The Georgia Historical Society (GHS) is dedicated to offering trustworthy resources that support K-12 teachers’ digital classrooms. Over the coming weeks GHS will be working diligently to provide educators and parents valuable tools and information to meet the needs of students during the Covid-19 school closures. The “Digital Resources for Georgia’s Students” blog series will explore GHS’s extensive catalog of online resources for learning Georgia and American history and offer strategies for using them at home or in a digital classroom.

Inquiry-based learning activities tap into student curiosity by emphasizing that students ask their own questions. Rather than teachers using the traditional lecture format—telling students what they need to know—inquiry encourages students to explore, form questions, and share their own ideas about what they are learning.

Inquiry-based learning helps students take an active role in their own education, allowing teachers to more effectively guide skill-development and content knowledge through hands-on activities.

GHS inquiry-based strategies and activities are designed to help teachers guide students to explore a curated set of primary sources. Often, through primary source exploration, students formulate questions about the topic they are learning, driving their curiosity which in turn drives their learning.

GHS inquiries are based on the Inquiry Design Model (IDM) from the C3 Framework for the Social Studies. The inquiry element emphasized in the C3 Framework is centered on asking a compelling question.

Compelling questions are open-ended and do not lend themselves to simplistic conclusions. They challenge students to examine a focus-of-study through a multi-disciplinary lens. This means that students examine not only specific facts (like names, dates, etc.) associated with the focus of study, but also the social, cultural, political, and economic conditions of the focus too.

GHS inquiry-based resources explore topics in civics and history, including the United States Constitution and struggles for voting rights.

Inquiries based on the articles of the United States Constitution featuring primary sources with a Georgia focus:

• Balancing Liberty with Security featuring founding documents such as: the Declaration of Independence, the U.S. Constitution, and the Bill of Rights
• The Great Compromise of 1787 featuring Abraham Baldwin’s role in the Constitutional Convention
• Powers of the Executive Branch featuring Jimmy Carter’s presidential administration
• The Role of the Supreme Court featuring Supreme Court cases: Worcester v. Georgia, Dred Scott v. Sanford, and Brown v. Board of Education
• Representative Democracy in Georgia featuring the Georgia General Assembly
• Oaths of Office featuring Georgia state flags and the Pledge of Allegiance
• Georgia’s Response to School Desegregation and the 14th Amendment featuring the Sibley Commission

Inquiries exploring the struggle for voting rights:

• “Winning the Vote: Women’s Suffrage in Georgia” inquiry activities featuring the New South era and the women’s suffrage movement
• “Finding My Voice” inquiry activities featuring the women’s suffrage movement and the Civil Rights Movement