Teaching Global Citizenship in Social Studies - A Case Study of an Exemplary U.S. High School Teacher -

Abstract

This study explored how global citizenship as an overarching aim of social studies can be realized and meaningfully delivered to students in a high school social studies classroom. Using a case study of an exemplary social studies teacher, Julia, this study focused on her curricular meaning making and pedagogical decision making as ways to promote global citizenship in a 9th grade social studies classroom in the United States. The findings of this study demonstrate that Julia's curricular decisions and pedagogical practices largely advocated world justice and governance and cosmopolitan notions of global citizenship, and emphasized a cooperative nature and dialogic understanding of the world. Specific pedagogical approaches Julia used are as follows: (1) global history and culture as interpretation and analysis, (2) from local to global, (3) cultural diversity, tolerance, and respect, (4) stay tuned for current events, and (5) visual texts. in-class activity, primary sources, student work sample, and homework/assignment guidelines are presented as examples of her actual teaching practices. This study, based upon a real-world classroom observation and interview data, seeks to provide implications for global citizenship education in Korea that goes beyond the narrowly defined nationalist and overly competitive neoliberal discourses and pursues more cooperative and justice-oriented visions of the world, and to contribute to the generation of more classroom-based empirical studies that would move the field forward.