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2018 HSS Textbook Adoption

California History-Social Science Project Copyright © 2017, Regents of the University of California, Davis Campus 2

Published by the California History-Social Science Project. Includes excerpts from the 2016 History-Social Science Framework for California Public Schools. Beth Slutsky and Nancy McTygue, Primary Writers. All Images within this toolkit are licensed free to use, share, and reproduce. Copyright ©2017, Regents of the University of California, Davis Campus California History-Social Science Project University of California One Shields Ave. Davis, CA 95616 http://chssp.ucdavis.edu

The 2018 CHSSP History-Social Science Textbook Adoption Toolkit

t.o.c.

4 forward 5 introduction 6 the instructional shifts 10 aligning with content 18 aligning with pedagogy 20 the checklist


forward Dear Colleagues, As you prepare to review, pilot, and adopt instructional materials that align with California’s new History-Social Science Framework, my colleagues and I here at the California History-Social Science Project (CHSSP) hope to provide you with the tools you’ll need to conduct a review of available instructional materials. As the Primary Writers of the new Framework, we’re keenly aware of the instructional shifts embedded within the document and are well aware of the challenges teachers face when trying to implement an inquiry-based instruc-tional approach that prioritizes the development of student content knowledge and literacy. It is hard to find sources that are accessible for your students, that address the content at hand, and are easy to integrate into your regular classroom instruction. Given those challenges, making a decision about what book to buy for what grade is diffi-cult, to say the least. Moreover, schools don’t buy new materials in history-social science very often. Twelve years have passed since the last adoption in 2005; schools that choose to adopt in 2018 are under significant pressure to make the right decision – for today’s stu-dents and those in the future. The CHSSP is committed to helping you find the right resources, through the development of an online collection of Framework-aligned source collections called Teaching California (available in 2019), and this toolkit, which incorporates relevant short excerpts from the Framework itself. In addition, we’ve put together a sample alignment chart to help you com-pare multiple texts. Let me also clarify what this toolkit is not. Although we’ve excerpted from the new Frame-work, this document is not a publication of the California Department of Education (CDE) or the State Board of Education (SBE). It was not used as part of the official state adoption re-view process and its use does not imply CDE or SBE endorsement. This document does reflect, however, our best effort, as the Primary Writers, to describe the characteristics of resources that align to the approach we outlined in the Framework. Finally, I want to take this opportunity to thank my colleague Beth Slutsky, who served with me as one of the Primary Writers of the Framework, and put this toolkit together. Her ef-forts on behalf of California teachers and students over the last three years have fundamen-tally reframed history education in our state, and provided for teachers a roadmap for stu-dent learning for years to come. Sincerely, Nancy McTygue Executive Director


introduction

a new approach to hss instruction The HSS Framework provides both a theoretical rationale and concrete classroom examples throughout the document to support the im-plementation of a new vision for history-social science and the History–Social Science Content Standards for California Public Schools (HSS Standards). It also organizes the grade-level content around questions of significance, de-signed to promote the use of inquiry as an ef-fective and engaging instructional method, and incorporates the most recent scholarship in a given field. Broad questions such as, “What does freedom mean and how does it change over time?” and more narrow inquiries, like, “Why was there a Columbian Exchange?” are included through the HSS Framework. Framing instruction around questions of significance al-lows students to develop their content knowledge in greater depth, and to create a narrative arc around which other information can be contextualized. It also allows the natural connections between the disciplines to take center stage by examining an important event, for example, from its economic, political, and geographic dimensions, as well as its place in the chronology of the past. Finally, it engages students in the process of “doing history,” which communicates to students that history and the related social sciences are interpretive

disciplines; that is, rather than having a stagnant body of information to memorize, these sub-jects are continually being shaped and reinter-preted. The HSS Framework extends the standards in a historically nuanced and significant direction in which students learn history and the related so-cial science by practicing the discipline itself. This HSS Framework is what should guide in-struction because it incorporates pieces of all of the HSS Standards, but in an inquiry-guided manner whereby students investigate the “how” and “why” of historical developments. It also reaffirms the importance of narrative in history and civics (a “story well told.”) and the use of biographies, novels, essays, plays, and engaging activities to help make the standards come alive. The HSS Framework also supports interdiscipli-nary instruction and implementation of the Cali-fornia Common Core State Standards for English Language Arts and Literacy in History/Social Studies, Science, and Technical Subjects (CA CCSS for ELA/Literacy), the California English Language Development Standards (CA ELD Standards) and the English Language Arts/English Language Development Framework for California Public Schools (ELA/ELD Framework).


instructional shifts

four key areas of emphasis Content: California’s students deserve to learn diverse, accurate, engaging, and nu-anced material in order to understand the past and make sense of the present. At all grade levels, and in all disciplines – from his-tory, geography, economics, ethnic studies, government, to civics – content must be front-and-center in guiding instruction. The HSS Framework’s grade-level chapters are content-driven. The latest scholarly and dis-ciplinary research is reflected in the chapters and translated into age-appropriate narra-tives and classroom examples. In kindergar-ten through third grade, the HSS Framework organizes the material as investigations into different studies of communities and ways of exploring the world. Starting in fourth grade and extending through high school, the grade levels are organized either with a U.S. and California history focus, or with a world history focus. Both the U.S. and world history content are organized into themes that intentionally cross grade levels. One key theme that unites the U.S. history course sequence (which includes grades four, five, eight, eleven, and twelve) is the topic of freedom. Students explore the evolution of the concept of freedom, and as important,

they investigate the ways in which different groups of Americans contested and shaped freedom from the founding of the republic through recent times. Students consider the ways in which the quests for liberty, free-dom, and equality have transformed the American populace. Starting with the free-doms outlined by the Framers of the U.S. constitution, students examine the many contributions of Americans seeking to de-fine the meaning of citizenship across the country, from farmers in Jefferson’s agrarian nation, to suffragists at the end of the nine-teenth century, to civil rights activists put-ting their lives on the line to end Jim Crow laws and discriminatory social norms in the middle of the twentieth century, to Ameri-cans seeking to bring marriage equality to same-sex couples in the twenty-first century. California’s students also learn about the history and geography of the world beyond our national borders (in grades six, seven, and ten). In the middle, grades students begin their study of the global past with consideration of the ancient world, from hunter-gatherer societies to the earliest civi-lizations in Mesopotamia, Egypt, China, and India.


Their learning extends to the ancient Isra-elites, Greeks, and Romans. Students ana-lyze the relationships between humanity and the physical world, trade, conflict, the development of new political institutions and philosophies (especially the rise of de-mocracies and democratic ideas), as well as the birth and spread of religious tradi-tions. As in earlier grades, students contin-ue to learn about these developments through a variety of primary and second-ary documents, analyze multiple pieces of evidence, and use this evidence to answer broader questions of historical signifi-cance. Through their study of medieval and early modern history and geography, students examine the rise and fall of em-pires, the growth of commercial, techno-logical, and cultural exchange, and the consequences of increasing population density and movement in Afro-Eurasia and the Americas. In high school, students con-tinue to analyze the connections between events at home and abroad as people, products, diseases, technology, knowledge, and ideas spread around the world as never before. Students survey economic, political, and social revolutions and the increasing impact of humanity on the natural and physical environment. They also investigate imperial expansion and the growth of nation-states, two world wars, decolonization, the cold war, globali-zation, and unresolved conflicts that con-tinue to affect the world today. Inquiry: Teaching history and the relat-ed social sciences demands more than tell-ing students to memorize disconnected content. Since the adoption of the HSS Standards in 1998, our state has recog-nized the importance of inquiry-based dis-ciplinary understanding in the history–

social science classroom. The Historical and Social Science Analysis Skills highlight the importance of chronological and spa-tial thinking; research, evidence, and point of view; and historical interpretation, orga-nized in three separate but related grade spans: K–5, 6–8, and 9–12. Embedded within these grade spans are discrete skills, vital for student learning, critical thinking, and literacy, such as understanding rela-tionships between events, chronological understanding, understanding perspective and bias, and corroboration. All of the grade-level chapters of the HSS Frame-work center around an inquiry model of instruction. Lower-elementary students learn about their communities by investi-gating the question: How are our lives dif-ferent from those who lived in the past? How are they the same? Fourth-grade stu-dents learn about California’s history by investigating the question: Why did differ-ent groups of immigrants decide to move to California? Seventh-grade students learn about medieval and early-modern history by investigating the question: How did the environment and technological innovations affect the expansion of agriculture, cities, and human population? And eleventh-grade students learn about modern U.S. history by investigating the question: How did the U.S. population become more di-verse over the twentieth century? These are samples of the questions – both large unit-long ones and small lesson-based ones – that allow students to consider the content the way that practitioners do, by asking open-ended questions and exploring a va-riety of primary and secondary sources to develop a claim about the question.


Literacy: Learning how to read and write in the content areas is critical to overall stu-dent literacy development. Text-based dis-ciplines such as history–social science de-mand student proficiency in content-specific informational text. Studying these disciplines entails vocabulary, reading, writ-ing, and discourse patterns that are difficult for students. The HSS Framework chapters explain that by teaching students how to identify different kinds of text and how to read a text closely, with different purposes each time, students learn to slow down and read on a level that transcends simple vo-cabulary or content comprehension; it heightens student critical thinking. In all of the grade levels, students explore a variety of texts (for example, census records, reli-gious texts, memoirs, or government prop-aganda), learn to identify a document by its purpose – whether it be persuasive, narra-tive, or autobiographical for example – and evaluate its purpose and context. The HSS Framework chapters emphasize that cross-curricular collaboration between history–social science and English language arts teachers should come naturally and necessarily to develop in students a well-rounded history–social science understand-ing. The adoption of the CA CCSS for ELA/Literacy in 2010 and the ELA/ELD Frame-work in 2014 reinforced the importance of disciplinary literacy and understanding. The California Common Core State Standards for Literacy in History/Social Studies include standards for reading and writing that make clear that not only is identifying and grappling with informational text integral to a well-rounded curriculum, but that it necessarily involves learning to think, read, and write with these skills. The relationship of English language development and his-tory–social science is both reciprocal and inextricable. Teachers in both subject areas can coordinate their use of literature, biog-raphy, and informational texts in their class-rooms to support the shared goals of litera-cy development, student engagement, and content knowledge. The HSS Framework provides several examples of how this can be done, including a description of a unit on European colonialism in Africa taught concurrently in both the World Literature and World History courses at a high school.


Citizenship: History and the related so-cial sciences emphasize the development of civic and democratic values as integral ele-ments of citizenship. The HSS Framework encourages students to understand the re-lationship between citizens and the state, and to see their place as members of their community. Whether studying U.S. history, world history, government, economics, or geography, students should become famil-iar with the growth of representative gov-ernment and democratic institutions, ideas, and habits, as well as the presence, ab-sence, or contestation of fundamental rights. The HSS Framework presents oppor-tunities for civic engagement or education for students to explicitly connect their learning to the significance of citizenship and their communities. Most importantly, as students learn to read and think critically

about their worlds, they not only become aware of how the government functions in the abstract, but they also gain a sense of the importance of civic participation by as many people as possible in the successful implementation of a representative govern-ment. In early elementary grades, students simulate elections through classroom exer-cises in practicing democracy and republi-canism. In eighth grade, students learn about civic participation by studying foun-dational documents and simulating de-

bates from the Constitutional Convention. In eleventh-grade, students engage in civ-ics by service-learning projects such as par-ticipating in a voter registration drive or lo-cal initiatives. The HSS Framework contains additional examples in the grade-level chapters, as well as in the appendices that focus on civic education and civic learning. Across the grade levels, the chapters en-courage students to learn about the rights of the individual, the rights and obligations of citizens to participate in government through voting, the rights to speak or pub-lish freely without governmental coercion, the rights to freedom of religion and asso-ciation, the rights to trial by jury and to be treated fairly by the criminal justice system, the rights to form trade unions, and other basic democratic rights. Moreover, stu-dents do not study these rights in the ab-

stract – or merely in the present application - they study how these rights have been constructed, challenged, contested, and continue to be reshaped to respond to an ever-changing world. Students also must understand the responsibilities of citizens to a functioning democracy, including the values of participation, tolerance, and the willingness to compromise and engage in productive discourse


aligning with content

substantial grade level updates The new Framework incorporates significant content updates in its latest draft. In response to legislation, state board guidance, and new research in the field, this new version requires instructional materials to incorporate a substantial amount of new content in order to align with the Framework’s ambitious curricular goals. Because K-8 alignment is done at the state level, we’ve focused our efforts in this toolkit on the content outlined in the high school chapters of the Framework and Executive Summary.

g rade nine. During the ninth grade, students can take elective courses in history–social science. These elective courses could con-

sist of a two-semester sequence focused on a single topic or they could be two separate courses on two different subjects. Ideally, these courses will build on the knowledge and experiences students have gained dur-ing their previous years of school. These courses can help prepare students for the history–social science courses required for graduation from high school and the stand-ards that will be covered in each of these courses. The choice to offer history–social science electives and the selection of those

courses is a local decision for districts and individual schools. All history–social science elective courses should be consistent with the curricular goals provided by this HSS Framework. Counselors at the school level should assist in the placement of students in elective courses by determining their interests, needs, and abilities. Electives provide an ex-cellent opportunity for teachers to prepare students for advanced course work and to integrate research-based practices in civic education, including simulations of the democratic process, service-learning, and current events.


The recommended 9th Grade elective courses in the HSS Framework are: World and Regional Geography. How does a society’s geographic location and environ-ment shape work and living opportunities as well as relationships with people outside of that society? Modern California. What enabled California’s rapid growth? Physical Geography. How do the Earth’s systems operate independently and in relation-ship to one another, and what has this meant for humans over time? Survey of World Religions. What do people believe, what practices do they follow as a result of their beliefs? Why should people understand various religions? The Humanities. What does the evidence tell us about how an individual understands, justifies, and orders his/her own existence, role in society, and relationship to the cosmos and the divine? Anthropology. Why are people who they are, and why do they do what they do? Psychology. What principles govern and affect an individual’s perception, ability to learn, motivation, intelligence, and personality? Sociology. What external forces shape people’s lives and make them who they are? Women in United States History. How did American women shape our nation’s history? Ethnic Studies. How have race and ethnicity been constructed in the United States and how has it changed over time? And, how does race and ethnicity continue to shape the United States and contemporary issues? Law-related Education. How can the legal system protect civil rights and promote jus-tice in American society? Financial Literacy. How can I best manage my money to make sure I have enough to reach my financial goals?

9th Grade Selected Content to Note: Financial Literacy Course; More robust ethnic stud-ies course description that includes the intersectional aspects of the discipline.


g rade ten. The tenth-grade HSS Framework chapter covers two-hundred-and-fifty years of world history by highlighting the intensi-

fication of a truly global history as people, products, diseases, knowledge, and ideas spread around the world as never before.

The course begins with a turning point: the transition in European systems of govern-ance from a divine monarch to a modern definition of a nation-state organized around principles of the Enlightenment, including representative government, liber-ty and freedom, and legal, social, and eco-nomic equality. The course ends with the present, providing ample opportunities for teachers to make connections to the glob-alized world in which students live. As stu-dents move through the years 1750 through the present they consider how a modern system of communication and ex-change drew peoples of the world into an increasingly complex network of relation-ships in which Europe and the U.S. exerted great military and economic power. The chapter encourages students to explore how people, goods, ideas, and capital trav-

eled throughout and between Asia, Africa, the Americas, and Europe. They analyze the results of these exchanges. The ability to see connections between events and larger social, economic, and political trends may be developed by having students consider the most fundamental changes of the era.

Some of the questions that frame this year’s investigation are: • How did ideas associated with the En-lightenment, the Scientific Revolution, the Age of Reason, and a variety of democratic revolutions develop and impact civil socie-ty? • Why did imperial powers seek to ex-pand their empires? How did colonies re-spond? What were the legacies of these conquests? • Why was the modern period defined by global conflict and cooperation, eco-nomic growth and collapse, and global in-dependence and connection?


The tenth-grade chapter features a class-room example in which students learn about the divine monarch, as it was articu-lated in a 1610 speech from King James I. Investigating the question how did King James I argue that kings are like gods? en-courages students to search for claims, evi-dence, and logic in the construction of po-litical arguments. The chapter also contains a classroom example about tyranny and the rule of law, as articulated by ancient philos-ophers and enlightenment thinkers. Stu-dents consider the question How did tyran-ny and the rule of law influence revolution-aries? by reading excerpts from Rousseau as well as Plato and Aristotle. In addition, there is a classroom example in which stu-dents address the questions What were the causes and effects of imperialism? and How did Europeans justify the expansion of their colonial empires? This classroom example focuses on collaborative teaching by the history–social science and English language arts teachers. Students read Chinua Ache-be’s Things Fall Apart in their English lan-guage arts class as they learn about coloni-zation from a variety of other primary and secondary perspectives that represent the colonists and colonizers voices in their his-tory–social science class. Finally, the chapter contains a classroom example in which stu-dents consider the question How did China pursue an “alternative path” to reform in the 1980s? by considering China’s econom-ic transformations and humanitarian crises at the end of the Cold War. This chapter also contains lesson ideas on a number of topics in world history, includ-ing: 1) the impact of industrialization upon nation states and ordinary people; 2) the causes and effects of the Mexican Revolu-tion; 3) World War I and its effects on na-tions and people; 4) the Russian Revolution; 5) the way the Cold War was waged in mul-tiple spots around the globe; and 6) the im-pact of globalization in recent times.

10th Grade Selected Content to Note: Global emphasis as opposed to western civiliza-tion model of world history; Chronology that covers the 2000s, especially the topics of globali-

zation, integration, and disintegration; Armenian Genocide; Colonialism and imperialism’s emphasis and justifications; Revolutions in the twentieth century


g rade eleven. In eleventh grade, students examine major develop-ments and turning points in U.S. his-tory from the late nineteenth centu-

ry to the present. This was a period when the nation experienced significant economic, political, and social transformations, which created incredible benefits as well as new challenges for its citizens. Given the breadth

of content addressed throughout eleventh grade, the HSS Framework encourages teachers to approach the span of modern American history by relying upon guiding questions and key themes that unite the material. This strategy will allow teachers to develop some topics in greater or lesser de-tail, so long as they connect to broader questions of the course. The expanding role of the federal government, changes in racial,

ethnic, and gender dynamics in American society, the U.S. as a major world power, and the evolving definition of American citizen-ship and freedom are four themes that or-ganize the eleventh-grade HSS Framework chapter. These themes allow for disciplinary understanding - such as learning to identify cause and effect or context – to take shape in a historically significant sequence.

Some of the questions that frame this year’s investigation of the past are: How did the federal government grow between the late nineteenth and twenty-first centuries? What does it mean to be an American in modern times? How did the United States become a superpower? How did the United States’ population become more diverse over the twentieth century?


The classroom examples in the eleventh-grade chapter include a lesson on child la-bor during industrialization in which stu-dents wrestle with the question “How old should you have to be to work?” In this classroom example, students explore a vari-ety of primary sources like Lewis Hines pho-tographs and engage in a structured aca-demic conversation and claims-based writ-ing activity by writing an opinion piece in a newspaper. The eleventh-grade chapter al-so features a classroom example about Langston Hughes’ 1926 poem, “I, too, sing America.” Students engage in a close read, breaking apart text individually and in groups to identify the poem’s purpose. The chapter includes classroom examples that address America’s involvement in Cold War struggles in places around the globe, draw-ing from the Blueprint curriculum from the California History–Social Science Project, a free curriculum resource. One of the Cold War activities is a project in which students research and construct a physical or virtual museum exhibit that addresses the question: “How did the U.S. contain communism at home?” by focusing on gender and family norms (including sources that explain the scope of the Lavender Scare), Soviet and American spying and espionage, and chang-es in atomic and environmental policies.

Another classroom example that appears in the eleventh-grade chapter is one in which students research and prepare an essay on the question “What did the U.S. lose in Vi-etnam?” Using a variety of writing supports, including the voices of American military and political leaders, along with soldiers and ordinary Americans, students are guided through the process of selecting evidence and developing arguments and counter-arguments to support their responses. The eleventh-grade chapter also features lesson ideas for: 1) the cultural changes of the 1920s, including LGBT-oriented sub-cultures; 2) a lesson in which students ex-plore the relationship between movements for equality (including the civil rights move-ments of African Americans, Mexican Ameri-cans, native Americans, Asian Americans, LGBT Americans, American women, and Americans with disabilities) by considering the question How did various movements for equality build upon one another?; and 3) a comparison between the immigrant expe-rience in recent times versus a century earli-er. The chapter also includes examples of civic engagement in which students might participate in voter registration drives or at-tend local government meetings.

11th Grade Selected Content to Note: Thematic emphasis on evolving definition of free-dom and citizenship; movement (migration and immigration); historical perspective; Role of

Filipinos and Filipino-Americans during World War II; The Pacific front of World War II; Imple-mentation of the FAIR Act; Chronology that addresses recent history; school year should end

with at least coverage of terrorist attacks of September 11, 2001.


12th Grade Government Selected Content to Note: More recent chronology that ad-dresses Supreme Court decisions from the 2000s and 2010s; federal and state legislation; and

power of the executive branch; Civic participation examples

g rade twelve. In the twelfth-grade Principles of American Democra-cy one-semester course students pursue a deeper understanding of

American government. The HSS Framework chapter explains that this course is the cul-mination of the civic literacy strand of his-tory–social science that prepares students to vote, and to be informed, skilled, and

engaged participants in civic life. As this course progresses, students will learn about the responsibilities and rights they have or will soon have as voting members of an in-formed electorate. Students will review how these elements developed over our history, such as the broadening of the fran-chise from white males with property, to all white males, then men of color that were born of naturalized in this country, then women, and finally, 18-21 year olds. The chapter also highlights the American sys-tem of government in relation to other sys-tems. Students conclude their study of American government with a study of both historical and modern problems of Ameri-can democracy. Some of the questions that frame this se-mester-long investigation of the American government are: • How much power should governments have over their citizens?

• What rights and responsibilities does a citizen have in a democracy? • What problems are posed by repre-sentative government and how can they be addressed? One of the classroom examples from the twelfth-grade government chapter focuses on the executive branch of the federal gov-

ernment by directing students to construct a multimedia museum exhibit about presi-dential powers. By working in groups to research a particular event or presidential act, students conduct guided research and curate artifacts that explains how their ex-hibit symbolizes the presidency of their as-signed leader. The chapter also contains a classroom example in which students en-gage in judicial review by analyzing histori-cal Supreme Court decisions relating to freedom of speech, religion, or privacy, for example. Twelfth-grade government lesson ideas include: 1) a close read of key Federalist Pa-pers; 2) a study of the distribution of power and influence within and around the federal government; 3) ways to research current events and struggles of governments around the world; and 4) a research project on a social problem or issue.


12th Grade Government Selected Content to Note: Financial Literacy, Globalization and the economy, Recent economic activity including the 2008 recession and student loan crises

g rade twelve The twelfth-grade Principles of Economics chapter provides students with an oppor-tunity to consider the impact of

choice upon individuals, groups, and insti-tutions. In this one-semester course, stu-dents examine more deeply the economic choices they make and explore how these choices have consequences that ripple across the world. They also study the forces that can constrain those choices and im-pose costs to economic decisions. By learn-ing about economics through investigation questions that often put the students at the center as consumers or producers, for ex-ample, they will deepen their understand-ing of fundamental economic concepts like cost-benefit analysis. This chapter also en-courages students to analyze the American economy in a global setting. Students will explore how the federal government affects the American economy. They will learn about the labor market in a national and global setting and see themselves in it by identifying which jobs will be growing in the near future and the education require-ments for certain jobs. They will analyze aggregate economic behavior of the U.S. to learn about how unemployment and inter-est rates, for example, affect the country. And they will explore issues related to in-ternational trade. To achieve all of this, stu-dents learn to apply basic economic princi-ples and methods of analysis, building on the knowledge of economics gained in their studies in earlier grade levels. Some of the questions that frame this se-mester-long investigation of Principles of Economics are: • What does it mean to be financially lit-erate? How does the economy relate to me? What does it mean to budget? • How is economics about scarcity, in-vestment, growth, employment, competi-tion, protection, entrepreneurship, and markets? • How do worldwide markets affect me?

The classroom example in the twelfth-grade economics chapter encourages stu-dents to investigate the question How does globalization affect me? Students get an up-close and broad view of how globalization affects their daily lives by identifying one personal item like a smartphone or back-pack, and by tracing how that item (and them, by extension) participated in the global economy from inception, collection of raw materials, processing, and trade. Twelfth-grade economics lesson examples include: 1) an initial activity about personal budgeting and financial literacy; 2) an ex-amination of the role of producers and consumers in a market economy, including the processes of supply and demand, along with the government’s intervention in some marketplaces; 3) an activity about the func-tioning of banks and markets; 4) and a study of the labor market, with an explora-tion of wages and unions.


aligning with pedagogy

topic-specific guidance The remaining chapters of the HSS Framework provide additional support for effective in-structional practice in history–social science. These chapters support teachers, administra-tors, and other educators as they implement the new Framework. A brief summary of each chapter is provided in the pages that follow.

A ssessment. The Assessment chapter opens with the question, “Am I using this assessment for the purpose for which it is intended?”

The chapter provides both a theoretical ra-tionale for the use of formative and summa-tive assessments, as well as concrete exam-ples that highlight how assessment can be used to deepen student content knowledge, increase literacy, and improve critical think-ing. The most important takeaway from this chapter is that assessments should provide teachers with meaningful and timely feed-back that they can use to modify instruction to meet the needs of their students.

The Access and Equity chapter offers both an overview of the needs of specific student groups, as well as discipline-specific tools that educators can use to differentiate in-struction in order to promote student learn-ing across diverse classrooms. This chapter provides some of the most extensive guid-ance for instruction of English learners, aligned with CA ELD Standards. In addition, there are suggestions for addressing the needs of lesbian, gay, bisexual, and transgender students, who often suffer bul-lying and other harassment that makes them feel unsafe and interferes with learn-ing, and a section on culturally responsive teaching that will help teachers address the needs of the diverse California classroom.


The Instructional Strategies chapter pro-vides greater context for the pedagogical approach to student learning in history–social science embedded throughout the grade level course descriptions by detailing the disciplinary practices in history, geogra-phy, economics, and civics. This chapter also provides an extended discussion about the development of student literacy in his-tory–social science through an integrated approach that both improves student con-tent knowledge and expands academic lit-eracy.

Teachers will likely need substantive and high quality professional learning support in order to implement the instructional shifts embedded within this new Frame-work. The Professional Learning chapter provides a vision for that learning, sugges-tions assessing the quality and learning goals for this work, and advice for adminis-trators seeking to integrate HSS support within their larger professional learning communities.

The HSS Framework includes a number of extensive appendices designed to provide additional guidance and support for educa-tors seeking to improve student learning. Appendix A details the capacities of literate individuals Appendix B, Problems, Questions, and Themes in the History and Geography Classroom, offers teachers suggestions to consider questions of scale in historical analysis. Appendix C lists the California HSS Standards including the Historical and Social Sciences Analysis Skills. Appendix D offers suggestions for high school teachers

on teaching the contemporary period. Ap-pendix E provides an extended examination of the benefits of civic learning. Appendix F offers concrete and helpful advice for teachers on teaching about religion in his-tory–social science. Appendix G lists the En-vironmental Principles and Concepts, as well as summaries of the history–social science curriculum units created by the Education and the Environment Initiative. And Appen-dix H provides an overview and examples of service learning.


the checklist

finding the right book

S electing the right instructional mate-rials program for your school is hard. Committee members must consider the needs of their students,

as well as the instructional shifts embedded within the new Framework, teacher prepara-tion and expertise, budgetary limitations and school and district priorities. The pro-cess can be both time-consuming and con-tentious, and selecting the wrong book is a mistake that can frustrate a faculty and in-hibit student learning for years.

Given the importance of this decision, we’ve put together the following criteria template for adoption committees. We’ve organized the template in the same fashion as this toolkit: assessing alignment with content and pedagogy, as well as local priorities. In addition to these more discreet criteria, we also encourage teachers to consider the quality of the prose itself. Contrary to what seems to be a trend toward an increasingly busy and distracting format, students de-serve a compelling narrative that keeps their attention.


publisher: _____________________________ grade level_______ title: __________________________________

Adoption Criteria Template

A. H/SS Content Alignment Yes / No Evidence and Comment

1. Do the instructional materials reflect and incorporate the con-tent with an explanation of signif-icance and depth?

2. Does the text present an en-gaging story with a coherent nar-rative that appropriately incorpo-rates content that is new to the Framework (e.g. the FAIR Act , en-vironmental or financial literacy)?

3. Do the materials include suffi-cient depth of coverage to repre-sent multiple perspectives?

4. Within the narrative does the text present race, class, ethnicity, and gender in a manner appropri-ate to the historical context? Are the perspectives and experience of different groups presented?

5. Does the text present debates within history as well as different interpretations of historical events, so students will under-stand the importance of reasoned debate and reliable evidence in the discipline of history?

6. Does the text present debates within history as well as different interpretations of historical events, so students will under-stand the importance of reasoned debate and reliable evidence in the discipline of history?




B. H/SS Inquiry Alignment Yes / No Evidence and Comment

1. Do the instructional materials include the investigation ques-tions (or similar open-ended dis-cipline-specific analytic ques-tions) from the Framework ?

2. Do the materials include pri-mary sources for students to ex-plore the questions?

3. Do the materials include suffi-cient depth and complexity of coverage to demonstrate the in-terpretive aspect of a question or

4. Does the text present debates from within history as well as dif-ferent interpretations of historical events, so students will under-stand the importance of rea-soned debate and reliable evi-dence in the discipline of history?

5. Are the following analysis skills incorporated into the text and support materials? Cause and effect Change over time Examination of evidence and

primary sources Geographical skills Significance of events, topics,

and people




C. H/SS Common Core & ELD Alignment Yes / No Evidence and Comment

1. Do the materials provide different genres (chronological narrative, compare/contrast, explanation, ar-gument, etc.) of writing so that stu-dents can become proficient in the comprehension of both simple and complex text?

2. Do the materials include literacy strategies to support reading, com-prehension, and analysis of primary and secondary sources?

3. Do the materials include sufficient literacy support for students with diverse levels of literacy (non-native English speakers, native speakers with low levels of literacy, and profi-cient readers)?

4. Do the instructional materials include collaborative (engagement in dialogue with others) ELD alignment?

5. Do the instructional materials include collaborative (engagement in dialogue with others) ELD alignment?




D. HSS Citizenship Alignment Yes / No Evidence and Comment

1. Does the text place sufficient emphasis on civic values and democratic principles?

2. Do the materials include sug-gestions for experiential activities that can bridge classroom and

3. Does the narrative provide op-portunities for students to critical-ly reflect on the concept of citi-zenship in the topic of study?

E. HSS Access & Equity Alignment Yes / No Evidence and Comment

1. Do the materials offer guid-ance for effective instruction to ensure both access to the curric-ulum and the development of critical thought for all students?

2. Does the program provide guidance and activities for stu-dents below grade level and for English learners to accelerate their reading and writing skills as well as content understanding?

3. Do the activities for advanced or emerging learners provide suf-ficient support?




F. H/SS Assessment Alignment Yes / No Evidence and Comment

1. Do the assessments measure students’ mastery of the content, skills, literacy, and civic demands of the subject?

2. Are multiple assessment tools provided for each lesson/unit (i.e., multiple choice, short an-

3. Will the assessment tools help teachers measure their students’ progress, as defined by the Standards? Will they provide in-formation about student progress so that teachers can modify their instruction appropriately and communicate students’ progress towards mastery?

4. Does the assessment program provide sufficient answer keys, rubrics, and/or grading criteria?

5. Does the program include writ-ing assignments that assess stu-dent achievement of the Frame-work goals?




H. Local Priorities Alignment Yes / No Evidence and Comment

1. Do the materials provide a clear road map for planning in-struction to meet the needs of students in your school and dis-trict?

2. Does the program provide ex-tension opportunities (like home-work, technology, service-learning) that meets the goals of your school and district?

3. Do the materials include sug-gestions for parents on how to support student achievement?

2018 hss textbook adoption - california history-social ... · ed social sciences demands more than...

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