2025 North Carolina Council for the Social Studies Conference

Help students commemorate the 250th anniversary of the state and nation. The Department of Natural & Cultural Resources is leading the America 250 NC commemoration and has produced resources to help K-12 students learn about change over time for state government and voting rights and explore the question, “When Are We US?” Classroom activities and displays can boost instruction about the founding principles of government and raise questions about citizen rights and responsibilities, while examining the cultural heritage the state preserves and inspiring students to make the past meaningful. This content is especially relevant for U.S. history and civics classes.

Simulations requiring physical movement, creativity, and problem-solving—while affecting simulated real-world outcomes—produce the energy necessary to wire the students' neural network for higher recall, better learning, and synthesis. Learn the science of simulations and how to design and implement them to avoid pitfalls and get the best from this dynamic learning strategy.

Teaching the Holocaust is a profound responsibility that requires sensitivity, accuracy, and the ability to foster empathy in students. This session offers practical strategies for integrating resources from the US Holocaust Memorial Museum and the NC Council on the Holocaust into their teaching. By leveraging these materials, educators can create meaningful learning experiences that honor the victims, highlight the resilience of survivors, and confront the historical realities of this pivotal event. Participants will explore age-appropriate resources designed to engage students in critical thinking and address common challenges, such as balancing the emotional impact of the content with student age and maturity levels and combating misinformation or bias. This session will include resources for 6-8 Social Studies, World History, Civics, and American History.

The Tar Heel Boys and Girls state programs are the premier government in action summer leadership programs in the state for rising high school seniors. This session will be an in depth look at the programs and will explain how we build government from the city and county levels, create political parties and platforms, and elect a governor of our fictious state in the span of one week. We will also discuss how to find the local contacts in your area so your students are represented.

High school and middle school teachers will be introduced to instructional activities and bell ringers available through ABC-CLIO and other sources that support inquiry based learning and critical thinking. Participants will take on the role of students as they engage with a sample bell ringer and instructional activity that brings to life diverse female voices and untold stories from Women’s History in the United States. Teachers will leave the session with a full lesson including primary and secondary sources to use in the classroom.

Are you struggling with modifying lessons for Multilingual (EL) Learners? Come to this session to see how two teachers have modified lessons to make content accessible for Multilingual (EL) learners. Participants will receive modified lesson plan samples in the following subjects: World History, Economics and Personal Finance, and Civic Literacy and strategies to help you modify your lessons in the future. You are encouraged to bring a lesson that you would like help modifying for your classroom.

Powerful learning happens when we share powerful evidence, ask compelling questions, and integrate edtech tools into lesson designs! We’ll showcase beginner, moderate, & veteran-level exemplar lessons based on the FIELD Guide, all guaranteed to engage students with primary sources, inquiry, and tech tools. Leave with ready-to-use materials and planning strategies. Objectives: This session will: Highlight the latest research on the impact of foundational evidence, inquiry-based activities, and technology tools on student achievement. Model concrete & practical strategies for integrating primary sources and edtech tools into inquiry-centered instructional activities, each one targeted to specific teacher experience and comfort levels. Demonstrate a framework for creating research-based lessons and units focused on increasing student content knowledge and historical thinking skills. Engage participants in small group and whole group discussions about how best to adapt our exemplars and to share their own best practice examples. Content/Skills: Attendees will: Learn about the FIELD Guide, a research-based framework for integrating foundational evidence, inquiry-based thinking skills, and edtech tools into social studies classrooms. Learn how to find powerful primary sources and integrate them in a variety of inquiry-based learning activities. Be introduced to the skills needed to find, rank, and integrate the most effective technology tools into their social studies instructional designs, using the FIELD Guide checklist. Build confidence in making lesson plan design decisions that align with their teaching experience level, background using foundational evidence, and comfort with using technology. Get a preview of a soon-to-be-published book about teaching social studies from Corwin publishing.

Attendees will examine curricular experiences for students and professional learning content for teachers that aim to address the civic literacy crisis that exists in the U.S. today. Discover what is being learned from North Carolina teachers implementing this work as part of a fellowship in high-need urban and rural schools. Attendees will learn how Literacy for Civic Life (LCL) fellowship teachers are using the LCL curriculum to enhance their teaching, and what they learned in the process about using intensive reading and writing tasks and instruction to teach across the C3 inquiry arc while focusing on civic literacy.

U.S. History: State Lotteries: From Colonial Times to the N.C. Education Lottery. The history of U.S. lotteries dates back to Colonial Times. George Washington, Thomas Jefferson, Benjamin Franklin in their day all employed lotteries to raise money for good causes. The popularity of lotteries has waxed and waned. Today, they are more popular than ever. Last year, North Carolina employed its state lottery to raise more than $1 billion for education programs in our state. The test for state lotteries today will be if this time in history their popularity can be sustained.

Empower your students to become historians! Join National History Day (NHD) State Coordinator Karen Ipock and Davidson County Schools educator Ashley Coons, also a former NHD student, as they explore how the program brings historical inquiry to life for students. This yearlong, inquiry-based program aligns with NC educational standards and promotes critical thinking in state, U.S., and World History. You’ll leave with tools to inspire student curiosity and meaningful historical exploration, along with resources to easily incorporate it into your classroom. This workshop is perfect for middle and high school teachers seeking active, integrative, and challenging approaches to social studies!

You no longer have to read through all of the 6,000 classroom-ready lessons that are available for free on the Bill of Rights Institute's website. https://billofrightsinstitute.org/north-carolina-bri-aligned-state-standards A cohort of North Carolina teachers has aligned 86 of their best lessons to our Civic Literacy standards. If you are confused by our state’s unpacking document, start here for a simple roadmap that will help organize your instruction, cover all your content, and set your students up for success in understanding the American system of government.

This presentation will explore how inquiry-based instruction can be applied in Economics and Personal Finance classrooms, with a focus on scaffolding strategies for diverse student abilities. Participants will learn how inquiry can work for all learners by anticipating knowledge gaps, supporting vocabulary development, integrating technology, and engagement strategies. Through a combination of lecture, participation in engaging techniques, and sharing resources, educators will gain practical tools to enhance instructional planning and student engagement. This session is designed to empower teachers with effective strategies for implementing inquiry in social studies education.

Explore and gain strategies to foster respectful dialogue among middle school students with diverse perspectives to advance students’ interest and engagement in any Social Studies classroom. Educators will learn engaging, research-backed methods that boost academic and social-emotional development and lower the temperature of polarization. Educators will receive free tools, discussion strategies, and assessment ideas to integrate civil discourse into any Social Studies content, preparing students to navigate challenging issues with empathy and understanding.

This professional development (PD) session is designed to provide educators with effective strategies for creating rigorous and engaging Social Studies classrooms. The focus will be on fostering a sense of belonging, promoting arts integration, differentiation, and supporting reading and writing across the curriculum, all while emphasizing cultural relevance. Participants will explore how the arts can enrich social studies education and learn methods to incorporate the arts to encourage critical thinking, engagement, and creativity in their lessons. This session will equip educators with the knowledge and skills needed to design dynamic classrooms that enhance student learning, promote inclusivity, and improve achievement in social studies. I am confident that this PD experience will be both enriching and valuable for all participants.

Social studies teachers are often faced with dwindling resources and a growing spectrum of student background knowledge and ability levels in their classrooms.One possible solution lies in the seemingly limitless scope of AI platforms and its generative abilities. In this session we’ll discuss takeaways from using multiple AI platforms to support social studies content development as well as the implications on inclusive course content, diverse learners, and Universal Design for Learning.

It can take hours to find the right resources and even longer to get them ready for your students. Kindred K-12 is an AI-based teaching platform that makes it easier for you to find, adapt, and use high-quality resources, like primary sources, for your classroom. We help social studies teachers build inquiry-based classrooms customized to what works best for them and their students. This session gets you started with Kindred and walks through a demo of what it can do for you. Curriculum and instruction leaders are welcome to learn more about how our technology can encourage research-backed teaching practices in your district. Geared 6-12. All are welcome.

This session is designed to help teachers hold meaningful and productive conversations with their students about public policies, controversial issues, and current events. It offers tools and teaching strategies that can make fostering civil discourse in the classroom feel less overwhelming and challenging.

To more effectively prepare teachers the field of education is amidst a “practice-turn” to emphasize the practice of teaching and mastery of skills directly related to effective classroom instruction (e.g., Grossman, 2018; Mancenido, 2023). Practice based teacher education emphasizes using the learning cycle to deconstruct, observe, practice and enact high leverage practices. This session will explore the use of a variety of intentionally structured simulation experiences including Mursion, a mixed reality platform that uses a combination of artificial intelligence and live human interaction to create immersive simulations for learning and practice teaching civics in an undergraduate social studies methods course.

How can you incorporate the histories of Brazil or Cuba in your U.S. History, World History, or Latin American Studies course? With Choices Program curriculum units of course! We’ll explore the student readings, lessons, and videos found in both the History, Revolution, and Reform: New Directions for Cuba unit, and the Brazil: A History of Change unit, and discuss ways you can incorporate them, in whole or in part, into your classroom. Each unit is about 10-15 days in length and is appropriate for middle and high school classrooms. Free one-year Digital Editions license to one of the units (your choice) is provided.

This session explores how elementary social studies educators can effectively integrate WIDA Standards to support multilingual learners in accessing and engaging with social studies content. Through hands-on activities, participants will analyze social studies tasks, adapt materials, and create learning objectives that align with both academic content standards and language development goals. Also, will examine strategies for scaffolding instruction to build academic language while fostering critical thinking and inquiry-based learning. The session will highlight examples of using WIDA’s Proficiency Level Descriptors and Key Language Uses (Narrate, Inform, Explain, and Argue,) to design lessons that are inclusive and culturally and linguistically sustaining.

Social Studies classes are enriched by inquiry – but what about the practicalities of incorporating it into your practice? Teachers attending this session will walk away with research-based materials addressing implementation hurdles of inquiry. Topics include: supporting ELLs, working towards student-led discussion, addressing digital literacies, differentiating inquiry, and improving compelling questions. Materials include lesson plans as well as teacher guides for specific scaffolds with examples. These materials can be incorporated into your existing curriculum and schedule. Geared towards 6-12. All Welcome. Hosted by Kindred K-12.

The session introduces the student readings, lessons, and videos in the Choices Program’s award-winning unit, The Vietnam War: Origins, History, and Legacies, and provides teachers with a complimentary one-year license to the unit. The session demonstrates an innovative “long history” framework to the study of war and demonstrates ways to bring multiple voices and perspectives into the study of the Vietnam War. Appropriate for U.S. History, World History, Foreign Policy electives, Asian Studies, and several AP and IB courses, the session will include participating in a very abbreviated lesson on creating Historical Narratives and one on women in the Vietnam War.

Participants explore the events of the Holocaust through the lens of media, by examining propaganda deployed by the Nazis to discriminate against Jews and other minorities. Educators gain tools to facilitate classroom discussions and support students to analyze media in today’s world. This session would be most appropriate for NC social studies courses in grades 6-11.

On November 10, 1898 the only successful coup d'etat in America took place in Wilmington, North Carolina. The insurrection ended with many of Wilmington’s African-American citizens murdered, many more fled Wilmington never to return, while still others were barred from the city in perpetuity. The Daily Record, the black-owned and published newspaper also had its building burned to the ground by insurrectionists. Self-avowed “white supremacists” led the insurrection that had been building for months with racially charged language and accusations. The aftermath of this massacre on Wilmington, North Carolina, and the South as a whole was palpable and repercussions were felt for many decades. This is a part of North Carolina history and United States history about which many are not aware. If you attend this session, you will learn more about the role played by Charles B. Aycock, Furnifold Simmons, Alfred M. Waddell, the Secret 9, the Redshirts, and Alex Manly, as well as The News and Observer. Come to this session to learn more about the famous people, the forgotten people, and the little-known events of the Wilmington Massacre/Insurrection of 1898. We will also discuss how this historical event continues to have an effect on the present.

Elementary students need to learn the beauty of the natural world before they become interested in saving it. Young children learn through their senses and experiences. Everyday children learn how the weather changes, how people interact with the environment, how things move, the characteristics of a place and how things are built. Teachers can help children learn the basis for geographic knowledge in everyday experiences. Participants will explore concrete suggestions and interesting activities including connections for both the classroom and to share with parents at home. Participants will experience hands-on activities together connecting everyday things to expand geographic thinking using maps, globes, books and exhibits.

Join our interactive session to explore how Reading Apprenticeship has enhanced disciplinary literacy in Social Studies, aligning with North Carolina's Standard Course of Study Standards. Experience classroom routines, led by a North Carolina Social Studies teacher, that empower students to engage critically with global topics/issues/narratives while fostering empathy and collaboration. Participate in text-based inquiry and discussions that bring historical and contemporary issues to life. Our exemplar lesson is on international trade and its impact on North Carolina. In this particular lesson, you will experience routines to that support reading infographics and reading for making a claim/disciplinary argumentation. You will learn more broadly about how instruction anchored in the Reading Apprenticeship framework can build more engaged and independent readers of Social Studies texts.