SCIM-C



**Directions:** //As a team, you will be responsible for compiling the information below about your inquiry strategy. Next week, your group will provide a 5-7 minute overview of your strategy for the class.//

** Name and Description of your strategy (mention any variations of your strategy as well): **

The SCIM-C strategy is a strategy designed to help students acquire the skills to interpret primary sources and reconcile a number of historical accounts. It was designed for historical inquiry. SCIM-C stands for five phases: Summarizing, Contextualizing, Inferring, Monitoring, and Corroborating. When examining one source, we move through the first four phases and after analyzing several individual sources we compare the sources collectively in the fifth phase. The strategy is used under the context of a guiding historical question. The ultimate goal of the strategy is for students to become self-regulated in the use of the strategy as part of the process of doing history.

** Inquiry Process associated with your strategy: **

**Summarizing**: Examine the source for information that is explicitly available: Type of source, subject, author, purpose, audience, key facts
 * 1) What type of document is the source?
 * 2) What specific information, details and/or perspectives does the source provide?
 * 3) What is the subject and/or purpose of the source?
 * 4) Who was the author and/or audience of the source?
 * Contextualizing ** : Determine the sources time period and how the time period relates to the content within the source
 * 1) When and where was the source produced?
 * 2) Why was the source produced?
 * 3) What was happening within the immediate and broader context at the time the source was produced?
 * 4) What summarizing information can place the source in time and place?
 * Inferring ** : Is the title suggests, in we make inferences based on our developing understanding of the context of the source. Sometimes the evidence is not explictly stated but instead must be drawn out
 * 1) What is suggested by the source?
 * 2) What interpretations may be drawn?
 * 3) What perspectives or points of view are indicated?
 * 4) What inferences may be drawn from absences or omissions in the source?
 * Monitoring**: This stage is about reflecting upon the use of the SCIM-C strategy and reflecting upon the source
 * 1) What additional evidence beyond the source is necessary to answer the historical question?
 * 2) What ideas, images, or terms need furher defining?
 * 3) How useful or significant is the source for its intended purpose in answering the historical question?
 * 4) What questions from the previous stages need to be revisted in order to analyze the source satisfactorily?
 * Corroborating**: Starts when a series of sources have been analyzed. The analysis can be extended and eepened by comparing the evidence that has been found.This is a chance to find similarities and differences in ideas, information, and perspectives. It also a chance to find gaps in evidence that may require more research. After comparing the sources, we can begin to develop our own conclusions and interpretations.
 * 1) What similarities and differences between the sources exist?
 * 2) What factors could account for these similarities and differences?
 * 3) What conclusions can be drawn from the accumulated interpretations?
 * 4) What additional information or sources are necessary to answer more fully the guiding historical question?

** Description of the Product or Products resulting from the inquiry process associated with your strategy: **

The product is specifically an analysis of various sources. You work with evidence to help construct a historical account. Obviously you can use the SCIM-C process to create a research paper or you can use it to create a more informal paper.

** Descriptions of Examples and Links to examples when possible (when you include a link to an example, provide a brief annotation / description of the example -- not just a link): **

The Historical Inquiry website disucess the process of historical inquiry, provides a in depth description of the SCIM-C process, and provides examples and interactive tutorials. It also provides links to other websites to other websites related to the study of history. In the first demonstration, historian Tom Ewing uses the SCIM-C strategy to analyze the primary source (A Letter from Bobby Murray to the Children's Bureau (1939)) to explore the question, What was the life of a child like during the Depression? In the second demonstration, historian Tom Ewing uses the SCIM-C strategy to analyze the primary source (A Letter from George Washington to Benjamin Tallmadge (1779)) to explore the question, What was the role of spies during the Revolutionary War? In the third demonstration, historian Tom Ewing uses the SCIM-C strategy to analyze the primary source (A Letter from Thomas Christie to Sandy Christie (1865)) to explore the question, What was life like in the artillery during the Civil War? []

The same website also provides videos: []
 * 1) An Explanation of Historical Inquiry
 * 2) SCIM Strategy for Historical Inquiry: Explanation
 * 3) SCIM Strategy for Historical Inquiry: Demonstration (Includes the three demonstrations from Tom Ewing)
 * 4) SCIM Strategy for Historical Inquiry: Participation (Includes the three demonstrations but allows students to participate)
 * 5) The Mystery of Sam Smiley ( A chance for students to practice their analyzing skills)

** Resources consulted related to your strategy (both hard copy and links): **

[] [] Doolittle, P. E., Ewing, E. T., & Hicks, D. (2004). The SCIM-C strategy: Expert Historians, hisroical inquiry, and multimedia. //Social Education, 68//(3), 221-225.


 * ADDITIONAL KEY RESOURCES FOR SCIM-C (DR. Y): **

The following resources are paired with steps from the SCIM-C model as a way of conceptualizing example applications for each of the steps.

1. Example for Summarizing: [|__http://wvde.state.wv.us/strategybank/Somebody-Wanted-But-So.html__] This shows the Somebody-Wanted-But-So technique that we were shown in last year’s ECI306 class. The example uses social studies content, but this strategy can be used in any subject to summarize information. Somebody-Wanted-But-So is just one way students can organize the texts they read.

2. Example for Contextualizing [|__http://jcflowers1.iweb.bsu.edu/mod/rlocontextualizing.htm__] This website explains contextualizing, how teachers can use it to their own benefit, and why contextualizing is important for students. Example 2 shows how to contextualize announcements, whether they are given verbally or written.

3. Example for Inferring [|__http://www.readinglady.com/mosaic/tools/Inferring%20lesson%20plan-grade%203%20from%20Elouise.pdf__] This is a lesson plan for a third grade classroom. Although the lesson is simple, its strategies are just what is needed to teach inferring. By using a story, poem, and handouts, the teacher is able to teach students how to make inferences about characters and situations.

4. Example for Monitoring [|__http://www.annefrank.com/who-is-anne-frank/diary-excerpts/__] A lesson using Anne Frank’s diary entries could be used for the Monitoring stage. In having students read excerpts of Anne Frank’s personal accounts, teachers should ask questions involving WWII, Jewish traditions, history of the Holocaust. After asking students “Was it safe for families to hide from the Nazis during WWII?” students could use the diary entries to answer questions and see what’s missing.

5.Example for Corroborating [|__http://www.iroquoisdemocracy.pdx.edu/html/iroquoisles4.htm__] In our SS Methods class, we focused on the question “Was the US Constitution written based off of the Iroquois Great Law of Peace?” The lesson we were given is provided above, and it let us compare the two documents while answering the question on our own. We looked for similarities, differences, and apparent gaps.

** 1-2 additional inquiry-based learning strategies we like, value, want to try, have experienced in a positive way, etc. (name and describe briefly): **

Problem Based Learning: S tudents learn about a subject in the context of complex, multifaceted, and realistic problems. This strategy helps students develop flexible knowledge, problem solving skills, collaboration skills, and intrinsic motivation. Students work in groups and the instructor acts as the facilitator who provides support (scaffolding)