Reclaiming Social Studies in the Elementary Classroom

Book excerpt: "'Reclaiming Social Studies for the Elementary Classroom' is a new text that defines the core philosophy of viewing social studies from the cultural anthropological perspective. This perspective allows children to bring their own prior knowledge and experiences from their home culture to the social studies curriculum. This curriculum is a logical place to allow students the freedom to demonstrate learning through the arts. It is also a place where people show their cultural identities in celebration of traditions, ideals, rituals, and creative products. Teaching social studies and visual-performing arts are complementary to helping students understand they live in an interdependent world where people, geography, and ideas are shared. This text is structured in three main sections: understanding the concept of social studies, understanding the content of social studies and the teaching of social studies in a classroom, and understanding the specific context of integrating the various art forms with the social studies."--Publishers website.