Social Studies Department PLC meetings
2015-2016
July 28, 2015
AGENDA
I.
Atkinson, Gardner, Toms, Pace, Alls
7:30-1:30
Norms and Mission Statement
a. Norms
i. Alls gave an example of the norms from the Social Studies Leadership
Network meetings that she has been attending.
ii. We all liked the norms.
iii. Atkinson pointed out that these norms had the 7 habits imbedded in them.
iv. Toms and Pace were commenting that we could make our norms using the 7
habits.
v. With that in mind, we developed the following as the Social Studies norms
for our department meetings.
1. Be Proactive - - be on time, prepared, and with necessary materials
2. Begin with the End in Mind – be enthusiastic, be supportive of each
other, work for common good of the group, and to achieve our goals.
3. Put First Things First – stick to the goals of the meeting
4. Synergize – work collaboratively with the participation of all members
b. Mission Statement
i. Alls stated that we all seem to say the following quote, “Those that don’t
remember the past are doomed to repeat it.”
ii. Earlier, Alls had sent out some examples of mission statements for Social
Studies departments in other schools around the US. After looking at
those, we all believed that a mission statement shouldn’t be too long so that
it was difficult to remember.
iii. Pace thought that the following would be a good mission statement.
1. “Students need to know the past and engage in the present, to have
the ability to impact the future.”
iv. Gardner said this was something we could post in our rooms. He thought
that we could pull three words out of the quote. KNOW, ENGAGE, IMPACT
v. All teachers agreed with this mission statement.
“Students need to know the past and engage in the present,
to have the ability to impact the future.”
II.
Writing
a. We discussed that the following are ways that we incorporate writing in our
lessons.
i. Open responses
ii. Short essays
iii. Do nows/bell ringers
iv. Summaries
v. LDC modules
b. We will continue with this as well as continue to add LDC modules to our current
lessons.
III.
LDC modules by grade level
a. We broke a part by grade level to work on new LDC modules for the upcoming year.
b. Atkinson and Gardner worked on a Jackson LDC module. This was found on the LDC
website and modified to go with our current lessons.
c. Toms, Pace, and Alls also found several LDC modules on the website. We focused
on one that dealt with Early Civilizations.
i. We decided to modify this as well.
ii. We took our current lessons and timeline and used the Bloom Ball model on
this LDC.
IV.
Back to School Bash items – make copies of the following
a. Syllabus
b. Remind 101
c. Distribution List signup sheet
“Students need to know the past and engage in the present,
to have the ability to impact the future.”
August 17, 2015 Atkinson, Gardner, Toms, Pace, Alls, Davis
AGENDA
3:30-4:40
I.
II.
III.
IV.
Mr. Davis’ reminders
a. Mr. Davis explained to us that he attends both SS and RATS PLC meetings.
Therefore, he will be able to stay for only a short while today because he will need
to attend the RATS PLC meeting as well.
b. He also reminded us that we needed to select a peer observer from our
department for PGES.
c. Matt Gardner agreed to be our peer observer.
d. Mr. Davis suggested that we alternate who leads the PLC meetings each month.
This would allow all of us to take a turn at being in charge.
e. The last item that Mr. Davis reviewed with us was Confidentiality. He asked us to
be careful with information sharing while other students are around…For example,
your computer email or Infinite Campus being pulled up when students approach
your desk. Other examples he shared were gradebooks, etc. laying on our desk.
Review Goals for year
a. Mrs. Alls reviewed the goals of accomplishing one to two LDC modules this year.
Discuss upcoming units
a. All teachers shared where they were at in their units as well as upcoming test
dates.
Break off for LDC
a. 8th grade – Atkinson and Gardner worked on finishing the Age of Jackson LDC
module that was started in July. They also began looking at ways to utilize LDC in
the Revolutionary War. The Spy ring was the focus of this research.
b. 7th grade focused on the upcoming LDC that was created in July. Alls, Toms, and
Pace reviewed the items to ensure everything was ready to go. This unit will start
at the end of the week for Alls and beginning of next week for Toms and Pace. We
worked together to compile the culminating activity, the bloom ball. The bloom ball
is new for us, and we wanted to make sure that this activity went smoothly. Pace,
Toms, and Alls created an example of a bloom ball and worked out the problems.
Then copies were made to share with students.
“Students need to know the past and engage in the present,
to have the ability to impact the future.”
September 15, 2015
Agenda
Atkinson, Gardner, Toms, Pace, Alls, Davis, Hammer
3:30 – 4:30
I.
Constitution Day activities
a. We discussed what we would be doing for Constitution Day. Alls shared a short
twenty slide power point that had been used in the past. Alls emailed that along
with the citizenship test Amy Irwin passed along to us from Todd Steenbergen.
b. All Social Studies teachers will make reference to and discuss in some way the
Constitution.
c. In 7th grade, the teachers decided to focus on how the Bill of Rights can relate to
our current topics of study: Ten Commandments and Code of Hammurabi. Students
will actively participate in a comparison of the two as well as a brief background on
the U.S. Constitution.
d. In 8th grade, our discussion will not be as in depth due to the fact that we spend an
entire month on the U.S. Constitution. However, we will discuss the importance of
the Constitution and share some important information about the supreme law of
our nation.
e. Constitution Day will be briefly recognized on morning announcements for the
school as a whole.
II.
Data training information
a. Mr. Davis and Mrs. Hammer have discussed that this is to be a school wide
initiative. Social Studies teachers received training on Thursday, September 10 by
GRREC employees. From this meeting, teachers are to move forward with a new
method of collecting and looking at data from our assessments.
b. Mrs. Hammer briefly explained that we could link our questions on gradecam with
standards. She will show us at a later date. All Social Studies concurred that this
was a little difficult because our standards have not been finalized and will
probably not be released for another year. Hopefully. Alls will attend the Social
Studies Leadership Conference on September 23rd and hopefully will have some
news to share with the content.
c. Mr. Davis commented that he would try to get us some time to work on this as a
group. Basically, he meant that the school needs to find more time for data teams.
d. Mrs. Hammer has volunteered to come help teachers during their common planning
periods in creating assessments that are target/standard focused as well as
collecting data from such assessments. She has already created such assignments
when she was a Science teacher. Therefore, she has been and will be a great asset
in explaining and aiding in the creation of such assessments. She explained that
Science may have 40 to 45 multiple choice questions and one extended response
“Students need to know the past and engage in the present,
to have the ability to impact the future.”
e.
f.
g.
h.
i.
j.
question. There would be about twenty learning targets for such an assessment.
The extended response may have as much as four learning targets associated with
it.
Mrs. Hammer is waiting to receive data formatted documents from GRREC that will
aid teachers in their data collections.
Mr. Davis asked the teachers what our first assessment/content to focus on will
be.
Alls explained that a few years ago Heather Gardner helped the 7th grade teachers
to rearrange their Ancient Israelites test by learning targets. Therefore, these
teachers will use this as the first attempt while they will work on later
assignments. Toms mentioned that a focus on Ancient Greece would be
appropriate. Pace agreed.
Gardner suggested that our focus be more on formative rather than summative
assessments. He also suggested that the 8th grade teachers look at the Road to
Revolution unit when creating such assessments. Since we all are currently
teaching the Life in the Colonies unit, Atkinson and Alls agreed that Road to
Revolution would make more sense and give us more time.
Mrs. Hammer stated that using standards/learning targets to develop tests makes
you more intentional in preparing your tests/lessons. This process may take longer
to connect standards and learning targets but she feels like she was a better
because of it.
The next SS PLC meeting will be Thursday, October 22nd. Mr. Davis would like for
us to have already given an assessment before this meeting.
October 22, 2015
Agenda
I.
Atkinson, Gardner, Toms, Pace, Alls, Downs
3:20 – 4:20
Data test information
a. We decided to split up. 7th grade teachers (Toms and Pace) would discuss test
results while 8th grade teachers (Gardner, Atkinson, and Alls) would look at
creating a new test.
b. 7th grade went to Toms’ room to look at test results over Ancient Israelites and
discuss what questions were most missed.
c. The most missed questions for Toms’ class and Pace’s were involving charts, maps,
and reading passages.
d. Toms pulled up her gradecam test results on the smart board. Her overall
averages were great. Pace and Alls overall averages were not as good but not
totally bad either.
“Students need to know the past and engage in the present,
to have the ability to impact the future.”
e. 8th grade looked at the test over the American Revolution in order to change the
format of the test to allow the questions to be aligned with the correct learning
targets.
f. Alls printed off the 8th grade curriculum map and American Revolution test for the
teachers to use in this process.
g. Gardner and Alls looked at each questions and decided which learning target the
questions aligned with the most.
h. During the process, Gardner and Alls realized that they needed to reword some of
the learning targets as well as created new ones. This allowed for questions to
better connect with a learning target.
i. Alls agreed to type this test in the new format.
II.
Snow day packets
a. These were discussed as a whole group prior to the split.
b. We wondered what types of activities were needed to send home with kids. Trying
to figure out the content of the packet was difficult. One does not know when
snow will come making the content selection for these packets tricking.
c. Alls shared that she had found several units for 8th grade using the Digital History
website. Unfortunately, this website is for American History only.
d. Gardner shared that he had been using the Stanford website for history teachers.
This was very beneficial and would probably have World history as well. This is also
known as Reading like a historian. Sheg.stanford.edu
e. Toms and Pace looked up information on this website that might be used for the
snow day packets. Topics included Roman Republic as well as Roman Empire and
Christianity. There were reading passages and activities for those topics.
Tuesday, November 10, 2015
Agenda
I.
Alls, Atkinson, Davis, Gardner, Toms
3:20 – 4:20
Data Team Meeting on Friday
a. We all discussed what items were needed for this meeting. 7th grade teachers will
be bringing their Ancient Greece formative assessments. 8th grade will be bringing
their Creating a Nation, Article I, and Article II-VII of the Constitution formative
assessment.
b. Davis asked about our standards. Alls told the group that as of the last meeting
the standards will be released for next school year. However, it is not known when
Social Studies will be accountable on the state KYPREP test. There was some
discussion about the learning targets and how our last tests with questions aligned
“Students need to know the past and engage in the present,
to have the ability to impact the future.”
to these targets will be beneficial in the long run. Davis made mention how this
helped the Science department to focus on what needed to be retaught.
II.
iLearn@home activities
a. Both grade have at least two days completed.
b. Mrs. Hammer had emailed a list of questions for us to answer to ensure the
iLearn@home will meet the guidelines set by Central Office and the state.
c. Alls went over these questions and asked about the elephant in the room which was
how do we handle if one of us is too sick to answer questions.
d. Toms, Gardner, and Alls had been discussing at the beginning of the meeting about
how to accomplish this.
e. The suggestion was made by Toms to create a separate google classroom that is
just for the subject and grade level.
f. This would give us all access.
g. Then the question was asked about how to go about letting the kids know which one
to use.
h. Would this be confusing to them? This was confusing to us.
i. Toms and Alls made the suggestion to add the email addresses of the other grade
level teachers to the bottom of the handout. This would allow them to contact
another teacher if their teacher was not available.
j. The link or code for a shared google classroom might also be added to the handout
in case they wanted to use that avenue.
k. Gardner and Toms both discussed google voice as a method.
l. We had earlier in the day met with Melissa Moss. She shared several ways that
google would aid us in these iLearn@home days.
III.
Primary Source Documents assessment
a. Davis and Gardner went to Gardner’s room to discuss the primary source document
quiz that 8th grade had taken.
b. Gardner then began working on correcting/changing some of the wording on the
upcoming American Revolution test.
c. Alls and Toms worked on the 7th grade primary source document quiz to be given at
the end of the week.
d. Finding primary sources for ancient civilizations has been a difficult endeavor for
the 7th grade.
e. Toms found a website that had sample primary source documents written by
Herodotus, the ancient Greek historian. These documents came with some sample
questions that would have to be modified or completely changed.
f. Toms and Alls worked on this for the remaining time.
“Students need to know the past and engage in the present,
to have the ability to impact the future.”
Monday, December 7, 2015
Agenda
Alls, Atkinson, Pace, Gardner, Toms, Hammer,
Willis, Edwards, Barrett, McConnell, Davidson,
Benefield
3:20 – 4:20
Joint meeting of Language Arts and Social Studies for Data Team instruction

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We spent the time working in our content and grade specific areas. Hammer gave
instructions on how to proceed using the Data Team example from our Data Team
meeting as a school on Friday, December 4, 2015.
Each content and grade level analyzed a writing piece that they had developed and
given prior to this meeting. On a chart paper, we marked how many students we
had from one class that were Proficient, Close to Proficient, Progressing or Needs
Improvement.
Then we used the handout to look at each of the above mentioned groups to see
teacher and student behavior and what we could infer. Then as a group we decided
next steps, what to look for, and what each group would specifically need to
improve.
After completing these steps for each category of students, we then wrote a goal
for the next Data Team meeting which will be on January 15, 2016. To arrive at
the percent, we divided the number of Proficient, Close to Proficient, and
Progressing students by the total number in class. Then we made a goal that we
hope to attain before the next meeting.
Final points: Design a writing piece to be given before the next Data Team meeting
in January.
Thursday, January 14, 2016
Agenda
I.
Alls, Atkinson, Pace, Gardner, Toms, Davis, Downs
3:20 – 4:40
Primary Source Documents assessment used for student growth goals
a. We discussed our student growth goals and the fact that the post assessment
date is coming soon.
b. Atkinson, Gardner, and Alls decided to give the 8th grade SS post assessment
over primary documents when we teach the Age of Jefferson unit. This unit
should have more primary source documents to choose from in creating the
assessment.
c. Gardner and Atkinson looked at several websites in designing this assessment.
They were able to create a rough assessment. Atkinson, Gardner, and Alls are
to review the assessment to ensure this would work.
“Students need to know the past and engage in the present,
to have the ability to impact the future.”
d. Pace, Toms, and Alls agreed to give a post assessment over primary documents
over Ancient Rome near the end of February if possible. They agreed to look at
websites and meet during planning to create the assessment and review it.
II.
Prioritizing the Standards to create an assessment
a. In lieu of creating a new assessment, Atkinson, Gardner, and Alls decided to see
what assessment they already have and revise it to make it work.
b. Atkinson and Gardner found some activities that would not only supplement the
assessment but also the unit that follows. It was decided that the 8th grade
assessment would cover Washington’s domestic and foreign policies.
c. Toms shared printed documents of open responses/extended responses over
the current unit. Pace and Alls agreed with her on which would be a good
assessment to use in the following week.
III.
LDC modules
a. Atkinson and Gardner had previously worked on a LDC module over the Age of
Jackson. They reviewed this to see what changes need to be made. This
module will be used near or at the end of February.
b. Toms, Pace, and Alls reviewed previously discussed sample LDC modules. We
decided that the students really enjoyed the Bloom Ball activity from the first
LDC module we used this year. Therefore, we sat down and created a Bloom
Ball activity that would cover the next unit in Rome. We created all the
categories for the Bloom Ball. Our next steps are to write the daily guide to
help focus our instructions around the Bloom Ball.
“Students need to know the past and engage in the present,
to have the ability to impact the future.”
Thursday, April 21, 2016
Agenda
I.
II.
III.
Alls, Atkinson, Pace, Toms
3:20 – 4:45
End of the year lessons
 We looked back over the prior tests from this semester to select questions for
the final.
 Divided by grade level
 Once the questions were decided upon then they were compiled into a separate
test and formatted.
 A study guide was also created.
 There was discussion over the number of questions to use on the test.
 7th grade decided upon 40 questions.
 8th grade decided upon 60 questions.
Finals
 We discussed where we are currently and how much we would likely cover by
the end of the school year.
 We decided on the best route to take.
Team building
 Derek provided us with an inspirational video that demonstrated the need for
team work to be successful.
 We gathered from this video that team members must work in sync with one
another in order to create a gold medal type performance. Through constant
practice and coordination we can be successful. Sometimes, one must give up
something that was holding us back in order to achieve our dreams. Another
may have to pick up the slack and venture outside of the “home” to help the
other succeed.
“Students need to know the past and engage in the present,
to have the ability to impact the future.”