What is Needs and Nations?
In my final practicum before certification, I found myself teaching grade eleven social studies. I was originally trained as an English teacher; so the transition from stories and narratives to outcomes and concepts was a challenge at first. I looked to the senior teachers around me, but I quickly found that nobody had an easy answer to the question I desperately needed an answer to: "How do you make high school social studies directly applicable?" So many of the outcomes in social studies are focused in developing skills, but many teachers take a traditional approach to teaching social studies. I knew immediately that this was not my way, and if nobody had created an alternative, I would need to do it. Suddenly, a thought came to me. "We have all the requirements to build a nation of our own, right here in the classroom. Why has nobody tried teaching social studies by creating an environment for students to build and work with the concepts we study with a hands-on approach?" It was in that moment that Needs and Nations was born.
Needs and Nations is an alternative delivery method built from the ground up to integrate active learning into social studies to better drive engagement, and increase practical student learning. Needs and Nations draws its concept from the traditional tabletop roleplaying games (TRPG). As such, the students in the class take on the role of the government of a simulated nation, the teacher then becomes a sort of game master (GM). The role of the GM is to build a world that the students can interact and exist within as representatives of a newly formed government. Through the process of implementing N&N into your classroom, you gain the ability to build an engaging learning environment where studenst will be able to apply and play with the core concepts, all while guiding themselves towards the curricular outcomes.
Needs and Nations is an alternative delivery method built from the ground up to integrate active learning into social studies to better drive engagement, and increase practical student learning. Needs and Nations draws its concept from the traditional tabletop roleplaying games (TRPG). As such, the students in the class take on the role of the government of a simulated nation, the teacher then becomes a sort of game master (GM). The role of the GM is to build a world that the students can interact and exist within as representatives of a newly formed government. Through the process of implementing N&N into your classroom, you gain the ability to build an engaging learning environment where studenst will be able to apply and play with the core concepts, all while guiding themselves towards the curricular outcomes.
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