Teaching 7th Grade Social Studies: The Spread of Christianity
A parent once asked me why the Church was the only thing left standing in Europe after the Roman Empire collapsed. That question is the perfect starting point for any 7th grade social studies lesson on the medieval era. It forces students to look past simple dates and... read more
Teaching Geography and Adaptation in 7th Grade Social Studies
I was watching a student struggle to connect the physical map on their screen to the daily reality of the Bedouin people. They were trying to understand why someone would choose to live in the middle of a desert when they could just move toward the coast. That is... read more
Teaching Medieval West Africa in 7th Grade Social Studies
Imagine a merchant standing in the heat of a market in Timbuktu, needing to verify a complex exchange of gold for salt without sharing a common native tongue with his trading partner. In the medieval period, merchants traveled across the Sahara Desert to trade goods... read more
Teaching the Black Death in 7th Grade Social Studies
When you start planning your unit on the Middle Ages, the bubonic plague often feels like a topic that could take three weeks or three minutes. You do not need an entire month to get the point across, nor do you want to skim over it so quickly that the students lose... read more