Common core – Page 2

November 7, 2013

Class 11: Mock Trials in the Classroom

I’m a big fan of using mock trials – they embody critical thinking in the classroom. Over the years I wrote a number of cases which proved to be effective tools for improving student analytic skills and Common Core skills. Here’s two posts from my blog on using them in the classroom. And here’s a link to two mock trials and an appeals case that I developed.

This week we will be visited by Ms. Barbara Rost, program director, Classroom Law Project. She will guide us through a mock trial – The People Vs Carter (2.4mb PDF) – and provide resources for law related education. (Be sure to follow that link – loads of lesson plans!)

Barbara graduated with a Bachelor of Science from Portland State University after using the 11-year plan to earn her degree, something she does not advocate for others. Three years later she earned her J.D. from Lewis & Clark Law School. She enjoys combining her interests in law and education in her work at Classroom Law Project. She is married, has two daughters in college and a really cute dog.

Classroom Law Project is a non-profit organization dedicated to bringing civics, government and law to Oregon classrooms K-12. Teachers and students know CLP through programs such as mock trial, con team, Law Day conference (for students), Civics Conference for Teachers, court tours, weekly current events, professional development and more. CLP makes civic education fun. Its mission statement: Classroom Law Project is a non-profit organization of individuals, educators, lawyers, and civic leaders building strong communities by teaching students to become active citizens.

Image credit: John Dodgson / Mug Shot / 1930s

This mug shot comes from a police identification book believed to be from the 1930s. It was originally found in a junk shop by a member of the public and subsequently donated to Tyne & Wear Archives & Museums. No information is available to confirm which police force compiled it but evidence suggests it’s from the Newcastle upon Tyne area.
This image is part of the Tyne & Wear Archives & Museum’s set “Newcastle upon Tyne criminals of the 1930’s.” Accession no. DX1190

October 5, 2013

Women’s Suffrage

Suffrage is one of the most important rights that an individual can obtain in a democratic society. Despite the importance of this right, the right to vote has been withheld from a vast majority of the population. This DBQ will focus on the the Women’s Suffrage Movement in the United States from 1900-1920.

Our generative questions are:

– What is the role of image media in the suffrage movement?

– How are pro-and anti-suffrage movements depicted in media?

– What are the biases that are found in image media?

– How are political, social, and economic factors portrayed in image media?

These generative questions are worth answering due to the facts that they will give students a better understand not just of the struggles females (and to a lesser extent minorities) had to overcome in order to receive the ability to vote. These questions will also give students a look at certain aspects of American life and culture in the 20th century.

There is a massive amount of media devoted to either defending or defeating the women’ suffrage movement, and as a result finding pictures that both support or attack the movement will be no trouble. Some of the photos that we will use are below:

handicapped_vintage_suffrage_propaganda_print-r6cf18d8cbe5f4edf99e42d6105edb7a1_wvg_8byvr_512

Students will use this DBQ to compare and contrast pictures from both pro-woman suffrage and anti- women suffrage, as well as understanding who the targeted audience was, and what argument each piece was making. This in depth analysis will allow students to better understand the media in their current lives as well as how that media affects them

September 14, 2013

DBQ Design Assignment

Working as individuals or in 2 person teams, students will design a DBQ question suitable for inclusion of our DBQ iBook (available at iTunes).
See Class 4 for recommendations for DBQs and Teaching with Documents.

I’ve posted some recommendations for best websites for finding primary documents.
American History | World History

This extended assignment meets two of our course requirements as noted in the syllabus (146 KB pdf)
#1: Resources Assignment
#5: iBook showcase

The DBQ Design Assignment will be accomplished in 3 phases:

Step 1: Develop a proposal which will be submitted for peer review.
You should be prepared to deliver a 2 min pitch to class. (not a written assignment to be turned in)
Due date: 9/23.

Then we did a bit of “speed dating” of our ideas for the DBQ Assignment. Students formed two lines and had 2 minutes to pitch their DBQ design idea to each other and share some feedback. Then one line shifted and we repeated the pitch exchange. In all students pitched their idea three times.

The goal of this phase is to gather feedback from peers regarding the following:

You have an interesting generative / essential question worth answering.
Your initial appraisal indicates there are suitable documents available. (Documents could be multimedia).
You have an idea for how students will use your DBQ to build Common Core skills. “What does it say, how does it say it, what’s it mean to me?”

Step 2: Following class feedback on 9/23. Student should send a brief description (via email) of their proposed DBQ to the instructor by Sat 9/28. He will give you feedback when we meet on 9/30 at the Nikkei Center.

Step 3: Students will share their revised idea as a blog post here at EdMethods by Sat Oct 5th. It should explain how you intend to address the 3 questions above. Students are expected to review and comment on at least two of their peers ideas by Sat Oct 12th.

Step 4: Students will open an account at Learnist and use the site to post their DBQ.
Due date: Oct 26

Learnist is a web-based curation site with built in social media tools – it can collect and comment on videos, blogs, books, docs, images or anything on the web.

Your Learnist board should be tightly focused on documents that help students answer the DBQ’s generative question. Each document should include one or two scaffolding questions which help the student to use the documents to answer the DBQ’s generative question.
For a sample of a Learnist board see your instructor’s Incarceration of Japanese Americans During WWII

Your peers will be able to make comments after each document on your Learnist board to help you focus the DBQ. Since Learnist is open to the public, you can expect that others outside our class may comment as well.

Phase 3: Students will finalize their DBQs for inclusion in our iBook showcase.
Details here.

Image Credit “Damn the Zeppelins”
George Eastman House Collection
Accession Number: 1973:0126:0026
Maker: L’AT D’ART PHOT.-Bois-Colombes
Date: ca. 1915
Medium: gelatin silver print, hand applied color
Dimensions: Overall: 8.7 x 13.6 cm

September 14, 2013

Class 4: Teaching With Documents

Common Core offers an incentive for teachers to use historic documents to build literacy skills in a content area while empowering students to be the historian in the classroom. But document-based (DBQ) instruction in this context requires four key elements to be successful:

The right documents.
Knowing how to look at them.
Letting students discover their own patterns, then asking students to describe, compare and defend what they found.
Basing the task on enduring questions, the kind that students might actually want to answer.

Class 4 offers strategies for assisting students to more closely read a document (in all their multimedia formats) by answering three Common Core questions.

What did it say?
How did it say it?
What’s it mean to me?

Here’s a pdf handout of my slide deck Week 4 HandOut (6 MB pdf)

Next our class examined two sample DBQ’s that I have designed. The first is my iBook “Progress and Poverty in Industrial America” ~ Free at iTunes. The second is the PDF version of my Homefront iBook series. Link to free PDF.

Students will be assigned the task of designing their own DBQ.

Additional resources:

For more strategies see these tags on my blog:
Close Reading | History / DBQ’s

Other examples of my DBQ’s available as free pdfs.
European Views of the New World | The Impact of Industrialization

Title: “An A B C, for baby patriots”
Creator: Ames, Mary Frances
Publisher: Dean & Son
Place of Publication: London (160a Fleet Street E.C.)
Publication Date: [1899]
Archive: University of Florida UF00086056:00001