Sam Nelson provides a window into his middle school social studies classroom based on his imagining that started three years ago. What if students were at the curriculum design table? Sam Nelson does just that with his middle school social studies students in Shelburne, Vermont. This interview shares how he orchestrates this with his 6th, 7th and 8th grade students and the impact it has on their learning.
After watching this interview, you might be interested in taking a look at some of the ideas Sam mentioned during the conversation:
- Unit overviews for Holocaust/WWII resources: structure, calendar, resources and content menu (there are two; Sam worked with a student-teacher this past year who created her own overview. They used his former overview as a content menu.)
- Historical avatar planner
- Blog post “Project-Based Learning with Historical Avatars“
- A Padlet wall of clips from this year’s avatar journals (8A Padlet, 8B Padlet)
- “SPC Notes” for 6/7th grade (totally taken over by students…messy but useful)
- Two Google Forms that were used to wrap up the year – these were passed to all students in the 6/7th grade and 8th grade classes. Then the SPC groups used the data to plan how to wrap up the school year (6/7th grade form, 8th grade form).
You can connect with Sam through his blog or on Twitter.