We had elections this past week, and we have been looking at the issues on Maine's ballot in the days leading up to the election. We didn't spend a lot of time studying the arguments for and against in my classes, but we did refer to the League of Women Voters Guide, and discussed the merits of the arguments. The real election happened on Tuesday, but on Monday and Tuesday I held secret ballot elections in my classes and tabulated the results. 6 out of the 7 questions on the ballot this year were bonds. All were approved in real life and in my student elections. We also had Representative Chellie Pingree running for re-election and she won both in real life and in my student election. In addition, Susan Collins also won both elections. What was interesting was the two measure son the ballot in which the real vote and the student vote differed. Question 1 asked voters if they wanted to ban the use of bait, traps, and dogs in hunting bears. In real life, the measure was voted down in a close vote. However my students voted to approve the measure (but also in a close vote). The other area of difference was in the election for Governor. In real life, the current Governor won re-election. Paul LePage defeated Mike Michaud by about 48%- 43% and Eliot Cutler had around 9%. In my student election Michaud won with 50% over LePage with 31% and Cutler with 19%. We discussed this in class and students speculated as to why they thought the vote came out the way it did. It was all an interesting exercise in democracy that I hope will foster a bit of interest so that they will vote when they have the opportunity in real life.
In Ethics class I had a guest speaker as well. Over the summer we received a letter form the Better Business Bureau that discussed a school speaker program in which they offered a variety of topics to go over. I took them up on it scheduled a speaker to come and talk about what the BBB does. I had told her ahead of time that it was an Ethics class and they had already been study the basic principles of Ethics. My speaker drove up from Massachusetts to be in my class at 8:15, so I'm sure she was up early. She was full of energy and had a nifty little powerpoint to share with videos on what the BBB does. the first few minutes were a bit of an overview of what the BBB can do. Then she decided to go basic and start posing hypothetical scenarios, most of which we had already discussed in class. She seemed impressed with the quality and depth of responses (no surprise to me since we had had the same discussions already). She was so impressed she sang their praises to me over and over. While she was impressed, I was not so much. She gave a great effort and I appreciate what she did, but she either missed the point and forgot that we didn't need the basics. I wanted her to talk about examples of how businesses have been accused of shady practices and what the BBB can do to help consumers, not hypotheticals about what to do if you see a $100 bill in the hallway. I think she has this "canned" presentation that she is used to doing it to younger students who have had no formal instruction about ethics. At least it kept the students engaged, they didn't seem to be bothered by having the same discussions over again, and I think it's because the speaker was so high energy and charismatic.
In History v. Hollywood students presented the Historical Trailers they made using the iMovie app on their iPads. Almost every single student felt the need to apologize in advance for how" stupid" their was. This is so annoying! Non of them were "stupid" the students just get easily embarrassed about showing these to the class as they are forced out of their comfort zone. This is why I like to show them the one I made, so they see that if I can be a little ridiculous, so can they. Each trailer showed creativity and a connection to the message from the film.
My students in Sacrifice for Freedom continue work on individual projects and I have to admit I really enjoy helping them look for material and leads to follow up on. It's great that they get to experience the work of what historians actually do and understand what makes it so interesting and important. As Veteran's Day approaches, I can't help but feel the emotional connection to the work the students are doing and I look forward to when they have a product that can be shared in some fashion. We also hope to follow up with the people living currently in Beddes, France who still honor Mr. Goddard. Despite the implementation of new standards, the pressure form student testing, and new teacher evaluation work, its this kind of work that keeps me going!
Next week we start $35 Dollar Bill projects!
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