This posting continues this blog’s review of a National
Council for the Social Studies (NCSS) publication, identified here as the C3 Framework.[1] That publication is the result of social
studies educators developing standards that can be utilized with the Common
Core standards. In turn, the Common Core
Standards project is one in which the US Department of Education is attempting
to upgrade the educational efforts of America’s schools.
Specifically, the social studies
standards are to be suggested to state education officials as content
components to the English/Language Arts standards – a “backdoor” entry for
social studies influence to be felt through the Common Core venue. The reader is invited to look at the last
three posting for a description of this effort.
This posting
will look at the structural format this NCSS publication employs. Actually, the structure is quite elaborate
and a bit extensive for a thorough review here.
Suffice it to point out that the structure is mostly organized around a
set of dimensions. These dimensions are
treated as extension of an overall organizing concept: “Inquiry Arc.” As stated in an earlier posting, social
studies educators have opted to focus on an instructional approach – one that
is seen as antagonistic to the instructional approach most social studies
teachers utilize.
Since the
sixties – more formally – and earlier, reformers of this subject area have
riled against the didactic approaches those teachers use. That would be mostly lecturing and perhaps using
demonstrations. Instead, these reformers
argued that social studies teachers should have students engage in active
research over “tantalizing” questions. An
example question, lifted from the C3
Framework, is: “Was the American Revolution a revolution?” That is, was the American War for
Independence a real transformative event or merely a shift in who had political
power?
With such a
question, students in some form will hypothesize, gather information, test any
hypotheses, form a conclusion, and apply the conclusion. At least that was the process promoted
initially by the New Social Studies during the sixties and seventies. Since then, there have been other
instructional models along these lines, but the general thrust has been this
active research role for students to analyze the content they are studying.
This writer is
partial to this general approach, but he believes it is not for everyone. He has known successful teachers that simply
do not feel comfortable with using inquiry style instruction. Yet, and this is seen as essential to
successful teaching, these teachers have been able to get their students to
reflect on the material these teachers present them.
That is, they did not rely on
students merely memorizing the material but thinking about it. That could include analyzing, questioning,
evaluating, etc. Students do this on
their own but are motivated to do so by the way these teachers present the
content. They were able to tantalize
their students by their presentations.
But the NCSS publication is committed
to “insisting” inquiry be “the way” by which to teach social studies. That policy decision addresses the sequence
of social studies subjects; how about the scope of those subjects? That is, what should the content of social
studies be? In terms of this
publication, scope cannot escape the Inquiry Arc.
Here is how the C3 Framework couches the content:
“The Inquiry Arc highlights the structure of and rationale for the
organization of the Framework’s four Dimensions. The Arc focuses on the nature
of inquiry in general and the pursuit of knowledge through questions in
particular.”[2] The content concerns – as indirectly as the
publication presents them – is through these Four Dimensions.
The four dimensions are: 1) Developing questions and planning
inquiries; 2) Applying disciplinary tools and concepts; 3) Evaluating sources
and using evidence; and 4) Communicating conclusions and taking action. One can readily discern the “Inquiry Arc”
having its influence throughout the substantive content of these
standards. The bias is clearly favoring
the sequence, as opposed to the scope, of social studies.
The one dimension that attempts to
address content most directly is dimension #2:
applying disciplinary tools and concepts. The subjects or disciplines highlighted in
this document are civics (interestingly listed first), economics, geography,
and history (interestingly listed last).
There is also material (appendixes) addressing other social studies
subjects: psychology, sociology, and
anthropology.[3] But in terms of the first four subjects –
civics, economics, geography, and history – the introduction of their treatment
is telling.
That is, under a section of the
publication which begins with an inquiry:
“What does liberty look like?: Compelling
questions through disciplinary lenses,” the judgement here is the developers
betray their central view of governance and politics. That view is the natural rights
construct. Hence, it is not critical
theory and it is not – more importantly to this blog – federation theory.
More specifically, here are the
identified, overall “compelling questions” the publication cites: in terms of civics the compelling question is
“what is the line between liberty and responsibility?” In terms of economics it is “does more
liberty mean more prosperity?” In terms
of geography it is “how does liberty change from place to place?” And in terms
of history it is “when did Americans gain their liberty?”
Not to claim the following is the
ideal set of questions, they can be considered if federation theory was the
main guide in determining content. They
are: for civics, what is the line
between duties and obligations and those of liberty?; for economics, can prosperity
be attained without duties and responsibilities being met?; for geography, “do
duties and responsibilities vary from place to place?; and for history, how has
American sense of duties and responsibilities evolved during the years of its
existence?
These latter set of questions project
a whole different tone to the effort. In
terms of the hypothesis this review of the publication has been applying – that
the effort falls safely within the guidance of the natural rights perspective –
the evidence is it is holding up. That
means that to this point of the review, the publication content indicates that,
one, it does not rely on a substantive sense of what the common good is (or
good citizenship in a substantive way) and, two, relies on instructional
concerns as opposed to content concerns.
This review of the NCSS publication will
not, in the future, be in consecutive postings.
This writer will visit this topic from time to time in the future. A motivator to revisit this topic will be if
the writer comes across material that counters the indicated hypothesis or if
parts of the publication indicates useful instructional or substantive ideas
that would assist civics instruction.
[1] National Council for the Social Studies, Preparing Students for College, Career, and
Civic Life (Washington, D. C.: NCSS,
2013), accessed April 16, 2018, https://www.socialstudies.org/c3.
[2] Ibid., 12.
[3] As stated earlier in this review – several postings
ago – it is done in real time. The
writer has not read those appendixes yet.
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