ABSTRACT
This chapter focuses on skills that are needed to make the best use possible of information in every problems context. The chapter begins with general information skills, decision making, and historical thinking before moving into two specific areas that have special importance to elementary social studies: map skills and time skills. Map skills are taught in a way that says to students that maps are to look at; to answer questions from worksheets; and sometimes to color, draw on, or mark. One of the reasons students have trouble learning map skills is most map work in school is too often just a series of questions and tasks for which students see no purpose. They really need to be exposed to maps in ways that seem meaningful and purposeful. Thinking and problem-solving skills are the core purpose of social studies. A critical issue in problem solving is the ability to recognize and identify the real problems.
