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OER Project and AIR: Raising the bar for social studies curricula A great curriculum is never finished. That belief sits at the center of OER Project’s work, and it’s one of the things that makes us unique in the social studies sector.After more than a decade of growth, innovation, and classroom impact, we partnered with the American Institutes for Research (AIR) to conduct an independent review of our courses. We were looking for more than validation. We wanted rigorous, actionable feedback to help us keep improving our offerings for teachers and students.Why this partnership mattered While we have a robust evaluation process (usage analytics, standards alignment, emerging research, and teacher feedback), we knew internal reflection alone would not be enough. To keep raising the bar for social studies curricula, we needed:• Objective, research-based validation • Clear identification of strengths and areas for growth • Actionable recommendations grounded in sector expertise AIR’s independent analysis gave us exactly that: an external perspective on what’s working, what can be improved, and how we can continue evolving to meet the needs of educators, students, and school systems.What we wanted to learn Through this collaboration, we aimed to better understand: • How effectively our courses support disciplinary thinking and inquiry-driven learning • The level of coherence, structure, and engagement in our materials• How well we provide differentiation, scaffolding, and instructional guidance for all learners• The degree to which our courses align with social studies standards across the USThe review examined social studies practices, usability, instructional supports, and standards alignment, combining qualitative feedback and ratings to surface clear patterns across the courses. Key insights AIR’s findings affirmed that OER Project courses provide: • Strong foundations for inquiry-driven, evidence-based learning • A coherent design that encourages students to engage with big questions and think like historians and social scientists At the same time, the review surfaced meaningful opportunities to improve, including: • Expanding student-generated inquiry and deeper evidence use • Strengthening instructional supports especially for diverse learners • Enhancing formative assessment and differentiation practices across lessons These insights are exactly why we sought this review: They identify concrete, actionable ways to make our curricula stronger.

OER Project and AIR2Our planThis report is not the end of a process. It’s part of how we work.We’re already using AIR’s findings alongside teacher surveys, classroom feedback, and site analytics to ensure our materials remain rigorous, relevant, and aligned to real classroom needs. We’re doing this by:• Prioritizing revisions that improve student learning outcomes and engagement• Examples: A series of new Big History activities to increase student inquiry and a series of new World History activities to strengthen geography understanding• Strengthening teacher-facing supports and usability • Examples: Streamlined lesson guides and improved in-lesson guidance via the Teacher Tools button• Iterating more effectively on pacing, scaffolds, and instructional design• Example: A new webpage featuring updated teacher course plans and standards-alignment resources By combining independent research with real-world teacher feedback and usage data, we can make smarter, faster, and more-impactful decisions about how our curricula evolve. Our commitment moving forward At OER Project, feedback isn’t a formality—it’s part of the design process. We build, listen, learn, and improve, again and again, so our materials stay responsive to what teachers and students actually need.In a field where curriculum is often treated as a fixed product, OER Project takes a different approach: We see it as a living resource, shaped by evidence, expertise, and the educators who use it every day.For OER Project, feedback is a gift—and iteration is the work. Want to provide us the gift of feedback? We’d love to hear it:team@oerproject.com.

==OER Project CurriculumReviewFinal Report American Institutes for ResearchApril2026

1|AIR.ORG OER Project Curriculum Review: Final ReportTable of ContentsOverview....................................................................................................................................2Courses Reviewed...................................................................................................................2Methodology..............................................................................................................................3Quality Review Method..........................................................................................................3Standards Alignment Review Method....................................................................................3Quality Review Results...............................................................................................................4Heat Map Summary................................................................................................................4Individual Course Results........................................................................................................6Course-Specific Recommendations..........................................................................................13Big History............................................................................................................................13Climate..................................................................................................................................15World History Origins...........................................................................................................17Cross-Course Priority Recommendations.................................................................................20Standards Alignment Findings..................................................................................................21Big History: Standards Alignment Findings...........................................................................21Climate: Standards Alignment Findings................................................................................24Overall Takeaways and Conclusion..........................................................................................26

2|AIR.ORG OER Project Curriculum Review: Final ReportOverviewThis report summarizes the findings from a review of three OER Project courses using astructured review framework with criteria and indicatorsand, for two of the courses, a standards alignment review. The purpose of this review was to evaluate the overall quality of the courses, identify strengths and areas for improvement, and assess how well selected courses align with relevant standards.The review focused on three main quality criteria (social studies practices, usability, and instructional supports) and used a consistent rating process to evaluate each course. Results are summarized using both narrative descriptions and a heat map to highlight patterns across courses. In addition, actionable suggestions for improvement are provided for each course.Courses Reviewed The following courses were included in this review:•Big History:The Big Historycourse is a seven-unit course, designed for grades 6-10, thatexplores13.8 billion years of history, from the origins of the universe to the future, using an interdisciplinary approach that blends history, science, and critical thinking. Students investigate major “thresholds” of increasing complexity, develop historical thinking skills, and ask big questions about humanity’s place in the universe.•Climate: The Climate course is a five-unit course,designed for 6-12graders,that introduces learners to the science, impacts, and solutions surrounding climate change. It blends foundational climate literacy with practical strategies for mitigation, adaptation, and community action. Designed to empower educators and students alike, thecourse encourages critical thinking, collaboration, and the creation of shareable resources that support a more sustainable future.•World History Origins: World History Origins is anine-unitOER Project course, designed for 9-12 graders,that explores how human societies developed from early humans to the emergence of complex civilizations, spanning 250,000 years of human history. Students investigate historicalthemes such as migration, agriculture, technology, and belief systems using evidence-based historical thinking skills. The course emphasizes connections across time and place while building skills in reading, writing, and analyzing historical sources.

3|AIR.ORG OER Project Curriculum Review: Final ReportMethodology Quality Review MethodAll three courses were reviewed using a quality rubric that measures course qualityacross three criteria: •Social Studies Practices •Usability •Instructional Supports The Big History course and Climate coursewere also reviewed for alignment with applicable standards to better understand how well they support required expectations.Each criterionis composed of up tofour indicators of success, each of which was rated using a defined scoring scale that reflects how aligned the course and its materials are to eachindicator. The review criteria were selectedand customizedfrom a large pool of options to provide a comprehensive evaluation of the materials and to best align withclient goals and interest. Reviewers examined course guidance, instructional activities, instructional materials, teacher resources, assessments, and overall structure to collect evidence of alignment to the criterion or identify potential areas of growth. Then, reviewers analyzed the collected evidence to determine how well each course met the criteria. Depending on the evidence collected, the rating options were “Strong Evidence”, “Some Evidence”, “Minimal Evidence”, or “No Evidence”. Ratings were applied consistently across all courses to support fair comparison.Standards Alignment Review MethodThe standards alignment review for theClimate Course and Big History Courseused a comprehensive database containing social studies standards from 49 U.S. states and the District of Columbia1. All standards in the database are coded by content area and grade level, allowing for targeted identification and organization of relevant standards.To identify standards associated with each course, a targeted list of key terms and core concepts was first developed based on the course curricula.1Standards for Vermont are not included in the Standards Commonalities Database because they use the College, Career, and Civic Life (C3) Framework for Social Studies State Standards as its official K–12 social studies standards.

4|AIR.ORG OER Project Curriculum Review: Final ReportTheidentifiedterms and concepts were used to conduct a keyword search across the full standards dataset. Standards returned through this search were then grouped according to the specific term or concept with which they aligned.It is important to note that while standards were identified based on their relevance to each term or construct, individual standards may not always use the term explicitly or reflect the concept in the same manner intended within the course. To best support the identification of potentially relevant standards, all standards returned through the search have been included in a separate spreadsheetfor each course. These standards may require individual review to determine their appropriateness for specific instructional or contextual use.Quality Review ResultsHeat Map SummaryA heat map was generated to visualize quality ratings across all three courses and criteria. The heatmap highlights patterns in performance, showing where courses consistently scored higher or lower. Overall, the heat map revealsall three courses encourage students to engage with big ideas, ask questions, and begin thinking like social studies scholars, providing a solid foundation for meaningful,inquiry-driven learning. At the same time, there are common areas for improvement. Inquiry opportunities are not always carried through to consistent use of evidence, source analysis, and argument construction, which limits depth over time. In addition, instructional supports, especially literacy scaffolds, differentiation, and formative assessment, are limited across all courses. As a result, while each program offers valuable strengths, teachers often need to supplement materials to fully support diverse learners and monitor student understanding throughout instruction.CriterionBig HistoryClimateWorld History OriginsCriterion 1a: Social Studies PracticesStrong Evidence Some Evidence Some Evidence

5|AIR.ORG OER Project Curriculum Review: Final ReportCriterionBig HistoryClimateWorld History OriginsCriterion 1b: Social Studies PracticesSome Evidence Some Evidence Some Evidence Criterion 1c: Social Studies PracticesStrong Evidence Some Evidence Strong Evidence Criterion 1d: Social Studies PracticesSome Evidence Some Evidence Some Evidence Criterion 2a: UsabilitySome Evidence Strong Evidence Some Evidence Criterion 2b: UsabilityStrong Evidence Some Evidence Some Evidence Criterion 3a: Instructional SupportsMinimal Evidence Strong Evidence Some Evidence Criterion 3b: Instructional SupportsMinimal Evidence Minimal Evidence Minimal Evidence

6|AIR.ORG OER Project Curriculum Review: Final ReportCriterionBig HistoryClimateWorld History OriginsCriterion 3c: Instructional SupportsMinimal Evidence Minimal Evidence Minimal Evidence Individual Course Results The following section summarizes the quality review findings for three OER Project courses, based on analyses conducted using the Evidence Collection and Analysis Tooland Quality Review Rubric.Big History Overall performance across the three criteria indicates strong to moderate evidence in social studies practices and usability, with instructional supports representing an area for further development.Criterion1: Social Studies PracticesAlignment to Criterion: The course demonstrates strong coherence, rigor, and intentional alignment with disciplinary thinking in both social studies and science. Units are organized around compelling “Big Questions” and Thresholds that consistently prompt students to analyze complexity, causation, and change over time. Lessons use openers, closers, guiding questions, and inquiry activities to reinforce reflection and skill development, while protocols such as Claim Testing are embedded across units rather than treated as isolated strategies. Students regularly engage with diverse source types, articles, videos, maps, data visualizations, and some primary sources, and are expected to construct evidence-based claims through writing, discussion, and debate. The integration of biology and history (e.g., evolution, extinction, agriculture, and complex societies) strengthens students’ability to analyze evidence from multiple perspectives. Culminating tasks like the Unit 5 Museum Project exemplify sustained inquiry, synthesis, and reflection, and vocabulary is meaningfully revisited to support conceptual understanding and academic discourse.Areas of Growth:There are clear opportunities for growth that could further deepen student agency and disciplinary skill-building. While reflection is present, most activities prioritize understanding course content over connecting learning to students’personal lives or local contexts, particularly in earlier units. Inquiry is often guided rather than student-generated, with fewer formal structures for students to develop their own research questions or inquiry pathways. The course relies heavily on secondary sources, especially in scientific units, and

7|AIR.ORG OER Project Curriculum Review: Final Reportcould benefit from more primary sources, raw or conflicting data sets, and explicit sourcing practices that emphasize science as a historical and human endeavor. Additionally, discussions and debates would be strengthened by clearer, more consistent discourse protocols and scaffolding for disciplinary reading strategies. Expanding opportunities for students to critique digital and popular media sources, and more intentionally integrating non-Western and marginalized perspectives earlier in the narrative, would further enhance equity, information literacy, and critical engagement across the course.Criterion 2: Usability Alignment to Criterion: The course is well organized and thoughtfully structured, with clear sequencing at both the unit and lesson levels. Content is organized around distinct “Thresholds,” allowing concepts and skills to build progressively across lessons and units. Within eachlesson, materials follow a consistent and predictable rhythm (openers, readings or videos, activities, and closers) which reduces planning burden for teachers and supports student understanding. Teaching Guides provide step-by-step instructions, time estimates for lesson components, sample answers, and explanations of instructional purpose, closely mirroring student-facing materials. Additional supports such as Lexile-leveled articles, audio transcripts, differentiation guides, and resources for teaching sensitive topics strengthen accessibility and flexibility. The course also benefits from robust professional learning supports, including online professional development (PD)D, a teacher community, and teaching tools that clarify instructional rationale and disciplinary strategies like Claim Testing and Scale Switching.Areas of Growth: The scope and interdisciplinary nature of the course present challenges that could impact pacing and depth. While lessons are logically sequenced, the breadth of content, particularly within units like Unit 5, can prioritize coverage over deeper explorationunless teachers make strategic adaptations. Teaching Guides provide time estimates for individual activities but lack explicit unit-level pacing tracks or guidance on prioritizing essential versus extension activities, limiting flexibility across different schedules. Transitions between lessons, especially between scientific and social implications, can feel abrupt and may require additional support. For some educators, particularly those without a strong science background, the interdisciplinary content can obscure the social studies focus; clearer explanations of how scientific material supports historical thinking, along with targeted teacher primers or refresher resources, would help maintain disciplinary clarity. Expanding instructional strategy options beyond frequently used approaches like Claim Testing could also enhance instructional variety, particularly in politically and socially complex units.Criterion 3: Instructional SupportsAlignment to Criterion: The course includes several meaningful supports for differentiated instruction and formative assessment. Nearly all articles are available at multiple Lexile levels

8|AIR.ORG OER Project Curriculum Review: Final Reportand include audio options, allowing multilingual learners and students striving for proficiency to engage with the same disciplinary content at an accessible reading level. Multimodal strategies, such as videos, graphic organizers, Threshold Cards, and guiding questions, provide consistent entry points into complex concepts and help scaffold comprehension across units. Embedded routines like Claim Testing, predictable opener and closer activities, and structured projects further support student engagement and skill development. Formative assessments are integrated through guiding questions, notebooks, checkpoints, and diagnostic openers that surface prior knowledge and track conceptual growth, and these assessments are closely aligned to unit driving questions, reinforcing coherence between instruction and evaluation.Areas of Growth: Gaps remain in how differentiation and assessment data are systematically supported and leveraged. Many scaffolds are generalized rather than embedded at the lesson level, making them difficult for teachers to consistently implement, particularly for multilingual learners, students with social-communication needs, or those requiring explicit disciplinary literacy instruction (e.g., how to read maps, diagrams, or sources). Extension materials tend to add content rather than increase rigor or provide alternative pathways for accelerated learners, and opportunities for advanced inquiry and disciplinary writing are limited. Formative assessments rely heavily on text-based, read-and-answer formats, which can obscure conceptual understanding for students with language barriers. Teaching Guides offer little guidance on how to respond instructionally when students struggle. The course also lacks diagnostic tools for core social studies skills, explicit intervention or reteaching options, and structures for students to track their own progress. Strengthening these areas would improve equity, instructional responsiveness, and the overall effectiveness of differentiation and assessment practices.Climate Overall performance across the three criteria indicates that the course demonstrates some evidence of alignment in social studies practices and usability, with pockets of strong evidence, while instructional supports reflect a lower and more limited level of evidence overall.Criterion 1: Social Studies PracticesAlignment to Criterion: The course demonstrates strong, authentic inquiry by grounding each unit in compelling driving questions such as “How is climate change affecting us?” and “Why do some people deny climate change?”.Students regularly analyze data, maps, articles, and case studies, and they engage with diverse source types including interviews, multimedia, and external datasets from organizations like NOAA and the EPA. The curriculum emphasizes critical literacy through the recurring “Claim Testing” scaffold, helping students evaluate assertions using intuition, authority, logic, and evidence. It also meaningfully connects learning to

9|AIR.ORG OER Project Curriculum Review: Final Reportstudents’ lives through personal inventories, career reflections, and civic action planning. These strengths collectively move students from passive data consumers to active argument creators who synthesize evidence to address real-world climate issues.Areas of Growth: Inquiry often appears in isolated segments rather than sustained investigations, and students have limited opportunities to generate their own research questions. Units 3 and 4 lean heavily on engineering-based solutions, sometimes overshadowing the social, political, and ethical dimensions of climate change. The course would benefit from more diverse and conflicting primary sources, particularly Indigenous perspectives, historical documents, and raw policytexts, as well as more opportunities for open-ended debate and evaluation of bias. Some linked resources are outdated or inaccessible, and later units rely heavily on curated OER articles, reducing opportunities for students to practice deeper source evaluation. Incorporating more demographic and economic datasets, along with richer academic speaking opportunities, would strengthen the social-studies dimensions of the course.Criterion 2: Usability Alignment to Criterion: The course is thoughtfully structured to build students’ social studies skills progressively, ensuring that each unit reinforces and extends prior learning rather than promoting rote memorization. Clear course plans, unit guides, and lesson-level teaching guides provide strong instructional coherence, with pacing estimates and built-in flexibility that allow teachers to adapt to different school calendars. Lessons are intentionally sequenced, often using structured formats such as “Opener, Activities, and Closer,” to move students from identifying information to deeper analysis. Assessments like the Unit 2 DBQ and the Unit 5 Civic Action Plan are well aligned to instruction and effectively measure students’ mastery of evidence-based argumentation, data literacy, and civic participation. The availability of multiple assessment options in Unit 5 further supports differentiated implementation, enabling teachers to tailor instruction based on available time and student needs.Areas of Growth: Several areas for refinement emerged. The volume of scientific content in some lessons risks overshadowing core social studies skills, potentially limiting students’ opportunities for deep analytical mastery if pacing becomes rushed. Streamlining data sets or emphasizing fewer, more focused analyses could better support skill development. While the course offers flexibility, clearer adaptation guidance, such as an explicit “fast-track” implementation map, would reduce the burden on teachers with limited instructional time. Additional supports, including vertical alignment documentation, crosswalks to traditional social studies themes, and more unit-specific teaching resources, would strengthen usability, especially for educators from non-science backgrounds. Overall, the course is pedagogically

10|AIR.ORG OER Project Curriculum Review: Final Reportstrong and well supported, but targeted refinements could enhance clarity, accessibility, and instructional balance.Criterion 3: Instructional SupportsAlignment to Criterion: The course demonstrates strong attention to accessibility, differentiation, and formative assessment, offering multiple entry points for a diverse range of learners. Leveled readings, audio recordings, visual media, graphic biographies, structured organizers, and consistent use of Openers and Closers help activate prior knowledge, support comprehension, and reinforce learning. Predictable lesson structures and recurring scaffolds, such as vocab guides, data literacy supports, guiding questions, and research charts, make complex content more manageable and support students in developing disciplinary skills like evidence evaluation, data interpretation, and civic reasoning. Formative assessment is embedded throughout lessons via discussions, short writes, data analysis tasks, and reflections, allowing teachers to monitor student understanding and adjust instruction. Overall, the materials are thoughtfully designed to engage students with grade-level content while maintaining consistent routines and supports that benefit multilingual learners, students with disabilities, and those at varying levels of academic readiness.Areas of Growth: Opportunities exist to strengthen and clarify scaffolding and differentiation. Language supports for multilingual learners arenot consistently embedded across lessons, and more explicit tools, such as visual glossaries, bilingual word banks, sentence frames, and model texts, would better support access to complex reading and writing tasks, particularly in later units that require formal civic writing. While formative checks are frequent, success criteria and next instructional steps are often implicit rather than student-facing, limiting their effectiveness. Extension activities for advanced learners and alternative assessment formats are also limited, and differentiation guidance tends to be general rather than lesson specific. Increasing the visibility of supports, adding clearer rubrics and checklists, and designing more targeted scaffolds and extensions would enhance the course’s ability to meet diverse learner needs while preserving its strong emphasis on skill-building andcivic engagement.World History OriginsOverall performance across the three criteria indicates varying levels of evidence, with social studies practices and usability showing mostly some evidence, and instructional supports demonstrating more limited and inconsistent evidence.Criterion 1: Social Studies PracticesAlignment to Criterion: The World History Origins course consistently supports student reflection, inquiry, and disciplinary thinking across units through a coherent structure built

11|AIR.ORG OER Project Curriculum Review: Final Reportaround driving questions, guiding questions, and sequenced activities. Students are regularly prompted to track their learning over time, reflect on how their thinking evolves, and connect new content to prior knowledge. Across the course, lessons integrate primary and secondary sources, images of artifacts, videos, and graphic biographies, with embedded guiding questions that promote active reading, viewing, and listening. Writing tasks frequently require students to analyze evidence, compare societies, and justify conclusions, while tools such as sourcing organizers and evidence charts help scaffold historical reasoning and claim-making. Perspective-taking activities and reflection prompts encourage students to think like historians and apply historical understanding to broader patterns and modern contexts.Areas of Growth: The course offers opportunities for growth in inquiry, argumentation, and engagement modalities. Student inquiry is largely structured by pre-determined questions, with limited space for students to generate and pursue their own lines of investigation or connect content directly to their personal experiences. While students routinely use evidence to respond to prompts, they are less frequently asked to construct, defend, and critique full arguments or to evaluate the reliability, relevance, and perspective of sources. Instruction across units is predominantly text-based and writing-focused, with fewer opportunities for disciplinary speaking, discussion, or debate. Expanding inquiry-driven tasks, incorporating more discussion-based and argument-focused activities, and diversifying materials (such as maps or data sets) would further strengthen the course’s ability to deepen historical thinking and student engagement across the full sequence.Criterion 2: Usability Alignment to Criterion: The course materials are generally well organized and supported by detailed teaching guides that clearly sequence lesson activities and include estimated timing and instructional guidance. Each lesson is aligned to a driving question and learning objectives, with activities introduced through background context and supported by embedded teacher tips, particularly for vocabulary and disciplinary skills. Unit guides further outline recurring skills and provide shared resources such as reading, writing, and historical thinking guides. In some cases, the “Process” sections offer flexibility by suggesting alternative ways to facilitate activities when time is limited, and the guides explain how recurring skills are applied within lessons, helping teachers understand instructional intent. Areas of Growth: Pacing and cohesion present challenges. Many lessons appear to exceed a single class period without clearly stating whether they are intended to span multiple days, which may complicate implementation within typical schedules, especially when lessons include a high volume of readings. While teaching guides sometimes suggest alternative approaches, they rarely offer concrete pacing adaptations or modified versions of materials. Additionally, connections between lessons and across units are not always explicit, limiting

12|AIR.ORG OER Project Curriculum Review: Final Reportstudents’ ability to see how concepts and skills build over time. Providing clearer guidance on lesson-to-lesson progression, cross-unit scaffolding, and multiple implementation options would strengthen coherence and better support diverse classroom contexts.Criterion 3: Instructional SupportsAlignment to Criterion: The course includes a range of differentiation, accessibility, and assessment supports designed to help students engage with complex content. A general differentiation guide, adjustable Lexile levels for articles, guided question worksheets, and extension activities provide multiple entry points for learners with varying needs. Teaching guides encourage strategies such as read-alouds, modeling tasks, vocabulary instruction, and alternative facilitation approaches to support comprehension and clarity. Some articles are available in Spanish, and teachers are given flexibility to adapt instructional delivery when needed. Opener and closer activities appear consistently across lessons, framing instruction and encouraging student reflection, while assessment resources and feedback tools help educators interpret student responses and monitor learning progress.Areas of Growth: Many of these supports remain broad rather than lesson-specific, limiting their practical impact. Differentiation strategies are largely generic and could be strengthened by being more directly aligned to individual activities and content demands, particularly for primary source analysis and disciplinary skills beyond reading and writing, such as speaking and listening. Extension activities are often lengthy and function as addonsrather than integrated enrichment, making them difficult to implement within typical class periods. Spanish translations are not consistently available, and they lack the Lexile flexibility provided in English versions. Additionally, while formative opportunities exist, openers and closers are not always designed to assess prior knowledge or mastery, and the materials provide limited guidance on how teachers should respond to assessment data. More targeted scaffolds, shorter and integrated extensions, clearer formative checkpoints, and explicit intervention strategies would improve the course’s ability to meet diverse learner needs effectively.

13|AIR.ORG OER Project Curriculum Review: Final ReportCourse-Specific Recommendations Big History Criterion 1: Social Studies Practices1.Increase student-generated inquiry.a.Embed opportunities for students to create their own inquiry questions.b.Use question-generation routines (e.g., Question Formulation Technique).2.Strengthen personal and local connections.a.Add reflection prompts connecting concepts such as agriculture, complexity, and the biosphere to students’ lives.b.Introduce local inquiry extensions (e.g., ecosystems, food systems, land-use history) earlier in the course.3.Expand use of primary sources and broaden source evaluation.a.Include primary scientific sources (e.g., Darwin excerpts, early biologists’ journals, historical diagrams).b.Balance synthesized datasets with raw or conflicting archaeological and scientific data.c.Add activities evaluating digital media, popular science, and social media claims.4.Integrate sourcing across science and history.a.Apply sourcing questions consistently (e.g., “Who created this?” “When?” and “For what purpose?”).b.Explicitly link scientific knowledge to historical and cultural context.5.Increase diversity of perspectives earlier.a.Include non-Western, Indigenous, and marginalized perspectives in early units.b.Add comparative case studies challenging Eurocentric narratives.6.Provide clearer discourse protocols.a.Embed structured discussion routines and teacher guidance for facilitating debates.Criterion2: Usability 1.Add explicit unit-level pacing tracks.a.Provide clearly defined Core, Enriched, and Accelerated options.b.Clearly label activities as “must-do,”“recommended,”or “extension”to help teachers prioritize when time is limited. 2.Clarify lesson-to-lesson and unit-to-unit connections.

14|AIR.ORG OER Project Curriculum Review: Final Reporta.Include short “Looking Back/ Looking Ahead” sections in Teaching Guides that explicitly explain how each lesson builds on prior learning. b.Add brief visual progression maps showing how lessons connect to the larger Thresholds and Big History narrative.3.Support depth over breadth in content-heavy units. a.Offer optional “depth focus” pathways that allow teachers to explore fewer civilizations or case studies more deeply without sacrificing standards alignment. b.Suggest which case studies can be abbreviated or skipped without disrupting conceptual coherence.4.Improve transitions between scientific and social studies content.a.Add interdisciplinary synthesis activities or reflection prompts when shifting from scientific concepts (e.g., evolution, DNA) to human or societal implications (e.g., migration patterns, origins of life). b.Provide teacher guidance explaining the specific social studies connections of science-heavy lessons.5.Create targeted teacher content supports.a.Develop short “Teacher Cheat Sheets” or “5-Minute Refresher”resources for complex scientific topics, explicitly linking them to historical thinking skills. b.Include quick background summaries explaining why each scientific concept supports the historical thinking skills covered in the lesson. 6.Enhance teacher planning efficiency.a.Include summary tables in Teaching Guides that outline lesson goals, key skills, estimated time, and required materials at a glance. b.Highlight common instructional pitfalls and suggested scaffolds for challenging concepts.Criterion3: Instructional Supports 1.Embed multilingual learner supports directly in lessons.a.Integrate sentence frames, translanguaging strategies, and multimodal response options.b.Add side-by-side examples showing how students can respond using visuals, labels, or oral explanations in addition to writing.2.Add explicit disciplinary literacy scaffolds.a.Include step-by-step guides for reading different source types (e.g., historical maps vs. scientific diagrams). b.Provide modeled examples or annotated samples showing how to analyze sources before students are asked to do so independently. 3.Expand speaking and listening supports.

15|AIR.ORG OER Project Curriculum Review: Final Reporta.Add structured discussion protocols (e.g., listening trackers, sentence starters, turn-and-talk roles) for debates and collaborative activities. b.Include alternatives to open-floor debates for students with social-communication needs (e.g., written exchanges, small-group rotations). 4.Provide advanced extensions for accelerated learners.a.Design extension tasks that increase rigor rather than length, such as deeper primary-source analysis or independent research questions. b.Offer optional advanced writing prompts that require synthesis across multiple units or thresholds.5.Improve writing scaffolds.a.Include graphic organizers for causal reasoning, comparison, and argumentation to bridge reading and final written products. 6.Strengthen formative assessments and assessment guidance.a.Clarify the purpose of each assessment and common misconceptions.i.Add teacher guidance explaining what each formative assessment measures and how it connects to unit driving questions. ii.Include suggested “look-fors”and common misconceptions tied to each checkpoint.b.Include reteaching options and targeted intervention activities.i.Include a “Plan B” or reteaching activity for each major checkpoint when students demonstrate misunderstanding. ii.Offer short, targeted intervention activities aligned to specific skills.c.Add multimodal checks for understanding and student self-reflection tools.i.Balance text-based formative assessments with visual, oral, and interactive options (e.g., diagram annotations, quick sketches, audio explanations). ii.Allow students multiple ways to demonstrate understanding beyond written paragraphs.d.Add diagnostic assessments for core social studies skills .i.Include an early-course diagnostic to assess skills such as map reading, timeline interpretation, and source evaluation.e.Support student self-monitoring and reflection.i.Provide student-friendly rubrics and reflection tools so learners can track progress toward skill mastery.Climate Criterion 1: Social Studies Practices1.Strengthen sustained inquiry.

16|AIR.ORG OER Project Curriculum Review: Final Reporta.Provide structured opportunities for students to generate and refine research questions.b.Explicitly identify inquiry, argumentation, and social-studies practices in lesson objectives and tasks.2.Expand and diversify source materials.a.Increase use of conflicting primary sources, including Indigenous perspectives, historical documents, and unedited policy texts and data sets.b.Review and update linked resources in current units and lessons for accuracy, accessibility, and relevance.3.Reduce reliance on heavily curated readings.a.Gradually introduce raw datasets and authentic sources, particularly in upper units, in conjunction with OER Project written sources.b.Incorporate datasets related to population, economics, and equity to deepen social-studies analysis.4.Enhance evidence evaluation and discoursea.Expand claim-testing routines to include bias, perspective, and authority.b.Add structured debates and evidence-based discussions.5.Increase academic speaking opportunitiesa.Add regular seminars, debates, and oral argumentation activities.Criterion2: Usability 1.Rebalance content to emphasize social studies skills. a.Streamline scientific content where needed to allow time for analysis, argumentation, and civic reasoning.i.Because climate is not traditionally a standalone high school course, teachers would benefit from clearer guidance on how it fits within a broader social studies sequence.b.A vertical alignment or crosswalk document mapping Climate units to familiar social studies themes (e.g., power, authority, and governance) would help educators integrate the course into established courses with greater confidence.2.Provide a fast-track implementation option for units.a.Identify essential lessons and assessments for limited instructional time.i.Teacherscurrently must manually determine what to cut in constrained schedules. An explicit fast-trackguide (e.g., 8-week vs. 12-week implementation maps) would strengthen guidance for schools with severely limited instructional time and reduce teacher planning burden.3.Strengthen support for non-science educators.

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OER Project and AIR: Raising the Bar for Social Studies