It's stuff like this which makes me cringe

I bet if you asked his dad, he'd say the exact same thing.

told her on Thursday that Pearl Harbor was in Baltimore. The really sad part is that they are working in Annapolis.


Arghhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhh....


Better off asking a citizen of Europe...........

for this result, or is he a Homeschooled kid?

It's not on the standardized test, so they do not think it's important. My district has eliminated middle school Social Studies by combining Language Arts and History into a single, hour-long class called Humanities. The unspoken message is that Humanities teachers will focus on Language Arts instead of history, since that's what the students are tested on.

I reviewed the questions from an old ITBS for 8th grade, and it required some specific knowledge (it was more than a reading with the answers in the reading).

I do like the idea of combining Social Studies and English, but it should be two hours and not one. Such a combination is how I taught my daughter last year in 7th grade. We went through Western Civilization (watching Eugen Weber's The Western Tradition), and I provided literature readings and writing about the literature and history. For example she read derivative works of The Iliad and The Odyssey, The Sword in the Stone, a biography of Livia, a biography of Augustus Caesar, and "How the Irish Saved Civilization". We read other works besides like Treasure Island and The Hunger Games. We also watched Oedipus Rex, Shakespeare's Julius Caesar, and portions of I Claudius. She also read some passages out of Tacitus to get exposure to primary works.

In general the middle school social studies teachers try at my daughters' school, but they are overwhelmed by children that just don't care.

I look forward to working with my daughter next year in 8th grade Social Studies (Economics) and History (first part of U.S. History). She will be reading "Undaunted Courage" for sure.