In the state of California when students are in the fourth grade they learn about the history of California. The California Fourth Grade Social Studies Content Standards indicates that students learn about 4.2.3 Describe the Spanish exploration and colonization of California, including the relationships among soldiers, missionaries, and Indians, 4.2.4 Describe the mapping of, geographic basis of, and economic factors in the placement and function of the Spanish missions; and understand how the mission system expanded the influence of Spain and Catholicism throughout New Spain and Latin America, and 4.2.5 Describe the daily lives of the people, native and nonnative, who occupied the missions (http://www.cde.ca.gov/be/st/ss/). There are numerous of websites that obtain historical information and facts about each of the twenty-one California Missions, but in the fourth grade Social Studies textbook there isn’t any historical information and facts about each of the twenty-one California Missions. Depending what city in California a student lives in which ever California mission is the closest to them that is the only mission the student learns about, or the teacher assigns the students one of the twenty-one missions to write a report and make a model of the California Missions in order to meet …show more content…
Since students don’t have standardized testing in Social Studies until high school these elementary school students are learning that the subject of Social studies in elementary school is not important to learn about since they are not being tested by the state. Which leads teachers to teach Social Studies towards the end of the school year after teaching Language Arts and Mathematics from the beginning of the school year up to the day before the standardized