Social Studies Resources 6-12
CultureGrams Online Database is a leading reference for concise, reliable, and up-to-date cultural information on countries across the globe.
Dollar Street is a website where we have collected imagery from homes from all over the World. Today we feature more than 200 homes in about 50 countries. In total we have 30 000 photos and 10 000 videos from these homes.
The goal with Dollar Street is to make everyone understand how people really live. Beyond the stereotypes and clichés. In a way, it's statistics that you can see, without having to learn how to read them. It's photos as data. Free for everyone to use and explore.
iCivics is a free website that was created for students in grades 6-12 but the site says that elementary teachers also use this with their students. You can search by standard, by state by class and by grade level to get lessons.
Newsela is a database of current events stories tailor-made for classroom use. Organized by broad themes (e.g. War and Peace, Arts, Science, Health, Law, Money), articles are both student-friendly and can be accessed in different formats by reading level. Use Newsela to differentiate nonfiction reading. (Knowledge Constructor)
The Open Book Project is aimed at the educational community and seeks to encourage and coordinate collaboration among students and teachers for the development of high quality, freely distributable textbooks and educational materials on a wide range of topics.
Poll Everywhere is a dynamic online polling platform that allows students to vote on custom teacher-generated polls using technology. With a free educator account with Poll Everywhere, polls can receive up to 40 votes, enough to accommodate most classrooms. There are two types of poll questions that can be used in the classroom: multiple choice or open text. Teachers can easily generate polls to be deployed individually or as a series of questions.