Grade 7 Social Studies Newsletter

Social Studies Newsletter #1
November 28, 2010 Email: Violet.bawab@asg.edu.jo Class Site: https://sites.google.com/a/asg.edu.jo/violet-bawab/   Blog: http://asgsocialstudies.blogspot.com/ Check out the latest post by Aya Al Nouri on Poverty!	Violet bawab – ASG
Dear Grade 7 Students…   It has been a busy first semester and it is going to get even more busy after our nice and long Eid holiday….   Below is a brief description of all the material we covered and that we will be covering in the next month:   Introduction skills to Social Studies / Basic geography: In this section of our course, we covered the concept of credibility and credentials giving us a better ability to assess whether a source of information is credible or not (how believable it is) and if the information we are reading and using is accurate and verifiable. This is a skill that is necessary for all the years to come and will go a long way in any future research project we will carry out. We also covered the difference between fact and opinion, fiction and non fiction, all of which are distinctions that should be clear to our students. 5 Themes of Geography: this section was covered as a self study section and the aim was to introduce all the themes for future application (when we start with our history component of the course). It is important for us to have an understanding of the 5 themes of geography yet we will not be testing on them alone. Countries of the world – Research Assignment: our students have conducted a mini research assignment on "How many countries are there in the world" and have found that even such a question could hold many answers, therefore they tested their abilities to assess information credibility and decided on which answer or answers to use. As a class, we have decided to use 195 countries, based on the 192 countries that are members of the United Nations, adding Kosovo, The Vatican City and Thailand to them.   Global Issues – Eradication of Poverty The concepts of responsibility, justice and equality were discussed in this chapter since they will form a good basis for our judgment of many real life situations we will study and they will form the basis of any socially responsible action we aim to promote in our students.   We are working on watching some videos that put poverty in context to our students in order for them to understand where we stand in the world relative to those in need, we also focused on the concept of poverty in Jordan through many class discussions on the differences between the Haves and Have Not's in Jordan using health care, education, lifestyle, housing style as indictors of the rich VS (versus – compared to) the poor. We have introduced the concept of GDP per capita and are relating it to population size and the status of a country (developed VS developing) all as indicators of poverty and wealth in a country through a worksheet. We have a homework assignment to be submitted in the next week on the Millennium Development Goals and students are required to understand them, describe them and be able to discuss them in our upcoming final exam. In our first assessed task, we are preparing project proposals for projects that could practically help a Jordanian family in need (something grade 7 students at ASG could achieve). The first phase of this project is completed and due for submission on November 22nd and 23rd. This part of the project will allow us to assess individual and group work and give students an opportunity to be creative and dynamic in their ideas. Phase 2 of this project will include a presentation conducted by every group on the idea I will be choosing for each group (each group will propose 2 ideas, only one will be chosen for presentation). The presentation part of the project will assess the ability of students to create dynamic presentations using tools on Glogster.com to integrate technology effectively into our work. This component of the project is due for submission prior to final exams. Final Exam: Our final exam is on the 11th of December 2010. Material included in this test will be provided in a separate study guide within the first week after Eid Break. The test will include all material covered in the period preceding the exam and will cover material of the first test as well.   I highly recommend that you all take a thorough look at the tests and review the questions and the answer guides posted on the class website, as well as the answer guide to the first homework assignment on credibility and credentials.     Glogster Account: For our next phase of the Poverty Project, you are required to log in using the Username and password provided to your group by visiting www.glogster.com and selecting log in, then enter the nick name and password provided by your teacher.