Winter Break

It is time for a break. We all know it. The kids know it. Our families know it. What are you planning to do with your time away from work?

I am heading north to visit family!!! I must be crazy, since I remember all too well what kinds of things can happen in families around holidays. But there you have it. Airports at 6am, paying to check my luggage, and wearing my Uggs.

I wish you the best time away, whether it is in your own home or on the road. Come back refreshed and ready.

.

Best Practices 101

How Many Ways Can You Use a Textbook?

1. as an excuse, OR

2. as a weight to build up flabby arm muscles OR

3. a doorstop, OR

4. to illustrate bad writing OR

5. as one of many sources of historical information for your students.

A strategy called OUT [Opening Up the Textbook], developed at Stanford University, helps students use the textbook as one source rather than the only source of information. This technique focuses on using small passages from the text juxtaposed with other texts so students can compare them. The combination of multiple texts with differing perspectives allows students to gain a better understanding of the process of historiography. Rather than accept the account of history as filtered through the lens of textbook writers and their committees, these differing accounts can open student eyes to the variety of interpretations available about past events.

One way to use this technique is to find a primary source that is the subject of a small portion of the textbook. Examining the primary source and then evaluating the text's treatment of the event will give students the opportunity to judge for themselves the validity of the textbook's interpretation of the event.

Another method is to compare multiple textbook accounts of the same event. Textbooks can be old and new, or published for classes of different levels, or even texts for different classes in the same discipline, i.e. world history and American history. How do these books tell the story of the same event? What parts are emphasized, and which are passed over lightly? What biases do the different authors have about the event?

A third method is to look at who is left out of the textbook narrative. Using the textbook and alternate sources, students can evaluate who or what is left out of the text narrative. Which voices are not being heard? Which participants in the story are included only in a sidebar? How did the authors decide who or what was important enough to include? How can the story be made more complete?

For more information about this technique, see the January 2010 issue of our newsletter.

End of the Year Stuff.....

The end of the calendar year is approaching and there are lots of things to do in addition to any holiday celebrations. One of those is check your FSA balance. If you have pre-tax money deducted from your paycheck for medical expenses, you may have a balance remaining that needs to be spent before 12/31. Eligible expenses include things like over the counter meds, glasses, eye exams, and other medical expenses. I notice that some eligible expenses are indicated on register receipts with a special mark at my drug store. Just something else to think about in these busy days.

Current Events Make Great Discussions

What kind of current events do you do with your students? There are so many stories that can be used in a social studies classroom, where does one start when choosing what to use? I noticed at least 3 stories recently making the rounds that would be great for bell ringer discussions or making social studies relevant to the lives of our students.


1. Greg Oden, the 2007 number one draft pick of the Portland Trailblazers, was seriously injured in a basketball game against the Houston Rockets. Oden, who has been sidelined with injuries during his rookie season, will now have to sit out the remainder of this season. Oden was diagnosed with a fractured right kneecap. EVen though injured during a defensive collision on Saturday, Oden continued to put his team first. He apologized for getting injured and letting the team down. He encouraged them to focus on the score rather than his injuries, and Portland won 90-89 in the last 3 seconds of the game. How could you use this story with your students?




2. Tareq and Michaele Salahi, alleged White House dinner crashers, are in the news. Their attendance at the first state dinner hosted by President Obama has created a number of inquiries. Their visit to the White House state dinner for the Prime Minister of India became widely known when the couple posted pictures of themselves at the dinner with various dignitaries on their Facebook page. The Secret Service has suspended the agents responsible for allowing them in without an invitation. Investigations have been called for by Congress, and the Salahis failed to appear before House Homeland Security hearing on December 3. Mrs. Salahi is trying to win a role on an upcoming reality series "The Real Housewives of D.C." How could you use this story with your students?


3. The Afghanistan-Pakistan War: the Center for Strategic and International Studies, a non-partisan thinktank, has published a number of monographs including "Losing the Afghan-Pakistan War? The Rising Threat" in September, 2008 and "The Afghan-Pakistan War: A Status Report 2009, A Brief Summary." [http://csis.org/files/media/csis/pubs/080917_afghanthreat.pdf and http://csis.org/files/publication/burke/090803_BriefSummary.pdf] [Map from BBC News http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/7601748.stm] These documents should be required reading for anyone who wants to speak intelligently on the Afghan-Pakistan problem and the President's current plan. The site has a number of other resources, including videos, that give background information on this vital topic. How could you use this information with your students?

What is Your Focus?

Now that we are working our way toward the end of the calendar year, we can take the opportunity to ask ourselves some important questions about what we have done since August. One of the most important questions we can ask ourselves is "What is my focus?"

Many of us are thinking about what we've done over the past few months and are looking forward to the end of the semester. Some of us are assessing our progress in dealing with challenges - discipline, academic, personal - and asking what we need to do differently after the Winter Break. Others are trying to understand benchmark results. The primary question underlying our thoughts is, "what is our focus?"

Focus is understanding the goal and objective before planning the lesson.

Focus is planning an assessment which reflects the Revised Bloom's Taxonomy level of the objective.

Focus is teaching the standard course of study.

Focus is managing the pacing of your course so that items assessed by the benchmark are the items you have already taught.

Are you focused?

Holiday Shopping or Holiday Shocking!

The holiday shopping season has officially begun and I am doing my best to avoid it. I was on the road visiting my grands this Thanksgiving and got to see all of them at the same time!!! I also got to see snow in Ohio and sleet in West Virginia. Finally, I got to see the ads for "Black Friday" which I thought was supposed to be a special holiday just for me! Imagine my surprize when I found out it was a shopping day when people get up before dawn to stand in line at stores to spend money they don't have for things they don't need. Not my kind of day at all.

I remember last year's Black Friday death of a Wal-Mart security guard who was trampled by a mob of shoppers.There isn't anything I could possibly want to buy that would be worth a man's life to buy.

What did you do the Friday after Thanksgiving?

Origami for the Ears

We all know what origami is. But do you know what OrigAudio is?

Named one of Time magazine's best inventions of 2009, these speakers fold completely flat and can be put into a laptop sleeve without adding much bulk. Made of recycled paper, these 3" cubes need no external power and can be used with any audio device that will take a headphone jack. If you are interested, check out the link below.

http://www.time.com/time/specials/packages/article/0,28804,1934027_1934003_1933984,00.html

Make it Easy on Yourself

Who works harder in your class - you or the students? If you are working much harder than they are, something isn't going the way it should. What do I mean by working harder? Do you spend hours grading assignments that it takes students a very short time to do? Do you have 15-20 grades per grading period for non-test assignments? Are you collecting lots of papers which you can't find time to deal with except at night, when you would rather be doing something else? Then you are working too hard!

Want some suggestions? Here's one!

When you think about assessments, what about student driven assessments? Instead of your grading students, let the grade each other. That kind of grading is great for vocabulary quizzes, crossword puzzles, fill in the blank, true-false and other simple assessments which are designed to get a feel for where students are on their way to completion of a goal or objective. How do you keep students from cheating or helping others to cheat? Use student numbers instead of names, and a certain color pen for checking. Have students sign the work they check. If they falsify an answer, those points are taken away from their points. Sounds complicated but isn't.

Share your suggestions, please.

On This Day in History

On this day in 2006, the Massachusetts Supreme Judicial Court ruled 4-3 that the state constitution guarantees gay couples the right to marry. Any thoughts?

The 90-10 Principle

Historiography

What is historiography and why is important?

Most of us don't think much of historiography or can even spell it.  After all, history is not what happened. History is what someone says happened.

However, students enjoy our classes much more if they have a grasp of "the study of history" or how to make sense of historical events. For example, students enjoy learning the whys of history much more than they enjoy memorizing facts and dates. They learn to use what they know combined with real situations to examine what they are told with a skeptical eye.

A fantstic example is the change in textbooks over the past 50 years. When I was in school, they only had papyrus rolls! But in the 1950s and 1960s most popular history books described few African Americans and Native Americans except in an occasional box on the side of a page. The curriculum focused on the exploits and accomplishments of white men, and left out in any meaningful way the accomplishments of most women, ethnic groups, and non-white, American born people. If you are looking for ways to make your curriculum more accurate, see James W Loewen's Teaching What Really Happened: How to Avoid the Tyranny of Textbooks and Get Students Excited About Doing History.

The Start of the Financial Crisis

Did you know that on this day in 1999, President Bill Clinton signed a sweeping measure knocking down Depression-era barriers and allowing banks, investment firms and insurance companies to sell each other's products? [http://www.nytimes.com/learning/general/onthisday/]


Why is this important?  This is really good debate information and connects the Great Depression with our current financial situation. For more information, see these sites:

http://www.time.com/time/specials/packages/article/0,28804,1877351_1877350_1877322,00.html 

http://www.time.com/time/specials/packages/article/0,28804,1877351_1877350_1877330,00.html

http://www.time.com/time/specials/packages/article/0,28804,1877351_1877350_1877320,00.html


http://www.rd.com/advice-and-know-how/the-financial-crisis-of-2008/article104369.html 

http://www.theatlantic.com/doc/200807/regulation-crook 

Collloquium II - Good Food and Great Presenters

The 2nd Colloquia of Year 2 was this past weekend at the High Point museum. We had good food and great speakers. We also had fun, and got some goodies. Each teacher received a flash drive loaded with grade-specific materials. We also provided information on the Essential Standards process, concept based learning, and the CIP project. MIche Franken, one of our presenters, was a participant last year. She demonstrated how to use History Alive! to make teaching more interesting and interactive. Great job, Miche.

We also got to see Edith Brady's new baby girl, who is a 6-month-old joy. Finally, some of us got to go shopping. We ate and listened, toured and took notes. We stood and sat and moved around the room. In general, most of us stayed awake after the great lunches. Finally, we cleaned up and headed home, tired but satisfied.

Next meeting: March 19, 2010 at Guilford College.

Way to Go, Mark!

Mark Griffin, Year 1 participant and Grimsley High social studies teacher, was featured in a story in the October 31 edition of the "News and Record. " 

Mark's students participated in the Kid's Voting project, and were wonderful examples of students getting involved in activities related to being good citizens. Mark is a former policeman who spends much of his time teaching civic responsibility and participation in his Civics & Economics classes.  

We are glad to see Mark receive some long overdue recognition for his work! You go, Mark!

The Great Depression

Did you know that today is the anniversary of "Black Tuesday,"  the day known as the start of the Great Depression?  If you are teaching this subject, a good site for photos is the Library of Congress American Memory site http://memory.loc.gov/ammem/fsahtml/fahome.html . Because This site contains government pictures, so there are no copyright issues [I know you follow the rules to avoid copyright infringement, right?]. There are other great sites listed on www.google.com/images.

  New York City

Guilford County, NC

One of my favorite sites for information is Stan Schultz's lecture series. http://us.history.wisc.edu/hist102/lectures/lecture18.html  Other sites are http://ezinearticles.com/?1929-Vs-2009---Will-We-Relive-the-Great-Depression?&id=2081891 &  http://ezinearticles.com/?Excessive-Leverage-Caused-1929-Stock-Market-Crash-and-2008-Economic-Collapse&id=2715175 . They are good for prompting conversation.  Let me know of other resources so they can be added to our list.

George Washington, Father of the National Debt

Did you know that the National Debt dates back to the Revolutionary War?

As of October 28 at 1:52pm our national debt was the staggering sum of $11,903,911,251,033.22 which translates to a debt of $38,751.82 per citizen [see http://www.brillig.com/debt_clock/ for up-to-date information].

The national debt began during the presidency of the Father of our Country, George Washington.

The 13 states signed the new Constitution only after the Federal government agreed to assume responsibility for some $75,000,000. in debts incurred while fighting the Revolutionary War.     
The debt grew to $1 billion during Abraham Lincoln's presidency.  Lincoln said about the debt,  "Men readily perceive they cannot be much oppressed by a debt they owe themselves."  During that time, most of the public debt was financed by issuing government bonds, like savings bonds.
The situation today is quite different, with much of our debt owned by foreign interests. Just something to think about......

Annenberg Media Resources Available

Do you look for FREE video that is on point and interesting? Are you having difficulty finding appropriate ideas to make the constitution real for your students [the BIll of Rights is easy, but the Constitution ......]? I have one set each of the following materials, which are also available via streaming video:

The Constitution: That Delicate Balance  which has people having debates on controversial constitutional issues like school prayer, the right to die, immigration reform, and many other topics.  http://www.learner.org/resources/series72.html 

Democracy in America has 15 half hour videos, and on-line materials. It covers all kinds of issues related to how democracy works including Civil Liberties, the modern presidency, Federalism: US v the States and more. http://www.learner.org/courses/democracyinamerica/dia_1/dia_1_topic.html 

Ethics in America I and II  are hypothetical cases discussed using the Socratic method. Subjects include National Security and the News; Under Orders, Under Fire; Does Doctor Know Best? and others that are equally interesting. There is also information available on the web:  http://www.learner.org/resources/series81.html  is Ethics in America and 
http://www.learner.org/resources/series207.html  is Ethics II.


The website for Annenberg Media is http://www.learner.org/# . Enjoy yourselves!

Precious

I was browsing at the largest online bookstore when  the thought struck me. I haven't read a book for pleasure in months! As I sat there feeling completely disconcerted, I tried to remember the last book I read completely for pleasure. A book, not a magazine. I came up dry. I remember a time when I read mysteries, romance, travel, horror, short stories, and other kinds of fiction as well as non-fiction. But now? I'm reading More Sex is Safer Sex by Steven Landsburg, which is an economics book somewhat like Freakonomics. l have Economics for Dummies and Teaching What Really Happened in my to-be-read pile - nothing that isn't related to work in some way.

I was on my way from Northeast HS and heard Oprah talking on the radio about a movie she has a role in creating called Precious. The movie is based on Push, a novel by Sapphire. I got the novel and thought it would be a good diversion when I am tired of doing what I am supposed to do. I was floored! This is very powerful stuff. I can see why Oprah made it into a movie. I even heard that Mo'nique shows us what an actress can really do [there's Oscar buzz]. I highly recommend this small book.  



 

Gilder Lehrman site for teaching the American Revolution

This is the most wonderful site for teaching the American Revolution.  We will be going to Gilder Lehrman Institute this summer to study.  Check it out and leave a comment.

http://www.historynow.org/09_2009/index.html   

Guilford Courthouse colloquium

This is a pix of the buildings at the former Tannenbaum Park site, now part of the Guilford Courthouse National Park.

Welcome to Building Bridges

Welcome to the new Building Bridges blog. For a look at what we did in the first year, see this video.