Integrating Social Networking into the Curriculum

To begin this project of integrating social network into my curriculum,  I explored some Web 2.0 social networking sites and decided to settle with Edmodo to use with my fourth graders. Edmodo is a social network Web 2.0 site for teachers and students to use efficiently in and out of the classroom. By creating a group, I am able to give my students a security code to join our private group. It’s that simple. My students will create a username with their first name last initial and their homeroom number for privacy. To make it easy on the students and I, I will assign them a password so I can help them if they forget.  The tutorials on Edmodo gave me some interesting ideas to use, but I am still unfamiliar with how to maneuver around the site to make my groups sophisticated. I may be nuts, but I am going to try to explore this site with my math students this week to see if I can work out any uncertainty before the start of the next school year. Edmodo will be a great tool to help my students learn how to communicate properly and effectively using a safe social networking site.  

Here is one way I could integrate social networking into my social studies curriculum:

My Lesson Plan and Goals:

In fourth grade we study US geography. Right now we are exploring the South with a focus on the People of the South. The lesson’s focal point is on the South’s people, past and present.  The essential question of the lesson is to discuss how African Americans in the South fought for equal rights. This lesson explores the heroic actions of Rosa Parks and Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. Students will read about Rosa Park’s refusal to give up her seat to a white person and the resulting bus boycott that ended segregation on the city buses in 1956. Rosa Parks and Dr. martin Luther King acts of philanthropy brought their communities together for the common good and resulted in major social change in the nation. Using Edmodo, students will explain what it felt like to be a minority, and identify the relationship of individual rights and community responsibility.

Objectives:

Increase their knowledge of African Americans’ struggle for civil rights.

Practice critical thinking skills.  

Practice proper use of “netiquette” in on-line communication and demonstrate use of Internet safety precautions

Materials

1.     Book: Viola, Herman. Social Studies State and Regions. Houghton Mifflin Company, 2005.

2.     Laptop Carts- 4^th and 5^th Mobile Lab

3.     Smart Notebook on Lesson 5.3 People of the South

4.     Flow chart on key events in the struggle for the civil rights.

5.     Video: Civil Rights Movement on Discovery Education

6.      Edmodo accounts

7.     Rubric Evaluation:

Beforehand:

Take away 5 to 8 of the desks and put them on the side of the room so the students cannot sit in them. Blue eye and green students will be the "minority" group and all other students will be the "majority" group. The majority group will be instructed to sit in the front of the room while the blue and green eye students need to go to the back of the room. Teacher will begin reviewing material for about five minutes. Teacher will include pictures that only the front rows will be able to see and require the students to write on a piece of paper, such as taking notes.

Pre-Reading Activities:

1.     As the students come in, tell the blue and green-eyed students (or whatever you choose as minority) to sit anywhere in the back two rows. Then tell all the other different eye colored  (majority) to sit wherever they want in the front rows, but not in the back two. Make sure you have less "minorities" than "majorities", but enough "minorities" so that there are at least two minorities that get a desk. As the desks fill up and there is no more room, make the blue and green eye students give their seats to the other eye colored students. Have the blue and green eye students stand in the back of the room behind the desks. After all the students are in the classroom, inform students that you are going to review material that will be on unit test. Tell the students to take notes, but students in the back of the room must stand and write. Start teaching, speaking softly and showing material on note cards down low to the front rows, tell the students the information may be on a test.

2.     After five minutes, inform students that this was a pretend lesson and that it actually has to do with your real lesson. Rearrange the room back to its normal setup. Explain to the students that this is what it felt like to be a minority. Today we are going to learn about a woman named Rosa Parks. She was a victim of racism because she was a minority. Back in the early 1900s not many people had cars, so they had to take the bus. However, black people had to sit in the back and if a white person got on and there were no seats left, the black person had to give up their seat and get off the bus. Ask the students if they think this is fair. Ask how they felt being excluded from the majority group. Have the students login into their Edmodo accounts and reflect about this experience from their perspective of the activity (minority or majority) and then how they think the other group felt. Make an original post answering the questions and comment on two of your peers’ responses. 

  Reading:

Students will read the passage about civil rights and progress in their social studies book, Social Studie States and Regions, with their small table groups. While students read, they will create flow chart of key events in the struggle for civil rights. Demonstrate the beginning of the flow chart by reading the first paragraph and putting the information from it onto the flow chart using the Smart Notebook, 5.3 People of the South. 

Post Reading:

Watch video Civil Rights Movement Equality.  After video, review flow chart together as a class using the Smart Notebook. 

  Evaluation:

After reading and watching video, hold another discussion on Edmodo. Students will post their solutions and respond to at least two other students agree or disagree with their peer’s responses.

                        -What are some ways that African-Americans were treated unfairly through segregation?

                        -How was the Montgomery Bus Boycott helpful in creating equality for African-                                 Americans?

                        - Dr. King believed we should all be peaceful. How do you think it felt to be Rosa Parks    on the  bus? Rosa Parks did not yell or argue with the man who asked for her seat. Instead, she just said  “no.” Can you think of ways to stay calm even when people are treating you badly?

Assessment: See rubric