Anna Gail Beard

History Through a Child’s Eye

This assignment was so interesting to complete, as I got to see just what students

are learning about and what information seems to stay with them as time passes. The

two students I interviewed were fairly knowledgeable on the topics I had asked them

about. Something that I took into account was that they both had spent a fair amount of

their lives in China, so some of their information learned came from their time there.

From my brief interviews with the students, I concluded that economics was not

touched much in their social studies instruction, the roles of the president had not been

taught yet, and geography does not seem to be taught as heavily now.

Economics was definitely a topic that both students struggled to understand and

answer. I noticed that the students both were making guesses when it came to banks,

taxes, pricing, etc. The answers to these questions became much shorter and more

general which clearly indicated that they were not confident in their answers to

economics questions. Both students quoted their daily life as a means for answering the

economics questions, not school. I think real-life activities that deal with economics

would be the most beneficial to these students. At their age, most children do not have

interest in economics, but if introduced through class markets, budgeting with needs

and wants, teacher banks, etc., I feel students would become more interested and

engaged with the information.

When it came to the president, both students were quick to answer; however,

when it came to his roles, both students struggled. They both knew he dealt with laws,

but neither knew what else he does or how he was even able to be elected. Student 2
Anna Gail Beard

knew that there was an election but not much past that, but Student 1 thought hard

work was the key to presidency. Scholastic has a great source called, “Seven Roles for

One President”, that students could use to begin their research into the president’s job. I

feel as though this research would be best in small groups or pairs so that each group of

students would be responsible for one role of the president. Then, the class could have a

discussion on all that encompasses being president.

Geography, for the students I interviewed, was actually pretty strong in their

knowledge of the content when it came to countries. Student 1 even named the two

countries that make up the whole of China, which indicated to me that it was very

important to know when they lived there. However, once we started honing in on

smaller locations, their knowledge of geography seemed to decline. There was a

confusion between cities and states, as both students used them interchangeably. For

instructional steps from here, I would incorporate the activity we completed in class

with the landing of the space shuttle. The instructions go from Earth all the way down to

the community while making the lesson fun and engaging. I think a circle map or brace

map would be an excellent resource in the classroom to help students see the breakdown

from largest area to smallest.

Anna Gail Beard

Overall, I would say the students did well in these interviews. They both seemed

to have learned and understood an impressive amount of information for a 1 st and 3rd

grader. With the feedback from them, I felt as though economics, presidential roles, and

geography need to be examined deeper in their schools, so that they can grow into

knowledgeable members of society one day.

Anna Gail Beard

Works Cited

Reardon. (n.d.). Geography. Retrieved March 22, 2019, from

http://reardonhistory.weebly.com/geography.html

Reginald, M. (2015, February 24). Text Structures and Thinking Maps. Retrieved March

22, 2019, from https://www.slideshare.net/scytalejm/text-structures-and-

thinking-maps-2

Seven Roles for One President. (n.d.). Retrieved March 22, 2019, from

https://www.scholastic.com/teachers/articles/teaching-content/seven-roles-

one-president/