Making lessons about Social Studies

There are many ways to cross over the span of several different subjects at one time. In class, we explored and investigated the materials at four science centers. Crossing the pendulum science center into social studies could be done through the discovery of medieval times and the weapons that they used to fight. The catapolts are a very well-known weapon of that time and the way that a catapolt is filled and let go, makes the upwards swinging motion of a catapolt. In the ball center, one could easily talk about the history of different cultures and how they play sports. You could show the students the various types of balls used in the experiment and make connections to the sports that they know and relate it to how various cultures may use something of the same kind for a very different kind of sport and use. For the float and sink center, a teacher could introduce the vikings, romans and greeks and the development of the boats that they used. Then expanding into how naval history has adapted to make things float and how they went from wooden boats to steel boats would really tie in the experiments. Determining how much water it displaces to determine if it will float was something that really took a lot of time for people to figure out! And lastly, in the ballon and straw investigation center, one could introduce the idea of rockets and the space program and how there are different forces needed to get a rocket off the ground. You could also tie in missles used in war and even the ideas of aviation - what kind of force it takes to keep a plane flying. Or the zeplins used by the Germans - blimps - who developed the blimp or hot air ballons could easily be explored in a classroom. As I said before, there are many different ways to use these investigation centers to cross over into Social Studies and "kill two birds with one stone!"