In 1992, the Board of Directors of National Council for the Social Studies, the primary membership organization for

social studies educators, adopted the following definition: Social studies is the integrated study of the social sciences and humanities to promote civic competence. Within the school program, social studies provides coordinated, systematic study drawing upon such disciplines as anthropology, archaeology, economics, geography, history, law, political science, psychology and sociology. The primary purpose of social studies is to help young people develop the ability to make informed and reasoned decisions for the public good as citizens of a culturally diverse, democratic society in an interdependent world. From the above definition it would be appropriate to justify that social studies is a science. According to F.X. John science is define as a systematised body of general truth covering a definite subject matter and established by an efficient or effective method. Two types of science can be identify that of the exact sciences (the natural sciences thus biology, physics and chemistry.) and those of the non-exact sciences (social sciences). Therefore social studies is considered as a non-exact science based on these five elements: a definite subject matter, generalization, scientific method of enquiry, it integrated nature of the social sciences and a body of systematized knowledge. To begin with, for a subject to be classified as a science it should have a definite subject matter. Social studies is a science because it has a definite subject matter which is the study of man and his society. This is clearly explained by looking at the various definitions of social studies that has been defined by the expert of social studies. Dickson (1968) stated that social studies is the study of man in society: Pecku (1974), describe social studies to cover the society or the world of people and things. The major idea implied in the two definitions is that, social studies deals with man and his relationship with the immediate environment. Other people also put social studies in other definition to mean citizenship education which also relates to man and his environment. The following definitions depict social studies to be citizenship education. Barth(1983) says that, social studies is an integration of the social sciences and the humanities for the purpose of instruction in citizenship education. Barr et al (1977) also looks at social studies as an integration of experience and knowledge concerning human relation for the purpose of citizenship education. An observation however is that most social studies educators (from the above definitions) agree that social studies is the study of man in society, thereby clearly depicting the subject matter of the discipline.

Again, every science subject characterise itself with the formulation of general truth and social studies is no exception since there are conceptualisation of generalisations in the subject (social studies.). Brownell and Hendrickson state that a generalization is any verbalized formulation of a relationship which is of broad applicability. Thus generalizations may be laws, rules, principles, conclusions, inferences and the like. Examples in the social studies are: people adapt themselves to the environmental conditions, increasing interdependence among the people of the world has brought about need for international institutions. Generalizations involve the relationships between concepts, according to Brownell and Hendrickson, and they grow out of problem-solving carried on by the researcher. Generalization help the individual order his physical and social environment. Rather than being represented by a single word or expression, however, generalizations involve the statement of a general law or principle that may be applied to several situations having common characteristics. A generalization that has applicability in social studies is: new inventions lead to changes in ways of living and man live in a continually changing world. Moreover, social studies also deal with the scientific method of enquiry. The scientist deals with his materials directly whiles the social scientist deals with his materials indirectly since his laboratory is the society and his materials of investigation are men. The scientific method of establishing the truth is one of the chief characteristics of science whether in it strict sense or broader sense. Since social studies is a science it places emphasis on method more than anything else. The scientific method is in four steps which is different from the method of enquiry because every scientific subject and it method of enquiry. These are, abstraction, analysis, data gathering and the construction of theories. Abstraction means standing back from the immediate appearance of things or activities in the world in order to look for aspects of their existence that allow the researcher to understand them more precisely. Analysis is the careful, systematic study of the relationship among different parts of something. Data are not just any bits of information but information that tells us about one or more of the abstraction dimensions we have identified as vital to whatever we are studying and theory is an orderly, logical attempt to show how the relationship identified by analysis fit together with existing knowledge in the field. Thus social studies base it establishment of scientific truth on these four main criteria. Furthermore, social studies is a science because it integrates subjects from the various social science disciplines. As defined by the Board of Directors of National Council for the

Social Studies, the primary membership organization for social studies educators, adopted the following definition: Social studies is the integrated study of the social sciences and humanities to promote civic competence. At times when the social studies student is carrying out his research he has to adopt concepts, generalizations, theories and principles from the various social sciences. Integration as applied to education generally means the interrelation of subjects so that the material of each subject is made interesting through its connecting with points in other subjects. For example on a topic of ethnic groups in Ghana all is find out about the ethnic group. In the process, they will be covering history, geography, sociology and even the psychological make-up of that ethnic group. When the syllabus of the JHS and SHS is taken, it will be seen that topics such as rock, river patterns and administrative regions in Ghana studied which is geography, history topics like the early of the Europeans, nationalist movements and their achievements are studied, sociological topics like culture, socialization, marriage and so on are studied which shows that social studies deals with social science topics which make it a science. Lastly, for a subject to be considered as science it must have a systematic body of knowledge. The content that makes up the subject should be well arranged. The facts or truth of the subjects must be arranged in accordance with a logical manner and social studies is no exception since the facts that are studied are well organised in the sense of cause and effect. For example when criminal offences in major cities are studied with the scientific method of enquiry, causes are identified, effects examined and likely solutions are recommended. Again social studies have a body of systematised knowledge because since it is an integrated subject from different social sciences than for every topic it treats from that field of the social sciences than it will use that fields body of systematised knowledge to drive home it point. For example when a history topic is taught, then the historical knowledge will organised according to the principle of chronology and that of the cross topical emphasis which require a different focus of different aspect of life, their interrelationship and their relationship and impact on the event occurred. Thus, for every subject to be classified as science, it should have some elements. The aforementioned and elaborated points shows that social studies is a science and therefore facts and concepts in this area of study can be scientifically tested using the element explained above.

References.
Shaver, J. (1996). NCSS and citizenship education. In O.L. Davis (Ed.), NCSS in retrospect. Washington DC: National Council for the Social Studies. Saxe, D. (1992a). Farming a theory of social studies foundations. Review of educational Research,, 62, 259-277. Wesley, E., & Wronski, S. (1958). Teaching social studies in high schools (4th ed.) . Boston: Heath. Lecture notes (2012). The meaning and scope of social studies. (ESS 304) Craig Calhoun Et al (1994). Sociology. McGraw-Hill. New York.