Bulletin Board Ideas for Social Studies
A social studies instructor connects students to the stories and people that make up our world. One way to facilitate this connection is by making bulletin boards that give students a better picture of the topics they study. When making your social studies bulletin board, it's important to consider its curb appeal.
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Identification
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When you first start planning the layout for your bulletin board, begin by summing up its main topic. Choose a word or very short phrase that will communicate the topic to your students so they can identify it quickly and easily. Remember to keep the lettering simple so that it pops out from the rest of your board, which will likely be more colorful and busy in appearance.
World Cultures
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If you are looking for bulletin board ideas to show students about world cultures, you might consider putting a map on your board and then pasting on faces of the people who live in those countries. Around the faces, you could put photos of the food they eat, the games they play, their typical habitat, and anything else relevant to the country.
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History
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To make the material relatable to students, show photos of people in current times alongside people from eras such as the Civil War, Great Depression, World Wars I and II, the Vietnam War and 9-11. You could even ask students to help you label the bulletin board so that the project becomes more memorable to them. This could lead into a discussion of how daily life has changed over the years. Create a history timeline with names, events and faces.
Current Events
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Your social studies display for current events could be entirely built by students. Ask students to collect and display newspaper articles under various categories such as "technological developments," "world cultures," "important people," and "just for fun." By having articles categorized, your bulletin board will appear less cluttered and more manageable for viewers. Over time, your board will grow more articles, which your students can eventually use for research projects, class presentations or other activities.
Interactivity
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If you are teaching about world cultures, you might leave some photos and glue in an envelope to the side of the board so that students can match those photos with the correct country. This matching practice could take place for any topic. For history, students could match dates with faces, and for current events, they could create a timeline that dates all the events that has happened over the last few months. Your board could also include CDs of music from various parts of the world--students could play the music during their lunch hour, and/or they could check out CDs of the music from the school or local library. The idea behind creating an interactive social studies bulletin board is to extend the student's learning into his or her own life. Additionally, interactivity can help a lesson sink in, which is especially important for students who are audio, visual or kinesthetic learners.
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References
- Photo Credit Shlomit Wolf
