8th grade Social Studies: how to help at home
What your child learns in 8th grade social studies in the Arizona Academic Standards, and simple things to try at home.
Focus areas this year
- The founding documents and citizens' rights
- Elections, media and civic action
- Personal finance and economics
Easy ways to practice social studies at home
- Follow a current event together and ask who is affected and why people see it differently.
- Build a timeline of a family event or a historical topic they are studying.
- Use an atlas or online map to trace a trade or travel route.
- Ask “Whose voice is missing from this story?” when reading about the past.
What each unit covers
Founding Ideas
Ideas the Founders drew from Greece and Rome, the Enlightenment and the Haudenosaunee Confederacy, why the Articles of Confederation failed, and the compromises and debates of the Constitution.
Rights & Amendments
What the first ten amendments protect, the Reconstruction Amendments, and why rights come with limits and responsibilities.
Taking Part
Ways to take part before and after 18, volunteering and civil society, petitions and peaceful protest, deliberating about tensions in our democracy, and checking news for reliability.
Media & Democracy
Why a free and responsible press matters, broadcast, print and online media, how officials use media to shape opinion, and how to spot misinformation, bias and spin.
Sources & Evidence
Children practice choosing and judging sources, reading artifacts and art, comparing accounts and drawing conclusions from evidence.
Maps, Graphs & Data
Reading map scales and legends, choropleth maps, scatter graphs and correlation (and why correlation does not prove cause), and what population pyramids say about a country's age and growth. The data in the questions are made up for practice.
Elections & Voting
How people register and vote, primaries and political parties, campaigns and polls, the Electoral College and redistricting, and the powers citizens have in elections.
Citizens & Civil Society
Civic virtues such as honesty, respect and responsibility, how volunteers, nonprofits and community groups help the common good, and how personal interests shape the way people address problems.
Money Smarts
Personal finance: income and taxes, making a budget, saving and compound interest, credit and debt, investing and risk, and insurance.
Supply & Demand
How supply and demand set prices in markets, shortages and surpluses, competition, and the roles of buyers, sellers and profits.
Markets & the Economy
How the whole economy works: GDP, inflation and unemployment, the Federal Reserve and interest rates, specialization and trade, and command, market and mixed economic systems.
Freedom & Change
Free Black communities in the North, abolitionists and the Underground Railroad, the women's rights movement, pioneer women in the West and the Exodusters, including Arizona's early vote for women in 1912.
What the report card levels look like at home
- Beginning
- Just getting started with this idea. Short, regular practice with lots of support helps most.
- Approaching
- Understands parts of it and is building confidence. Keep practicing the tricky parts.
- Meeting
- Has it! Mixed review now and then keeps it strong.
- Exceeding
- Applies it confidently, even in new or harder situations. Try challenge mode and real-life problems.
Your child’s teacher decides the level on the report card. Read the Arizona report card guide.
Common questions
Follow a current event together and ask who is affected and why people see it differently. Build a timeline of a family event or a historical topic they are studying. Keep sessions short, about 10 to 15 minutes, and stop on a success.
The Arizona Academic Standards 8th grade social studies units include Founding Ideas, Rights & Amendments, Taking Part, Media & Democracy, Sources & Evidence, Maps, Graphs & Data.
Free printable 8th grade social studies practice sheet
Questions from every unit, with an answer key.