B: Students know how societies have been affected by religions and philosophies.

Geography 1: Students know how to use and construct maps, globes, and other geographic tools to locate and derive information about people, places, and environments.

Benchmark A: Students know how to use maps, globes, and other geographic tools to acquire, process, and report information from a spatial perspective.      

Geography 2: Students know the physical and human characteristics of places, and use this knowledge to define and study regions and their patterns of change.

Benchmark 2A: Students know the physical and human characteristics of places

Geography 3: Physical processes shaped the earth's surfaces.

Benchmark G3A: Students know the physical processes that shaped earth's surface patterns.

Geography 4: Students understand how economic, political, cultural and social processes interact to shape patterns of human populations, interdependence, cooperation and conflict.

Benchmark4 A: Students know the characteristics, location, distribution, and migration of human populations.

Geography 5: Students understand the effects of interactions between human and physical systems and changes in meaning, use, distribution, and importance of resources.

Benchmark5 B: Students know physical systems affect human systems.

Civics 1: Students understand the purposes of government and the basic constitutional principles of the United States' republican form of government.

Benchmark C1 A: Students know and understand what government is and what purpose it serves.

Civics 2: Students know how to use structure and function of local, state, and national government and how citizen involvement shapes public policy

Benchmark C2B: Students know how power, authority, and responsibility are distributed, shared, and limited.

Civics 3: Students know the political relationship of The United States and its citizens to other nations and to world affairs.
Benchmark C3 A: Students know how and why governments…..interact politically.

Civics 4: Students understand how citizens exercise the roles, rights, and responsibilities of participation in civic life at all levels.

Benchmark C4C: Students know how citizens can exercise their rights. 

Economics 1: Students understand that because of the condition of scarcity, decisions must be made about the use of scarce resources.

Benchmark E1A: Students know that economic choices are made because resources are scarce and that the act of making economic choices imposes opportunity costs (e.g., using land for farming and ranching, forests for recreation or lumber). 

Economics 2: Students understand how different economic systems impact decisions about the use of resources and the production and distribution of goods and services.

Benchmark 2A: Students understand that different economic systems employ different means to produce, distribute, and exchange goods and services.

Economics 3: Students understand the results of trade, exchange, and interdependence among individuals, house holds, businesses, governments, and societies.

Benchmark 3A: Students understand that the exchange of goods and services creates economic interdependence and change.

 

Elementary Social Studies D-11 Indicators, K-5

History
1. Chronological Organization: Organize events and people in history chronologically (time lines, lists, sequencing).
2. Historical Inquiry: Use primary and secondary sources to ask and answer questions (who, what, when, why, how) about the past and present, and to determine cause and effect relationships.
3. Diverse and Changing Societies: Describe cultural similarities, differences and interactions among various groups in both past and present.
4. Science, Technology, and Economic Activity: Identify and explain changes in technology (scientific achievements and inventions) and how they changed history.
5. Political Institutions and Theories: Describe how and why rules and laws (government) have been made and enforced.
6. Religious and Philosophical Ideas: Identify beliefs of individuals and groups and their effects on societies.

Geography
1. Use of Geographic Tools: Use tools (maps, globes, photographs, graphs, charts, and databases) to locate information about places.
2. and 3. Physical Processes/Physical and Human Characteristics of Places and Regions: Identify and describe human and physical characteristics of places, and use them to define regions.
4. Patterns of Human Population: Explain why people migrate and settle in different places.
5. Human and Physical Systems: Describe ways humans change the physical environment and how the physical environment affects human activity.
6. Apply Knowledge of Geography: Describe how and why places change over time.

Civics
1. Purpose of Government and US Constitutional Principles: Explain how people get, use, and misuse power and authority.
2. Structure and Function of Government: Explain how governments are organized at the local, state, and national levels and the responsibilities of each.
3. Political Relationships: Describe ways that peoples and nations interact.
4. Citizenship Participation: Explain the rights, roles, and responsibilities of students as citizens in the classroom, school, community, state, and nation.

Economics
1. Scarcity and Decision-Making: Identify scarce natural, human, and capital resources and evaluate decisions about how they are used.
2. Resources and Production of Goods and Services: Explain how, why, and for whom goods and services are produced.
3. Trade, Exchange, and Economic Interdependence: Identify ways goods and services are distributed through trade, exchange and interdependence.
 

Sample Lessons

District 11 Diamond Units/Lessons Overview - includes information about the purpose, goals and structure of these sample instructional units:

Parents

This unit presents a perfect opportunity for parents to sit down with their child to talk about rules at home and rules at school, who has responsibility for making sure rules are followed and what happens when they are not followed. You can also look through family albums. Share family history with your child, and focus on family members' accomplishments, traditions, and memorable events so he or she has an understanding of how your family is similar and different from other families. Focus your conversation on the Essential Questions listed earlier on this page.

ABCs of Elementary Years: These ABC Tips are designed to help you support your child’s learning in social studies during their years in elementary school.

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