**5 Days of 6th Grade FREEBIES**

You’ll get exclusive access to 5 free resources that are waiting to be used in your social studies classroom. They're all standards-aligned and can be used to teach both social studies concepts and ELA skills! Can it get any better?! Don’t miss out!

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Map Skills Packet for Middle School Students

July 19, 2021 by Sarah Miller

Kick off your school year with map and globe skills! What middle school social studies classroom doesn’t cover map skills? Since map skills are a basic concept covered in middle school social studies, you'd think it would be easy to find resources for it. However, most of the resources out there are for lower grades. Finding map activities for older kids is no easy task. That's where I can help!!

This packet is perfect for middle school or upper elementary classrooms! You can use this to kick off your Geography Unit or just for an overall review.

This packet includes 12 different worksheet pages that cover a variety of map and globe skills.

Skills included:

Cardinal and intermediate directions
latitude and longitude
Grid maps: reading/interpreting and creating
Physical maps: reading/interpreting and drawing conclusions
Graphic scales: to determine distances
Map Keys: to acquire information

Tips to Use: This packet can be used in so many different ways! The pages do not have to be completed in order or all at once. You can adjust it to fit your classroom.

Some ideas for using this map skills packet in your classroom:

Warm-up/Bell-Ringer/Activator: use one worksheet as an activating strategy. You can sprinkle them in throughout the year or 12 days in a row.
Part of spiral review for ongoing map skills: sprinkle map and globe skills with your other content throughout the year, so the skills stay fresh
Independent Work: Have students complete the pages independently during quiet time
Small groups/partners: Have students complete some of the pages with a partner (or a combination of partners and independent)
Station: When you’re doing stations/centers for another concept, add in a “Map and Globe” station. Use some of the pages from this packet as a station.
Homework: Give one or two pages from the packet as homework to avoid neglecting map skills in your classroom.

For other ideas on teaching map skills to middle school students, read this blog post!

My print-and-go Map Skills Worksheet Packet includes all the pages you see in the images above, plus more. I created this knowing you are super busy, so it is NO PREP. Click here to purchase the complete Map Skills Worksheet Packet.

Looking for more map and geography ideas?

If you need more inspiration for teaching map skills and geography in your social studies classroom, you must check out these other posts.

Map Skills Packet for Middle School

12 print-and-go worksheets that cover all of your map and globe skills!

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SMT Copy of 25 Free Templates by Morgan Tylka (1).png

Digital Interactive Notebook

Digital and Printable Interactive Map Skills Notebook designed for grades 3, 4, 5.

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blog image 2.png — Grab my FREE guide!

Stop neglecting social studies with these easy to use strategies! Teach social studies, even when you don’t have time!

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Middle School Social Studies Classroom Decorating Ideas

July 11, 2021 by Sarah Miller

There are so many different directions you can go when decorating your social studies or history classroom! I have scoured the internet and Pinterest to curate this list of perfect social studies classroom decor! Everything is linked just for you!

General Decorating: Standards Posters and Computer Desktops

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Use standards posters - put them all up at once, or only put up what you’re teaching! Don’t forget to decorate your student desktop backgrounds!

Geography, Travel, Maps, Places Themes

Bulletin Board Set from Oriental Trading Co.

Turn wooden cutouts into Hall Passes with twogirlzstuff!

Great Classroom Tour by Building Book Love

Use a paper globe on your lamp! Idea from Michelle Bush

Hang paper globes all around your classroom! Idea from Michelle Bush

Use places you study as Table Group Labels! Credit to Joy in the Journey by Jessica Lawler — Use places you study as Table Group Labels! Credit to **Joy in the Journey by Jessica Lawler**

Decorate your door with a globe and flags!

Multicultural Theme

Create a super cute Diversity bulletin board with this affordable kit by My Taylored Classroom! — Create a super cute Diversity bulletin board with this affordable kit by **My Taylored Classroom**!

Use this pre-made bulletin board cut out and add your students’ names!

History Themes

“Why history matters” Bulletin Board set by Social Studies Toolbox — “Why history matters” Bulletin Board set by **Social Studies Toolbox**

Post your classroom constitution! Idea by Teaching with Terhune — Post your classroom constitution! Idea by **Teaching with Terhune**

Create a flag with student-created stripes!

Create a historical timeline! Idea by Collaboration Cuties — Create a historical timeline! Idea by **Collaboration Cuties**

Tag me on IG!

I know you are going to come up with something fantastic! Let me see it! @SarahMillerTech

Pinterest for blog post.png — Get Ready for Back to School!

Read my tips for you to get ready for back to school! Don’t forget a single thing!

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Screen Shot 2021-06-24 at 2.03.17 PM.png — Don’t forget Classroom Quote Posters!

Snag these to spice up your classroom!

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Graphic Organizers in Geography (that aren't maps)

September 21, 2020 by Sarah Miller

As you already know, teaching geography in middle school is much more than just memorizing locations on a map. Students are expected to extend their learning past the recall and identify stage in order to analyze, interpret, and predict. To accomplish this, we need much more than just maps and globes!

Graphic organizers are a great tool to help students visualize new information. There are plenty of graphic organizers out there, but you must make sure the one you choose for your students is the best for the situation.

For example, if students are expected to explain how population influenced agricultural and industrial locations in the United States after the Civil War, then a cause and effect graphic organizer will be best. That isn’t to say a sequencing or problem-solution organizer will not work - it just depends how you are using it and in which stage in the learning. Strategically switching the graphic organizers while covering one topic is a great way to challenge students to synthesize this new information.

Using the standard mentioned above, you might introduce the new information about how those factors influenced agricultural and industrial locations, then have students complete a cause and effect graphic organizer. The following day, you could have the students complete a problem-solution graphic organizer describing which problems those industries faced and how those problems were solved (by changing locations). Later, you might have students complete a sequencing or chronological graphic organizer that describes how the history took place (which would include the industries facing problems and solving them).

Here’s my suggestion of graphic organizers aligned with some Georgia Standards of Excellence for middle school Social Studies:

Standards are from Georgia Standards of Excellence (GSE)

To me, having students complete a graphic organizer after learning any new information helps to solidify the new content. It can be a great way for students to process what they’ve just learned. This process can also be a great way for you to check for understanding and clear up any misconceptions.

Here are some free generic graphic organizers you can use to enhance your geography lessons.

Population Distribution

This reading activity packet features a graphic organizer to help students visualize the causes of population patterns in Southwest Asia.

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Emergency Sub Plans for Social Studies

August 17, 2020 by Sarah Miller

Unfortunately, we all have those days when we just have to call in a sub. Now, all of us teachers know that being “out” is often more work than just coming in to teach. This is why having “Emergency Sub Plans” pre-made and ready to go is vital. This way, you can show your neighboring teacher where it’s located at the beginning of the year and not stress any more about it!

Some teachers create elaborate “Emergency Sub Binders”, some create cute, decorated “Emergency Sub Tubs”, and some teachers just put all the things into a manilla folder and call it a day. It doesn’t matter which of those teachers is your teacher-twin or if you fall somewhere in between. There are certain “must-haves” that will make your Emergency Sub days run smoothly. Use the free worksheet below to help plan for Emergency Sub days!

Emergency Sub Plans Checklist — Don’t forget anything!

Use this free digital checklist!

Download

How many days should I plan?

You might be wondering, “How many days should I plan?”. This is a great question because you cannot predict how long you will be absent. I recommend having one set of plans for five consecutive days, one set of plans for 2 consecutive days, plus having 3 to 5 single day plans (nonconsecutive). Don’t panic. Don’t feel like you need to do this all at once! Go ahead and have the 2 consecutive days planned before school starts, so you at least have something. Then, over Winter Break or any other break, put together the others. Obviously, you don’t have to create these during your breaks, but my point is that you can stagger them out some.

Planning your Sub Directions

I had the opportunity to be a substitute before I started teaching, so I can speak from experience on this one! I recommend providing the sub with 2 versions of directions: an outline and full-detail. These are great to include in your emergency lesson plans. This is especially helpful if the sub is covering multiple days. Things can quickly become chaotic, so having something a sub can use at-a-glance is helpful. The full-detail version is helpful for those moments when students ask detailed questions.

Helpful Tips

Avoid plans that require background knowledge unless you are providing the background knowledge. In a typical middle grades classroom, the sub might experience the students claiming they don’t know anything about this, so they simply cannot do the work. You know what I’m talking about! I can hear the “we haven’t learned this” whines all the way from here! It’s a good idea to provide a reading passage (or something similar) with the work to eliminate this excuse.

For middle school Social Studies, use plans that extend from your standards and that you can use at any point during the pacing. Typically, we cannot predict when in the pacing guide we’ll need these Emergency Sub plans. This can make it difficult to decide what to put into our plans. I recommend choosing a topic that extends from at least one of your standards. For example, if at some point in the year you teach about World War II, use an article with activities about a famous WWII spy for your sub plans. If you teach about the Civil Rights Movement at some point in the year, use an article with activities about a civil rights leader that isn’t covered in your curriculum. If you teach about trade barriers at some point in your year, use an article with activities about a specific trade barrier placed and the events surrounding it.

Prepare for “Fast-Finishers”. Make sure you have some work for students to finish early. From experience, my middle school students finish work either really fast with a sub because they aren’t trying or they don’t finish at all because they aren’t trying. So, be prepared for both. It is ALWAYS best practice to consider halving the time you expect it to take, and provide extra work to accommodate the “new” time. For example, if your students typically complete a reading passage and 10-question worksheet in 45 minutes, plan for them finishing it in 20 minutes. If your sub is inexperienced (or even ineffective), it will likely be difficult to come up with something on their own for students to do when they’re finished. I do not recommend “silent reading” as a “fast-finisher” activity for middle school students. From a teacher’s and a substitute’s perspective, independent reading fuels all kinds of issues. One issue is that students will want to use this opportunity for a library trip, a bathroom trip, or any-other-place-I-can-think-of trip. There is no accountability for this activity, so classroom management might become difficult during independent reading. Try to use activities that can be turned in, such as color-by-number, word search, crossword, sudoku, etc.

Provide answer keys for your subs. This is not required but is definitely a bonus! Students will inevitably ask the sub questions about the content, so the sub will be more comfortable if there is an answer key to reference. Plus, the sub might even grade some of the papers for you! Please do NOT ask your sub to grade papers, unless you know for 100% that they will have a planning. Sometimes subs are pulled to work in different areas of the school during your planning period, so don’t assume they will have an abundance amount of extra time to grade papers for you.

sub plans worksheets.jpg — Want save hours and hours of time?

I’ve got 5 days of emergency sub plans + fast finisher work ready to go for you! Print, assemble, and go tackle other things on your to-do list!

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Reading Activity Packets for Sub Days

Reading activity packets are PERFECT for sub plans! I have three whole years of Social Studies Reading Activity Packets at your disposal! If you’re already using the reading packets for your grade level during your curriculum, you can choose a reading packet for a different grade level for your sub plans to avoid repeating it. For example, if you are currently using the 6th grade Social Studies Reading Packets in your curriculum, you could choose to use packets from the World War II unit in 5th Grade Social Studies or from an economics unit in 7th grade Social Studies. Use the shopping guide below to help you choose!

Download My Shopping Guide

Map Skills Resource Round Up for Middle School

August 10, 2020 by Sarah Miller

I’ve got so many resources you can use right now in your classroom for your Civil Rights Unit!

5th Grade Differentiated, CCSS-Aligned Reading Packet

FREE Boom Cards Set

“It’s easy to ‘save’ maps and graphs for your geography units, but maps and graphs can and should be tied into other concepts of social studies.”

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Teaching Map Skills in Middle School

August 03, 2020 by Sarah Miller

It’s easy to “save” maps and graphs for your geography units, but maps and graphs can and should be tied into other concepts of social studies.

The first step in teaching map skills is to know your standards. This sounds obvious, however, in Georgia map and globe skills are intended to be taught across grades K-8. These standards are not included in the “grade level” domains because they are intended to be infused with the domain standards. Study the chart provided in the standards. You will notice that if you are teaching grades 6-8, most of the map skills should be a review for students. The only new standard is to use latitude and longitude to determine location.

Use vertical planning to guide your lessons

Image from Georgia Standards of Excellence, 2016. Click on the image to access the Georgia Standards of Excellence.

If you’ve been teaching for even a short amount of time, you probably know that it might say review but students might not have mastered it yet. The bottom line here is to avoid assuming students are proficient at reading and interpreting maps.

Many teachers choose to have a “Map Skills” unit in the beginning of the year. Map skills are a great way to start off your curriculum because it can set some foundational background knowledge for your students. However, it is important to continue referencing these skills throughout the year - not just during your “Maps Unit” or your “Geography Units”.

Map Skills for 6th Grade Digital Task Card Activity — Map Skills Review

This activity focuses on nations covered in 6th grade, but can be used with any 5-8 social studies classroom.

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One way to frequently review and cover map skills is to add them to your spiral review. You could add one map skill prompt to every day’s warm-up/bell-ringer. You can also sprinkle them into all of your lessons’ guided practice. Avoid “reserving” these types of prompts only for your Geography Unit. Students will need lots of practice and should be exposed to maps and graphs frequently.

Screen Shot 2020-07-20 at 11.00.47 AM.png — Sample Bell Ringer

This sample bell ringer includes one prompt in which students must use both a graph and map.

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For middle grades, map skills cannot simply be memorization of locations on a specific map. Map and globe skills involve reading and interpreting maps. Further, these skills may also involve analyzing that data to make predictions or draw conclusions as they relate to the concepts you are covering.

Many times location and geography play a major role in historic events. The Cuban Missile Crisis was fueled by its proximity to the United States, for example. Further, land plays a major role in continuing conflicts in the Middle East. Across all regions, geography is a main factor in a nation’s economy and ability to trade with others. Each of these examples are great times to infuse map skills activities or map skills worksheets into the guided practice.

Grab these reading packets with map activities

Map Activity for Currency Exchange — Currency Exchange

SS7E8c

Map Activity for Capital Goods and GDP — Capital Goods & GDP

SS7E6c

Screen Shot 2020-07-20 at 10.14.30 AM.png — German Reunification

SS6H3c

Map for Influences on Latin America — Influences on Latin America

SS6H1b

Map & Globe Skills Nonfiction Reading

12 print-and-go worksheets that cover all of your map and globe skills!

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You can do a Google search and round up hundreds of map skills worksheets for lower grades, but try finding some for upper grades! Well, I am going to hook you up! I have rounded up 10 map skills resources for middle school!

Read the Blog Post

Teaching Population Distribution in Europe

July 26, 2019 by Sarah Miller

Population Distribution in Europe can be so tricky to teach!

Teaching factors that affect where people live can be difficult! One way to help your kiddos grasp it is by comparing and analyzing maps. You can display a population density map alongside a climate or distribution of natural resources map. Working with this combo can really help your students to visualize that climate and natural resources have an impact on where people live.

Below is a climate map I found that can be really helpful. While students do not need to know the specifics in all the different types of climates listed, they should be able to visualize which climates are more unfavorable (those in the dark blue in northern Russia). They should then be able to compare this to the population distribution map, also linked below. Students should be able to note the similarities