DBQ's and more

One of my favorite activities is a little simulation designed to get students thinking about World War One.  I call it simply the War Simulation. I first learned about it as a junior in College at the University of Maine at Farmington in a class activity from my Professor on Social Studies methods, Dr. Rod Farmer. According to his handout, he adapted it from the journal Social Education from 1966. However, a quick Google search will find it all over the internet and it apparently was in the book Social Studies for the Twenty-first Century: Methods and Materials for Teaching in Middle and Secondary Schools, 3rd Edition published in 1999. This simulation puts students in pairs and assigns them a fictional country on a fictional world. They are thrown into a state of war and must decide to stay neutral or go to war. They end up negotiating with other countries and forming alliances. The idea is to show students how quickly World War One could have gone from a small to a large conflict. It also demonstrates how the cause of the War are somewhat in dispute and why and how U.S. President Woodrow Wilson may have come up with his "Peace Without Victory" plan. The simulation never fails to make these points well. In addition, student never fail to get consumed by the strategy part of this simulation. It makes our study of the conflict, and the outcome of the war, much easier as I keep referring back to the simulation. Always good fun!

Since the only class all juniors take is U.S. History, The Guidance Department used some of our class meeting time this week to help students prepare for some testing. All juniors will be taking the SAT on April 15 and the State of Maine is paying for it. So They registered for the test online. In addition, students will be doing the Smarter Balanced Assessment for the first time. This involves downloading an app so they can practice how the test will work on their iPads. The Smarter Balanced Assessment has gotten a lot of media attention recently. Our school is one of the first in the State to take it, so it will be interesting to see how it goes. Unfortunately students missed a day of class for this prep and will miss two other days for testing.

In Psychology class we have been studying the Brain and its functions. This includes mapping the basic areas as well. Students seem to find this interesting as we also discuss examples of people who have had brain damage to the different areas and how their lives changed as a result. The most famous being the case of Phineas Gage who was impaled by a tamping iron and lived. The study of his changed behaviors helped pave the way for modern psychology to emerge.

(Phineas Gage)

In Ethics classes this week students started their Moral Courage projects. They get to pick someone who has exhibited Moral Courage and defend why. We debated and discussed the case of Edward Snowden and raised the question. Is he exhibiting Moral Courage or is he just a traitor?

One of the highlights of my week was a professional development day spent learning about the DBQ project. On Tuesday, myself and two other teachers from my school traveled to Portland to meet with a bunch of other teachers and learn about this innovative project. There are some definite similarities to the Stanford History Education Group, but lots of time and money has been spent by this teacher and a few others developing Curriculua using historical questions and primary source documents. Luckily, The Maine Department of Education received a grant so that each person who attended received a free binder full of these units which normally go for $350 a piece. Then we spent the day learning about the units and how they are taught. We will choose one to practice with our students and then when we meet again May we will bring student work with us to share. I will be doing a unit on the Dust Bowl and the Great Depression. I can't wait to share and hear from others in May!