{"id":556,"date":"2020-08-05T09:07:12","date_gmt":"2020-08-05T17:07:12","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/sites.sandiego.edu\/character\/?p=556"},"modified":"2020-08-05T09:33:07","modified_gmt":"2020-08-05T17:33:07","slug":"presentology-the-study-of-the-present","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/sites.sandiego.edu\/character\/blog\/2020\/08\/05\/presentology-the-study-of-the-present\/","title":{"rendered":"Presentology (The Study of the Present)"},"content":{"rendered":"

Background:<\/b>\u00a0 <\/span>Early in my teaching career, I was a junior high school social studies teacher.\u00a0 <\/span>Part of my teaching assignment was teaching a \u201ccurrent events course.\u201d\u00a0 <\/span>The texts I used were the local and state newspapers.\u00a0 <\/span>Our intent, at the time, was to engage students in a study of and conversations about what was going on in their community and in the world, and why.\u00a0\"\"<\/a><\/span><\/p>\n

As a result of these experiences, I wrote three books on the use of newspapers in classrooms:\u00a0 <\/span>Project Update: The Newspaper In The Elementary And Junior High Classroom, Character Matters: Using Newspapers To Teach Character (co-authored), and The Newspaper: A Reference for Teachers and Librarians. \u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

WHY Teach Current Events (CE)?\u00a0<\/span><\/b><\/h3>\n

Here are six reasons for having CE become a key part of your classroom and school’s curriculum.<\/p>\n

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  1. Your students are already talking about what is going on in their world and the \u201creal world\u201d anyway, so under your guidance, take time each day to let them talk about current events\u2014hearing and discussing multiple issues respectfully.<\/li>\n
  2. A CE curriculum will introduce your students to a wide range of new content\u2014the more you know, the more you grow.<\/i><\/i><\/i><\/li>\n
  3. A CE curriculum will contribute to creating, hopefully, students who are informed, engage, active citizens as well as lifelong news readers.<\/span><\/span><\/span><\/span><\/span><\/li>\n
  4. A CE program will provide the opportunity for teachers to help students develop digital media literacy skills, improve reading comprehension, critical thinking, problem solving, oral expression, and listening skills.<\/li>\n
  5. A CE program will encourage your students to improve their language, vocabulary, and writing skills especially using the \u201cnews style \u201c\u2014Who, What, When, Where, Why, and How\u2014also an important skill for summarizing and interpreting digital content.<\/li>\n
  6. Most CE teachers report that they tend to use a variety of grouping methods in their classroom as student collaborate to study, discuss, and debate issues and events.<\/li>\n<\/ol>\n

    Prior to the advent of digital media and technology, research using newspapers (the print copies) and current events in classroom showed:\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n