ABSTRACT
Anybody who writes a book about teaching has to expect certain questions. Who are you? What have you studied? What is your experience? Will your ideas about teaching social studies be useful to me?
My name is Alan Singer. I am a white, male, husband, father, son, brother, collegeeducated, politically active, ethnic Jew,
Learning Activity: Ballad for Americans Toward the end of the Great Depression and just before U.S. entry into World War II, the African American singer and political activist Paul Robeson performed the song “Ballad for Americans” (lyrics available on the web at https://www.cpsr.cs.uchicago.edu/robeson/links in a series of concerts across the country. It became so popular that in 1940 it was selected as the theme song for the Republican Party’s national convention (Robeson, 1990). During the song, the chorus asks Paul Robeson to identify himself, and he responds that he is a member of every ethnic, religious, and occupational group in the United States and represents an amalgam of all the people who built America (LaTouche and Robinson, 1940). The song takes
atheist, citizen of the United States, New Yorker, city dweller, sports fan, hiking and biking enthusiast, high school social studies teacher, college education professor with a PhD in U.S. history and a specialization in the organization of the coal miners’ union.
