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Monday, August 27, 2012

Systems Thinking

Systems Thinking is something we are going to use a lot in social studies this year.  However, this is something that you'll probably see across the middle school because it it not something that is limited to just one content area.  Systems Thinking is the process of understanding how things influence one another within a whole.  There are many different tools we use in Systems Thinking, one of my favorites being BOTGs or Behavior Over Time Graphs.  BOTGs focus on patterns of change over time rather than isolated events.  Check out the video below for a quick BOTG tutorial.


In social studies this year we will use BOTGs (& other Systems Thinking tools) a lot.  We will use them to graph changes in our environment, changes in our economy, changes in the way we use to live as opposed to now, and many more things.  BOTGs are a great tool for students to be able to visually and quickly show a change over time without having to worry about long paragraphs or detailed drawings.  Stay tuned for some upcoming projects and assignments with BOTGs involved!  I hope you'll be as impressed and I will be with what these 7th graders come up with!

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