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The purpose of this paper is to illuminate for social studies teachers and teacher educators the ways in which students' disciplinary writing is scaffolded within the context of the inquiry design model; trends in such scaffolding are called “the learner's pathway,” since it leads students to more abstract levels of historical argumentation. The author argues that engaging historical writing genres is a necessary component of historical thinking and that understanding the ways that teachers support students' historical writing capacities can help them to make more intentional choices when building inquiries.

To study genre-related scaffolding across inquiries, this study draws on systemic functional linguistics (SFL)-based genre theory as an analytical structure and seventy-four history-focused secondary social studies inquiries to determine any patterns in the ways that teachers scaffold students' writing genres through an inquiry.

Findings suggest that there is a learner's pathway that teachers use to develop students' argumentative writing capacities; however, there is also evidence to suggest that notetaking and source synthesis are not valued instructional products, limiting the potential impact of historical thinking work within the inquiry process.

The existence of this learner's pathway has implications for the ways that teachers and preservice teachers can be professionally developed to leverage this pathway. Rather than the often-used methods of support students' generic writing capacities, professional development should focus on the ways social studies teachers can guide students to more abstract reasoning through their writing. This study's findings also have implications for the ways that social studies teachers assess students' summative arguments. Assessment practices should focus on the genre-features of “argument” rather than just the stages of the argumentative essay.

This piece is original because genre-based research is missing from much of the social studies education research. This study's findings present an additional paradigm through which social studies teachers and teacher leaders can explore the purposes of historical writing tasks and assessment.

In the Fall of 2020, three teacher educators in Ohio collaborated on a three-month long online professional development series on how to write Focused Inquiries, a la the Inquiry Design Model (IDM).

The authors detail the contents of the six group professional development (PD) sessions and share the lessons that the authors learned as a result of leading this training.

Given this study’s mixed results, the authors often came back to the questions of “maybe it was us? Maybe it was the pandemic? Maybe there wasn’t enough training? Or maybe IDM creation isn’t a skill that all teachers possess and maybe that’s ok?” The authors share the struggles with these questions and situate all of this within the current culture wars raging around schools today.

Finally, the authors offer the current approach to inquiry training for teachers that situates inquiry creation later in the process after significant structured introductory work.

This work explores the creation and purposes of an inquiry about Emilio Aguinaldo, a Filipino revolutionary and sometimes United States ally, as a means to discuss the value of both inquiry and historical empathy in bridging history instruction and civic life. Though history is often identified as a means to foster democratic dispositions, learning can often feel disconnected from students' lived experiences, let alone directly connect to their out-of-classroom circumstances. Teaching with historical empathy allows students to affectively engage with content, resulting in complex reasoning and content acquisition.

The authors explain an original inquiry that uses the Inquiry Design Model (IDM) and historical empathy to help students complicate Emilio Aguinaldo and his legacy. By combining historical empathy and the inquiry model, the authors structured their work for practitioner use but also as a way to draw on rarely emphasized content in US or World history courses.

In using this model, students will be able to apply their learning in a civic engagement task related to modern questions of US geopolitics.

The authors offer and explore the process of an original inquiry as a way to help practitioners and scholars consider how to create other such rigorous opportunities for students to practice global citizenship.

The C3 Framework is a recent example in a long history within the field of social studies education of efforts to engage teachers and students in inquiry-oriented teaching and learning. While there is some research regarding the efficacy of the inquiry design model (IDM) of the C3 Framework, few studies have sought to engage social studies teachers as coresearchers as they integrate the framework. This study addressed a persistent divide between the theory and practice of integrating inquiry in the social studies.

In this study, a classroom teacher and a university-based researcher conducted a hybrid action research study to understand the instructional shifts that occur as the C3 Framework is fully implemented into instruction.

Based on the findings, the authors present a theory of action to highlight key opportunities to shift instruction, while also acknowledging the factors that might mitigate those shifts. In particular, the authors focus on teacher decision-making and contextual factors that allow for and hinder the full integration of inquiry.

This study is unique in developing a hybrid action research/qualitative case study that provides insider knowledge related to improving social studies teaching and learning.

Preservice teachers (PSTs) typically have few opportunities to observe social studies instruction in PSTs' elementary field placements. To practice effective integration as a pathway to include more social studies instruction, PSTs developed a unit plan based on inquiry during an undergraduate methods course. The purpose of this study was to explore what scaffolds were effective in PSTs' development of social studies inquiry projects.

The author used a multiple case study approach, examining initial submissions, feedback and resubmissions as PSTs developed PSTs' inquiry projects. The data were analyzed with an eye on PSTs' ability to plan a unit according to the four dimensions of the C3 Framework's inquiry arc (National Council for the Social Studies [NCSS], 2013).

The author analyzed data related to PSTs’ area of highest need from PSTs' initial submissions: staging the task, formative tasks and resources. PSTs were able to develop inquiry projects after being supported in their (1) organization, (2) clarity, (3) alignment and (4) developmental appropriateness.

This study shows that novice teachers can create high-quality social studies learning experiences in elementary school when provided appropriate supports (in this case, feedback about organization, clarity, alignment and developmental appropriateness). With the tools to develop such projects, new teachers may be able to increase the amount of social studies taught in elementary classrooms.

Advanced Placement Human Geography continues to grow in popularity at the secondary level, but not without its supporters and critics. The purpose of this paper is to examine one critique, the lack of critical geography and then give two examples how teachers could incorporate it using inquiry.

Critical geography examines the praxis between space, place and identity, exposing power imbalances constructed within space and place. Critical geographers also consider how to transform space and place to be more equitable. This paper provides two examples of how critical geography can be infused into content covered in AP Human Geography using the C3 Framework and the Inquiry Design Model. By infusing critical geographic perspectives into AP Human Geography students practice asking questions about inequities in space and place with an opportunity to become agents of transformation.

There is a gap in AP Human Geography when it comes to incorporating critical geography. This paper looks to redress that by providing two examples on how critical geography could be used in an AP Human Geography curriculum.

This collection of two inquiries is given as ways that AP Human Geography instructors could incorporate critical geography into their classrooms.

The purpose of this paper is to present a method to incorporate teaching about religion into K–12 social studies classes. A central tenet of social studies education is preparing students to be engaged citizens, and religious literacy is essential to this. Yet, teachers often feel uncomfortable teaching about religion. One way to approach this is by centering discussion about religion around understanding who our neighbors are.

This paper employs the Inquiry Design Model to outline lessons for early, middle and upper grades, each centered around the compelling question, “Who are my Muslim neighbors?” Beginning with a picturebook depicting a Muslim American child, the lessons explore supporting questions with academically appropriate sources, culminate with an evidence-based response to the compelling question and suggest an opportunity for students to take informed action.

While religion does not appear in many social studies standards, teaching about religion has strong connections to civics standards. In an increasingly diverse USA, students need to understand the beliefs and religious behaviors of their neighbors and how those traditions provide a sense of belonging within the faith community. This paper provides the necessary tools for teachers to teach this content. In addition to teaching these as outlined here, teachers can also select resources from across the three units in order to customize an inquiry for a particular group of students.

Teachers are often hesitant to teach about religion. This paper offers a concrete method for doing so. Incorporating religion into social studies classes is necessary for preparing students for civic engagement.

This article outlines theoretical and pedagogical approaches to investigating racial violence with learners in grades 3–12 and K-12 teacher candidates. Throughout, the authors use the 1898 Wilmington Race Massacre as a central example of racial violence. Using a blended framework of Muhammad’s historically responsive literacy, King’s Black historical consciousness and place-based learning, the authors describe two different inquiries that build content knowledge around the Wilmington Race Massacre and context knowledge around place as it relates to Black agency, resistance and perseverance.

The first inquiry, aimed at 3–12 learners, explores the Black historical consciousness themes of Black agency and resistance. It uses the inquiry design model (IDM) template but expands the template to include a historically responsive literacy lens. The second inquiry describes how to incorporate historical sites into the study of racial violence. This inquiry explains how local cemeteries can be used as interdisciplinary classrooms and also artifacts.

Throughout, the authors also reflect on how this work has changed and improved over time as well as thoughts moving forward with examining the 1898 Wilmington Race Massacre through an interdisciplinary lens.

This article is the first to explore the 1898 Massacre in Wilmington, North Carolina from an interdisciplinary practice and cross-grades lens. It offers multiple step by step approaches for classroom teachers and teacher educators to enact interdisciplinary work with both 1898 and other acts of racial violence in their own places and across the United States.

The purpose of this paper is to engage readers with Unity Productions Foundation (UPF) films, which provide a powerful, inspirational digital tool for teachers. The organization's mission is to create documentaries, films and educational materials that contribute to bringing to light compelling stories of Muslim engagement through history and culture. UPF films and educational projects aim to promote peace and understanding to increase cultural pluralism and counter bigotry in our world.

Teachers will be able to utilize the resources provided in this paper to harness the power of media in their classrooms. Outlining the process by which teachers can follow the C3 inquiry using the film Prince Among Slaves will prepare teachers to see the alignment of the C3 Framework with their teaching. The “best practice” classroom strategies in structuring deliberations are ones that encourage students to fully participate and emphasize their voice.

This paper will unpack the practice methods that address the film Prince Among Slaves to be of benefit when sharing narratives through digital film and engage students in critical thinking through the C3 Framework. UPF films are the product of scholarly research and innovative production teams as the films provide the opportunity to visualize and explore multiple perspectives to understand historical content by providing a context for inquiry teaching and learning that is inclusive through deliberative discussions in the classroom.

The author certifies that this manuscript submission is original work and that all authors were involved in the intellectual elaboration of the manuscript and all parties have been acknowledged.

In recent years, the field of social studies education has seen renewed interest in using inquiry to teach intradisciplinary concepts and skills. However, prospective primary grade teachers may have few (if any) opportunities to observe classroom teachers modeling inquiry during field placements. Methods courses provide fitting contexts in which to introduce preservice teachers (PSTs) to inquiry as a basis for intellectually challenging, meaningful social studies instruction. The purpose of this paper is to utilize a published inquiry curriculum developed for the New York Social Studies Toolkit (NYSST) Project as a tool to explore PSTs’ thinking about teaching first grade economics.

This qualitative study utilized focus groups with two groups of early childhood PSTs enrolled in a social studies methods course (n=28). Secondary data sources included PSTs’ handwritten comments on hard copies of the inquiry curriculum and the researcher’s analytic memos.

In the process of critiquing curriculum during focus group interviews, PSTs concentrated on the proposed tasks, evaluated those tasks for their potential to affect children’s understanding, and suggested new activities that would promote more active student engagement. Participants recognized the significance of children’s prior knowledge and were sensitive to students’ family values, although they underestimated young children’s capacity for robust discussion and intellectually challenging content.

This study is unique in its use of a published NYSST Project inquiry to explore how PSTs make sense of new curriculum. Its attention to PST education for primary grades contributes to elementary social studies literature. Additionally, this study addresses a general concern in teacher education about the need for PSTs to develop skills in interpreting and adapting curriculum materials. Findings suggest that engaging PSTs in discussions about social studies curriculum can help teacher educators identify latent learning goals for their courses that may be overlooked or assumed unnecessary.