Curriculum Assignment - Robyn

For my curriculum evaluation, I took a look at the third grade standards for history and social science. The short overview of this standard is as follows:

“Drawing on information from local historic sites, historical societies, and museums, third graders learn about the history of Massachusetts from the time of the arrival of the Pilgrims. They also learn the history of their own cities and towns and about famous people and events in Massachusetts’ history.”

I think this curriculum really has the potential to be fun and intriguing for students, as they will be learning about people, places, and ways of life of the past, but that can be brought back to life. For example, third grade standard 3.3 has students learning about the Mayflower and about the pilgrims and their way of life. An interesting way to learn about this would be to actually take students to Plimoth Plantation, so instead of simply teaching what pilgrim life was like, students can actually see it and participate in it. I do think it’s really important, as I’ve seen other people note as well, to make connections between Massachusetts history and students’ own history (i.e. part of the standards includes why the pilgrims left Europe, which could be related to why immigrant students’ families left their home countries). In creating history lesson plans that are really relevant to students and in encouraging students to critically think and make connections between “history” and today, I feel they will (hopefully) be interested and motivated to learn the material.

However, there are so limitations to these standards and critiques that I do have. Although it doesn’t seem required, it seems as though these standards are encouraging teachers to take advantage of the resources Massachusetts has to offer outside of the classroom. While it is ideal that teachers be able to take their students on field trips to places like Plimoth Plantation, it is not always a reality, especially in urban schools. This would require much planning and organizing, especially to avoid costs that students’ families might unable to pay, and not all teachers would be willing to put in this much effort. In addition, the standards do not acknowledge the fact that learning about Massachusetts history is not relevant for some students. Therefore, it is really important that teachers help students make connections between their own backgrounds, birthplaces, cultures, etc. in order to make this information relevant and intriguing for students. One way to do this is through standards 3.10 and 3.11, which deal with the American flag and students’ own towns, respectively. Not only can students learn about both of these things, but students might be able to do research on their home country’s flag or the town they were born in. Finally, I think it’s important to introduce this history from more than one viewpoint (which is not addressed in the standards) – i.e. students can predict/infer/learn about the American Revolution (standard 3.5) from the British point of view as well. There are many ways to expand the standards to be more pertinent and applicable to our students’ lives.