Chapter 12

Personally, I have never really liked the subject of Social Studies. I have always enjoyed math and even science and English more. However, chapter twelve of M.D. Roblyer's Integrating Educational Technology into Teaching, gave some great ideas of how to use technology to make social studies more interesting and beneficial.
With the emergence of technology, the Internet, and other communication devices, the global world is becoming smaller and individuals have access to more information about the world and the people in it. Due to this, the content of social studies keeps growing, but teachers still only have a certain amount of time to cover all of the information. One problem is that using technology in constructivist ways usually takes more time, and even though it could be very powerful, it doesn't allow for the teacher to cover as much information. Also, the Internet has so much information that it is very important for students to know what is accurate and what is not. The text said that, "Some believe that rather than shying away from hate or conspiracy sites, we should be using them as demonstration tools to teach our students how to become critical consumers of information." Last semester, in my education class, my teacher did an activity just like that. We all had to look up sites that he gave us, mostly hate sites, and see how they gave out information and how they worked to make the viewers believe in them. It was a great way to see the false, but tricky information on the Internet, that younger people could easily believe.
Next, the text talked about good strategies for using technology in social studies. There were a bunch of ideas that I really liked. First, simulated problem-solving environments seemed like they would b like games, fun and exciting, but provided problem solving skills for social studies scenarios. Also, as I have mentioned before, virtual field trips are great for every content area, but they can really add a great dimension to a social studies class. Student telecollaborations seemed like a great way to get students from different places to work together and gain insights about other parts of the world. Last semester and this semester I have worked with the Deliberation in Democracies website where my class has communicated with people from the Ukraine. I feel like this type of communications, if done properly, can greatly benefit students.
Another great idea that the textbook offered, was digital storytelling. I think the best way to integrate this into the classrooms would be to have the students create a digital story about a famous person or era related to what they are learning. This seems like such a fun and simple thing to do. Finally, I think that using drill and practice or instructional games is a perfect way to get students to memorize facts like capitals, locations of states, dates, geography, and famous events. In school, I had never had to learn the capitals of the states, and just this past year I decided that I wanted to learn them. I went on a website and used a drill and prat ice game over and over until I knew all the capitals. I really think that this was a perfect way for me to quickly learn them.
Social studies is a very broad topic that can cover many areas. Though many can find it uninteresting or not fit for them, there are many ways to make it more interesting for all students. Technology definitely has so much to offer in getting students interesting and excited about learning social studies.