Direct civic engagement enables students to learn through citizenship rather than simply about citizenship and empowers them to take effective action in the future.

In this article, Kimi Waite and Jennifer Burgin describe a three-step interdisciplinary framework for learning partnerships between TK–2 students and scientists that covers the NCSS themes SCIENCE, TECHNOLOGY, SOCIETY and PEOPLE, PLACES, AND ENVIRONMENTS. The authors showcase standards-aligned learning activities and resources to help practicing educators bring the Explorer Imprint vision into their classrooms.

Examining the featured nineteenth- and early twentieth-century documents from women to Congress regarding voting rights can launch a fascinating classroom lesson on women’s suffrage and the First Amendment right to petition.

Examining the featured political cartoons offers students an opportunity to analyze myths about immigration and to consider ways that politicians have historically used nativist sentiments for political gain.

By integrating the process of critical questioning of media messages into the everyday classroom curriculum, we can help produce a citizenry with the skills needed to negotiate future threats to truth.

A close look at contemporary voting rights issuesvoter identification laws, English only laws, and felon disenfranchisementdemonstrates ways in which voting rights can be restricted by seemingly ordinary requirements.

Role-play in the classroom that avoids mimicking, caricaturing, or minimizing events in history can broaden students’ understanding of the complexities of the world.

This review of censuses from 1790 to 2010 is told through 23 objects that will stimulate student interest and offer insight into the myriad of information provided by censuses.

Examining the recent monumental Supreme Court rulings on abortion, gun rights, and religious freedom can spark important classroom discussions on their legal, political, and social implications.   

Social studies teachers can play a critical role in fostering the civic development of immigrant youth.