Children’s literature has long been utilized and recommended in classrooms across subjects and grades as a resource to support social studies standards.  Sharing diverse perspectives and narratives acts as a mirror, window, or sliding door to the self encouraging students to foster empathy, positive self-esteem, and tolerance (Bishop, 1990).  However, we know that reading diverse literature is not enough and many teachers, like myself, are looking to provide our students with historical and sociocultural context around these books.  Primary sources like photos and real-life narratives bring moments in history to life, engaging students in a subject that many find “boring” or irrelevant to their lives.  

When it comes to social studies content, a common pitfall for teachers can be sourcing quality and consistent materials and resources.  

In a 2022 RAND Corporation report, about 16 percent of elementary teachers reported using district- recommended curricular materials or textbooks for social studies. The majority of teachers (52 percent) reported cobbling together their own content from multiple websites requiring considerable time and effort (Dilberti et. al, 2023, p 19).  

So what’s out there that can help time-strapped educators fill some of the gaps in social studies?  One of my favorite sites is Google Arts and Culture.

Google Arts and Culture provides free access to museum quality exhibits, artifacts and first-person narratives to round out most social studies topics.  Pulling from vetted institutions and organizations from around the world, material is timely, current and engaging. Teachers have multiple ways to integrate primary sources, videos and activities into lesson plans and the ability to assign content to students through Google Classroom.

While Google Arts and Culture is a powerful tool, there are some concerns around the age-appropriateness and exposure to some of the content, which is often the argument for a lot of social studies topics, but that should not deter educators from exploring ways this tech can enhance everyone’s learning.

REFERENCES:

Bishop, R.S. (1990). Mirrors, Windows, and Sliding Glass Doors. Perspectives: Choosing and Using Books for the Classroom, 6(3). https://scenicregional.org/wp-content/uploads/2017/08/Mirrors-Windows-and-Sliding-Glass-Doors.pdf

Dilberti, M.K., Woo, A., Kaufman, J.H. (2023). The Missing Infrastructure for Elementary (K-5) Social Studies Instruction (Report No. RR-A134-17). The Rand Corporation. https://www.wsdot.wa.gov/research/reports/fullreports/896-4.pdf

Yen, K. (2024, March 16). Filling in the Social Studies Curricular Gap [Video].