California Standards, Frameworks, & Blueprints

History-Social Science Standards
http://www.cde.ca.gov/standards
(California Department of Education's official Webpage for K-12 Content Standards; provides the scope and sequence for instruction at each grade level.)

History-Social Science Framework
http://www.cde.ca.gov/cfir/curfrwk.html 
>California Department of Education's official Webpage for K-12 Curriculum Frameworks; a comprehensive document which incorporates standards, strategies, and rationale.

California Standards Test Blueprints
http://www.cde.ca.gov/statetests/star/resources/blueprints.html
-California Department of Education's official Webpage for K-12 Curriculum Blueprints; assists teachers in making instructional decisions in order to prepare for the annual state assessments (STAR).

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Standards-based Lesson Plans

Discovery Channels School for Teachers
http://school.discovery.com/teachers/
http://school.discovery.com/teachingtools/lessonplanner/index.html
-Excellent resource for Social Studies lesson plans, teaching tools, and puzzlemaker activities, and a create-your-own lesson planner.

United Nations CyberSchoolBus
http://www.un.org/pubs/cyberschoolbus/index.asp\
-A comprehensive international resource centered on world social concerns, including lesson plans, activities, quizzes, and games.

African Americans in the Civil War
http://www.pbs.org/wgbh/aia/part4/4narr5.html
-Comprehensive resource for information and lesson plans for teachers.

Gold Rush!
http://www.museumca.org/goldrush/
-Extensive resource for California Gold Rush curriculum with standards aligned lessons and activities. Presented by Oakland’s Museum of California, this is an outstanding interdisciplinary site as well.

PBS TeacherSource
http://www.pbs.org/teachersource/soc_stud.htm
-Provides an abundance of resources on a variety of topics, with lesson plans and activity suggestions.

Annenberg/CPB Learner.org
http://www.learner.org/index.html
-Extensive Standards aligned resource integrating arts and social studies curriculum.

EDSITEment
http://edsitement.neh.gov/tab_lesson.asp?subjectArea=3
-Social Studies and History lesson plans for teachers

Familiar Quotations
http://www.bartleby.com/100/
A Collection of Passages, Phrases, and Proverbs Traced to Their Sources in
Ancient and Modern Literature Social Studies Bookmarks Compiled by John Bartlett

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Differentiated Instruction for the EL Student

Marks ESL World
http://marksesl.com/?source=bwft
-Provides an extensive array of topics on ESL including teaching strategies and techniques, as well as job opportunities.

ArtsEdge ESL Curriculum links
http://artsedge.kennedy-center.org/teaching_materials/weblinks/weblinks.cfm?subject_id=ESL
-Provides links to lessons that incorporate ESL teaching methods and accommodations.

Dick Blick Art Materials
http://www.dickblick.com/lessonplans/lessonplans/
-This site provides creative ideas, activities, and lesson plans for multi-cultural students.

Boggle's World ESL Worksheets and Lesson Plans
http://bogglesworld.com/
-This site has worksheets, flash cards, and lesson plans for ESL students, with some interesting Social Studies topics.

English Exercises: Learning English Online
http://www.englisch-hilfen.de/en/index.htm
-Interesting site with social studies exercises for English Language Learners.

Internet Picture Dictionary
http://www.pdictionary.com/
-The Internet Picture Dictionary is a free, online multilingual picture dictionary designed especially for ESL students.

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Differentiated Instruction for Special Needs

Teachers Helping Teachers Special Education
http://www.pacificnet.net/~mandel/
-Provides a variety of lesson plans for K-12 teachers.

American Sign Language Browser
http://commtechlab.msu.edu/sites/aslweb/
-Allows you to look up thousands of ASL signs.

LD Online Teachers Homepage
http://www.ldonline.org/teaching/index.html
-Extensive resource for Special needs teachers including strategies and techniques and more.

A Teachers Guide to Inclusion
http://www.ldonline.org/ld_indepth/teaching_techniques/dld_ecologies.html
-Part of the LD Online site.

Edbydesign.com
http://www.edbydesign.com
-This web site has activities for children with disabilities, including art, learning computers, math development, language, basic science skills, and more.

I Love That Teaching Idea
http://www.ilovethatteachingidea.com/WRCenter/WRCenter.htm
-This is an excellent site with worksheet reproducible centers that includes the subjects of Math, Science, Language arts, Holiday and seasonal, Social Studies, Art, First day, health, classroom management, reading and spelling.

Special Ed Needs Resources
http://www.geocities.com/SEN_resources/resources.html
This is an incredible resource for activities specifically geared toward special needs students, including board games centering on phonics, alphabet and other literacy efforts.

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Interdisciplinary Instruction

ArtsEdge Social Studies Curriculum
http://artsedge.kennedy-center.org/teaching_materials/weblinks/weblinks.cfm?subject_id=SOC
Includes a collection of lesson plans and activities linking Art to Social Studies.

Carnegie Museum of Natural History Presents Native Americans
http://www.carnegiemuseums.org/cmnh/exhibits/north-south-east-west/index.html
Site offers a beautiful integration of Museum artifacts and Native American history.

Ancient Egypt
http://www.ancientegypt.co.uk/menu.html
Beautiful site presented by The British Museum, incorporating artifacts from their extensive collection.

Ansel Adams at 100
http://www.sfmoma.org/adams/
Engaging interactive site integrating the works of Ansel Adams with the history of California.

Exploring Leonardo
http://www.mos.org/sln/Leonardo/
Interactive site incorporating the works of Leonardo da Vinci to teach about inventions, and art.

American Memory Historical Collections & the Learning Page
http://rs6.loc.gov/amhome.html
http://rs6.loc.gov/ammem/ndlpedu/index.html
Part of the National digital library with access to all its collections online, including the learning page for teachers with lesson plans, activities, and collection connections.

smART Kids
http://smartmusueum.uchicago.edu/smartkids/
smART Kids helps students, particularly 7 to 12 year olds, look at art, learn art vocabulary, explore materials, and find out about historic pieces of art.

First Amendment Schools Project
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2006/02/20/AR2006022000970.html
Project Stresses Civics Through Petitions, Voting

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Formal & Informal Assessment

Grading Students with Disabilities
http://www.ascd.org/cms/objectlib/ascdframeset/index.cfm?publication=http://www.ascd.org/publications/ed_lead/200310/munk.html
Informative research with links to more information.

20 Ways to Examine Test Modifications
http://www.ldonline.org/ld_indepth/teaching_techniques/exam_test_modifications.html
This site is a part of LD Online and provides some good resources for teachers assessing special needs students.

Integrating Technology: The Key to High Stakes Testing
http://www.eagles.k12.mo.us/sullivan/elem/sumner/integratetech/index.htm
An excellent resource for integrating technology into assessment, as well as providing extensive technology tutorials.

Rubrics.com
http://www.rubrics.com/
Provides assessment and rubric tools and downloads, as well as assessment information.

Assessment Survey Tool
http://www.getfast.ca/index.html
This site provides an assessment building tool which is useful and simple to use.

An Educator's Guide to Evaluating the Use of Technology in Schools & Classrooms
http://www.ed.gov/pubs/EdTechGuide/
This 100-page online handbook is designed for individuals who have little or no formal training in research or evaluation

Blackboard.com
http://www.blackboard.com/
This site enables instructors to easily add an online component to classes or host a course online, it’s features include threaded discussion, chat, whiteboard, assessment tools, gradebook, content creation tools, and more.

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Additional Web Resources

Early America.com
http://earlyamerica.com/
-Provides a wealth of newspapers, documents, maps and images which focus on the late 18th to early 19th Centuries in the United States.

California as We Saw It (California State Library)
http://www.library.ca.gov/goldrush/index.cfm
-This site provides an overview of the Gold Rush and features many examples drawn from the California History Section's extensive manuscript collections including maps, journals, letters, printed books, pamphlets, periodicals, and newspapers.

Career Voyages
http://www.careervoyages.gov
-Current and updated lists of careers and "hot" occupations reported by states. The site lists the fastest growing occupations by state, the educational requirements for the occupations, and salary ranges

This Nation
http://www.thisnation.com/
-An extensive resources for students and teachers on the U.S. Government, including links to historical documents.

1st Headlines
http://www.1stheadlines.com/
-Provides international and U.S. current event coverage with links to most major newspapers, and extensive search and browse features.

America's Story from America's Library
http://www.americaslibrary.gov/cgi-bin/page.cgi
-An extensive resource for both students and teachers offering information on American history, people, and culture.

Portals to the World
http://www.loc.gov/rr/international/portals.html
-A Library of Congress site with links to information about most countries.

Best of History websites
http://www.besthistorysites.net/
-An excellent compilation of links to the most reputable history resources on the World Wide Web.

Project Vote Smart
http://www.votesmart.org/index.htm?PHPSESSID=d09075f6f7ee2fe6468cc43a4d4769d8
-Incredible resources for all political information, including local and national representatives.

September 11 Digital Archive
http://911digitalarchive.org/
-The September 11 Digital Archive uses electronic media to collect, preserve, and present the history of the September 11, 2001 attacks in New York, Virginia, and Pennsylvania and the public responses to them.

Digital Hurricane Memory Bank
http://www.hurricanearchive.org/
Like the September 11 Digital Archive this site uses electronic media to collect, preserve, and present the history of Hurricanes Rita, Katrina and Wilma
and the public responses to them.

Words and Deeds in American History
http://lcweb2.loc.gov/ammem/mcchtml/corhome.html
-This site collects and posts original manuscripts and letters archived at the Library of Congress.

State Reports and Capitals: Study Tools
http://www.50states.com/       Maps, Worksheets, Flashcards, and more. Teaching and homework help resource for state report assignments. State flags, songs, symbols. This site is the premier resource of state information for students, teachers, and their parents.

Presidents of the United States
http://www.whitehouse.gov/history/presidents/
An index to the biographies of all presidents of the United States of America, from 1789 to present.

PBS Teacher Resources
http://www.pbs.org/teachersource/  -  For more than 30 years, teachers have trusted PBS's quality programming and educational services. Maintaining that trust is the foundation of PBS's mission to serve educators and learners.  Using PBS content in the classroom is easy since producers work with teachers to create standards-based curriculum materials, which are then aggregated at PBS TeacherSource.

Rulers
http://rulers.org/
This site contains lists of heads of state and heads of government (and, in certain cases, de facto leaders not occupying either of those formal positions) of all countries and territories, going back to about 1700 in most cases. Also included are the subdivisions of various countries.

General News Links

ABCNEWS.com
http://abcnews.go.com/

CNN Interactive
http://www.cnn.com/EDUCATION/

The New York Times on the Web
http://www.nytimes.com/

Mercury Center
http://www.mercurynews.com/mld/mercurynews/

USA Today
http://www.usatoday.com/

 

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Books & Publications

The Technology Source
http://horizon.unc.edu/TS/
-The University of North Carolina publishes this bimonthly periodical as a resource for educators working to integrate information technology tools into teaching and managing educational organizations.

This Nation
http://www.thisnation.com/teachers.html
-Tools and resources, as well as book recommendations for teachers.

IRA
http://www.reading.org/choices/index.html
-International Reading Associations site with extensive lists of books for students.

Instructor magazine
http://www.scholastic.com/Instructor
-This site offers curriculum integration strategies, professional development opportunities, help with assessment, and more.

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Teacher Professional Organizations

National Council for History Education
http://www.history.org/nche/

National Council for Geographic Education
http://www.ncge.org/

National Council for the Social Studies
http://www.ncss.org/

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Family and Community Resources

Myth Man’s Homework Helper
http://mythman.com/
-Provides an abundance of resources on Greek Mythology.

Info Please Homework Center
http://infoplease.com/homework/
-This is a great site for homework resources and more, providing reference materials including an almanac, dictionary, encyclopedia, and biography database. They also provide maps and atlas materials and a map library.

Gorp Travel for people with disabilities
http://gorp.com/gorp/eclectic/disabled.htm
-This website is comprehensive in its discussion about adventure travel for people with disabilities, offering information about places to go that accommodate for disabled people including all National parks with wheelchair accessible trails, forests, fishing sites, beaches, mountain hiking, sand dunes, rock climbing and more.

Frontier Travel Camp, Inc.
http://www.frontiertravelcamp.com/index.htm
-This site provides comprehensive information about camps that accommodate different needs and disabilities. http://www.frontiertravelcamp.com/index.ht

Ben's Guide
http://bensguide.gpo.gov/index.html
-Ben’s Guide provides information and interactive activities specifically tailored for educators, parents, and K-12 students.

HomeTownLocator Gazetteer
http://Gazetteer.HomeTownLocator.com
-Gazetteer with data for 1.8 million physical and cultural features, census information for 98,000 local areas and distance calculations for 177,000 populated places. Links to aerial photos, regional, local and topographical maps. Seach by city, town, county, state or zip code.

Smithsonian Education Resource Library
http://www.smithsonianeducation.org/educators/resource_library/resource_library.asp
-The Smithsonian Education Resource Library is a finding aid to the many education resources provided by the Smithsonian. It allows searching for lesson plans, labs, field trips, and more by grade level, subject, keyword , media, and institution. The Smithsonian Education site is subdivided into sections for teachers, students, and family. This finding aid is a great way to search all sections.

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Multimedia Resources

GeoSense
http://www.geosense.net/
-An online geography game that tests your knowledge of world geography alone or against another online player.

The Greatest Places
http://www.greatestplaces.org/
-An educational film that takes the viewer to "seven of the most geographically dynamic locations on Earth.”

National Geographic Geobee Challenge
http://www.nationalgeographic.com/geobee/
-Interactive game, as well as a map maker and more make this an excellent site for teachers.

Artist's Toolkit (Minneapolis Institute of Arts)
http://www.artsconnected.org/toolkit/index.html
-An extensive resource for art including animated demonstrations, examples, and information for students.

National Geographic Magazine
http://www.nationalgeographic.com/
http://www.nationalgeographic.com/xpeditions/
-An extensive multimedia site with many interactive games and activities. Xpeditions is a sister site devoted to Geography teachers and students. Both are excellent.

Virtual Tour of the National Mall
http://dcpages.com/Tourism/
-Take a virtual 360 degree spin around ten monuments and museums of the National Mall, courtesy of D.C. Pages

The Virtual Smithsonian
http://2k.si.edu/
-This exhibit highlights 360 specimens from the fourteen Smithsonian museums along with a virtual walk to the Castle (as the Smithsonian Institution Building is affectionately known.)

Humanities Interactive
http://www.humanities-interactive.org/a_base.html
-An interactive site offering a wide range of Humanities topics with exhibits, games, and lesson ideas.

Virtual Marching Tour of the American Revolution
http://www.ushistory.org/march/
-Extensive resource of Revolutionary information presented in an interactive format.

Don't Buy It
http://pbskids.org/dontbuyit/
-Attempts to engage students in media literacy education by dissecting pop culture and advertisements to help students build critical thinking and analytic skills, and become more discriminating in the use of mass media.

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Instructional Technology Resources

DiscoverySchool.com Technology
http://school.discovery.com/lessonplans/tech.html
-A great K-12 resource for Social Studies technology instruction.

Kathy Schrock's Guide for Educators
http://school.discovery.com/schrockguide/eval.html
-Evaluating web pages for your students

PBS Technology & Teaching
http://www.pbs.org/teachersource/teachtech.htm
-Provides a range of tutorials for technology applications, as well as the latest reports and information resources.

Computer History Museum
http://www.computerhistory.org/
-Comprehensive historical information including timelines, collections, exhibits, and research information.

Marco Polo Education
http://www.marcopolo-education.org/
-Provides-standards based internet content for the classroom for all K-12 teachers

Education World Technology Lessonshttp://www.education-world.com/a_tsl/archives/ed_tech.shtml
-Offers a range of technology lesson plans for K-12 educators.

Tech Learning
http://www.techlearning.com/
-Extensive resources on Educational Technology.

Technology in Education
http://www.inet-toolbox.com/toolbox/tkednews.html
-Current news and articles about technology in education

BellSouth's Digital Storyteller
http://www.knowitall.org/bellsouthdigitalstoryteller/
-An opportunity for students to learn history first hand by interviewing veterans from WWII and Korea. Using video technology, the students interview the veterans, capture footage, edit the story, and record a living memory, putting learning into practice while developing communication, research, and technology skills.

Anne Frank the Writer: an Unfinished Story
http://www.ushmm.org/museum/exhibit/online/af/htmlsite/
-This website presents an indepth look at her writings through the use of a narrated exhibition, interviews, an opportunity for site users to respond, artifacts from the museum, and links to other recommended sites.

American Notes: Travels in America, 1750-1920
http://lcweb2.loc.gov/ammem/lhtnhtml/lhtnhome.html
-This site is comprised of 253 published narratives by Americans and
foreign visitors recounting their travels in the colonies and the
United States and their observations and opinions about American peoples, places, and society from about 1750 to 1920.

The Technology Source
http://horizon.unc.edu/TS/
-The University of North Carolina publishes this bimonthly periodical as a resource for educators working to integrate information technology tools into teaching and managing educational organizations.

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