Students in US History classes are still working on their Dollar Bill projects. but in addition to this we also started discussing slavery. To help with this, we listened to a former slave talk about what his life was like. Thanks to the Federal Writer's Project in the 1930's and the new technology of the day, audio recording, we have quite a few oral histories recorded in the National Archives that are the words of men and women who had been born into slavery. This Born in Slavery website is wonderful for this. I chose to use the words of one slave in particular named Fountain Hughes. I chose him because what he has to say is interesting and engaging, and he is relatively clear in his speaking. The Site does also offer a written transcript of what the former slaves are saying which I always print and have students follow along with because there are places where because of the age of the former slaves and the old style technology it is difficult to hear what is being said. This is a great discussion starter to get into the basic life a slave. I really like how Mr. Hughes repeats over and over this idea that as a slave "Dogs got it better now than we did then". Which sends a message about the low level of treatment, but very interestingly is not all that detailed. Many of the slave narratives leave out some of the worst details. You do hear these folks says things like "I don't want say too much because it makes folks feel bad." It's just a great resource and I really enjoy the follow up discussions.
(Only known photo of Fountain Hughes)
This week in Ethics we discussed and debated Animal Rights vs. Animal Welfare. This led to a discussion of meat eating and vegetarianism as well. For this we used an couple of online articles and videos. This website on the basics, this article about ethical meat eating, this video about the intelligence of Dolphins, this video about the Gorilla Koko, and this video about Temple Grandin and her work in advancing ethical ways of treating Animals (but not Animal Rights philosophy). In History v. Hollywood we finished watching Schindler's List and continued to study the Holocaust and its legacy. In my online class through Virtual High School, we are now discussing the end of the Cold War in the late 1980's and analyzing Gorbachev vs. Reagan. This course will end in 3 weeks and students will be posting their presentations about future American Foreign Policy.
(Temple Grandin)
(Koko with her pet kitten)
I was very proud of myself this week for taking a the "bull by the horns" this week on two different things. I sometimes can get so caught up in my lesson plans, grading, and day to day routines that I struggle to quickly pick up on issues that need to be addressed. Thanks to a conversation with a fellow Advisor that he started with me, I came to the realization that something was amiss in my Advisee group (and perhaps many 9th grade groups). My Advisees have not made much progress in interacting with each other. My theory is that its because of the iPads to a certain extent. With my last group as 9th graders they came in and sat down and looked to me or each other for what we were going to do. Over the 4 years that evolved into time to do homework and having a small laptop device to help with that. Because they had time to get to know each and other and bond as a group before we made changes, the group seemed to come together well. It happened naturally and not something I had to force. With my new group there is a whole lot of individual work on the iPad (as well as games or whatever) and not much social interaction. So I made 2 changes. From now on, the first 10 minutes of every Advisee time will be spent in a circle at the front of the room with no electronic devices. The other change was that every other Friday for the whole 30 minutes I will bring in some type of food goodies and and we will have a discussion in a circle. I purchased something called Table Topics online that has a series of cards with interesting discussion topics for teens. I learend about this during Advisor training on the first day of school from other Advisors. I am happy to report that both of these changes have been well received and dare I say even appreciated by my Advisees. On Friday we had our first Table Topic discussion and I think we learned more about each other in that 30 minutes than we had learned in all the time up to that point! The other item on which I grabbed the horns was in my study hall. Never before this year have a I had a study hall with so many students on silent study (this means no talking, and no signing out to anywhere). I started the beginning of the year with 5 or 6 and each grade check the number has gone up. In order to get off silent study a students can have no grade lower than a "73". In theory silent study should help them get their grades on track and be "painful" enough that they will be motivated to work harder and get off silent study. This theory has not held true as I now have 20 on silent study out of 31! So this week I instituted assigned seats and purposely put students next to people I knew they were not friends with. I have been doing this on the first day of school in all may classes for a few years now with great success. I never bothered with study hall because until this year I only had 5-10 students ever stay in the room and they stayed quiet without much difficulty. This year has been different. So I announced on Thursday a change. There was moaning and groaning and so I said there is an easy solution- do some work and get off of silent study. I offered to help them, talk to teachers, whatever is needed to help them be successful. I am hope to see some progress!
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