For and Against - December Post

          Ever have one of those days that you think you've completed something only to realize you didn't post it?  Well looking at my list I see that I've posted everything, but this... so now it is out of order... "Best laid plans of mice and men..."

          This month we are working on our "For and Against" projects - students were assigned a topic from the list compiled - they could also give suggestions of topics.  They had to take a survey to see what their stances were before they were assigned.  If a student chose neutral they could be switched to being "For" or "Against" based on their classmates stances and groupings.  

Here was the form for their topics:

-Abortion

-Gay Marriage

-Minimum Wage - Increase

-Raising the Debt Ceiling

-Euthanasia/Physician Assisted Suicide

-Vaccine for Kids

-Gun Control

-Medical Marijuana

-Animal Testing

-Video Games and Violence for Youth

-Death Penalty

-Drinking Age

-Cell Phones

-Illegal Immigration

-Concealed Handgun Permits

-Legalization of Marijuana

-E-Cigarettes

-Social Media in Schools

-Felons and Voting

-The Gold Standard

-Standardized Tests

-Tax Exempt Organizations

-Corporate Tax Rate

-Drones - Domestic

-Drones - International

-Electoral College

-Vocational Education

-Welfare

-Social Security

-Military Spending

-Domestic Violence

-Gambling

-Medicating Children

-Vaccinating Children

-Religion in Schools

-Police Brutality

-Discrimination/Affirmative Action

          Students had to provide a historical overview of their topic in an unbiased faction.  The main bulk of their paper is their persuasive portion where they focused on being for or against the topic and explaining why.  

         Next month, we will have them create short presentations where they introduce their main arguments to their classmates and then have open discussions about the topic.  This project is working on the research component of their standards, group communication, public speaking, and presenting information.

Review Games - January Post

          End of the Semester Review is very important because students typically don't remember what we studied in August/September.  For review games this year, I have created a few new things simply because the new Smart Board in my room does not allow you to throw things at it, like the old boards did; this issue has rendered my Bulls Eye game and Basketball game worthless because you can't score when the board doesn't pick up the ball.
          Quizizz.com - review game that allows multiple choice questions - students may go at their own pace, but can be timed (mine have 30 seconds to answer their questions), but it allows them to answer questions and then see what they got wrong.

          Flippity - Jeopardy and it does the MATH for you!!! Allows you to set up your boards, you must publish it to the web and then attach the link on the second tab.   You then can play with your students and it allows you to keep track of points just by clicking the "x" and check mark.  

           Baseball - took the terms for the final exam and broke them into singles, doubles, and triples.  Students are then asked a question at random (drawn from a bag)  
     

         
Otherwise I have kept my standard reviews of History (Bingo), Square Game, and Bazinga, but those have been talked about at some point or another so I am not going to beat a dead horse.  Review games should be interactive and keep students engaged, but also review the content.

Oregon Trail - November Post

          The Oregon Trail is the first portion of the westward migration that occurs under the concept of Manifest Destiny.  I have done a simulation for the event, but have been adding and tweaking it every year.  Even this year I have spent the weeks after the fact digitizing the sheets for the assignment.  It will make it even easier because students will just change one number and it'll do all the calculations for them in the coming years.  This year we were still doing it by hand, which them and their calculators (phones) is the most time consuming part of the project.  

Couples are chosen ahead of time so students are not with the same people every project.

First Step: Students choose whether they are the husband or wife out of the couple.  Husband Students identify which profession they have (Popsicle sticks have professions written on it and they draw it from the cup).  Mostly the boys of the groups are husbands, but we have some same gender groupings due to class numbers and some girls who refuse to be the wife that are husbands.

Second Step: Wives roll a dice to see how many children they have - 1-2 = 4 kids; 3-4 = 6 kids; 5-6 = 8 kids.

Third Step: Name all the children, given them a gender, and an age. (this will impact the weekly consumption of the family)

Fourth Step: Begin Shopping - on day two they are given an estimate of needed resources for a family of four to survive (since no one has a family of four no one can claim favoritism) 

Fifth Step: Begin the Journey

Sixth Step: Starting on week three we start rolling a twenty sided die to see if they were attacked by Native Americans and also start choosing fate cards - rivers, floods, tornadoes, snakes, etc. Plus each week we deduct from their resources their weekly resources.  When they no longer have resources for their family members they begin to die off.  

All of the standard students died this semester.  In the one classes defense they were hit by a tornado and no one rolled where they got to safety before hand.  Some of the Honors students were successful in their endeavor, potentially.  We did not get in as far with the Honors because they had a primary document to complete that the regular students did not have.   Next year with the digital form for the calculations should make this possible still in the Honors class.  

Lewis and Clark - October Post

          Students have done time line on Lewis and Clark and have watched a documentary on it.  At this point we are looking for something that they can create that will show they understand what they have studied and seen.  This year we decided to do journal entries.  Students were broken into groups of three, each person in the group had to choose a different person from the expedition and three different events.  Students then had time to research their specific events and write their journal entries.  Honors had to write three entries with seven sentences each.  Regulars had to write three entries with five sentences each.  The qualifications for Honors were more stringent in regards to details and personal characteristics in their entries that could identify the person without seeing who signed the entry.

Here is an example of an entry: 

June 19, 1803;

I have just sent out the proposal letter to my dear friend William Clark requesting his assistance in my upcoming expedition. The amount of anticipation for the answer to my request is unbearable. I have presented him with all of the information that was given to me, in the best hopes that he will agree to assist me on this fabulous journey. I provided Clark that I have had the choice to indict soldiers, whom of which cannot be commissioned officers, and exceeding no more than twelve, along with any other men that I so believe will be an aid to this journey. I have the highest of hopes.

Meriwether Lewis.

  Overall I would consider the project a success. There was an issue in having all the students turn in their projects (here we are in November and I am still waiting for six projects to be turned in). The reviews went over well with students. The only major issue they faced was in putting their final product together in chronological order. The use of Google Docs for the document definitely assisted in letting everyone work on their portion at the same time. It also helps them in regards to spell check and grammar.

Time Line You - September's Project

          Ever have one of those moments where you think "it's okay I can do that later" and then you realize you still haven't done it.  Well that's me and my project posts.  I've spent so much time creating, grading, reading evaluations of students, etc. for these projects that I forgot to post descriptions and examples from them.  So I apologize profoundly, but here is my September Post (in November).  I will attempt to be more diligent in the coming months.  
         The first big project of the year was checking to see if student's understand the difference between primary and secondary sources, as well as chronological thinking.  In years past I've had them take their life events and compare them with others life events and make one large time line.  This year I had them focus solely on themselves and then find Primary Documents and Secondary Documents to use as reference for those events.  

          Overall the project was a success, but there were multiple students who found the sourcing component of this difficult.  This also led us into the Ordeal by Cheque Activity in which they had to create a story based on a primary documents (checks) about the life of the person.  We also then talked about Historical Perspectives and Interpretations and how people with the same set of primary evidence could come to different conclusions.

Here are examples of the finished products: (You'll notice that the major primary source for most of the students was pictures) Names, Dates, and Pictures have been blurred/erased for the safety of my students.

Exceeding Expectations

     This year I gave my students a boat project with the hopes that it would be an interactive way for the students to learn about the various ships used during exploration.  My students by far went over and above my expectations.  The research plan started simple... I gave them a list of ships that were famous during the period of Exploration.  I attempted to tie in information from multiple countries and then gave a basic assignment.  Find out information about what the boat is made out of, what the purpose of the boat was used for, benefits of the ships, and drawbacks of the ship.  They created a poster and a model of the ship (which had to float).  Each group member made their own poster and tied in their information on the board to present to their classmates.  We also sailed them in my "ocean" (huge plastic container filled with water).  The fastest boat won bonus points, and the physical boats were graded based on details and flotation capability.  The Galleon group earned bonus points based on how much weight the ship could carry.  Here are some of my students marvy creations...

 

 

       The projects exceeded my expectations.  My classes did very well and while some students did not do well in the overall presentation of their information I was overall very impressed both with my Honors and my Regular classes.  Most of them also retained lots of information about their boats because they spent time researching it and had a more vested interest than a basic lecture.  

Chromebook (and slight comparisons to the iPad)

     A few weeks ago at EdCamp I had some luck on my side and won a Google Chromebook to use in my classroom and with my students.  I also have 10 iPads for student use in my classroom.  So choosing a select group of students (I have groups of three for projects, etc.) I had students using the Chromebook in each class.  I also used it in the evenings to create my google slides presentations.  Here are some of the things we've learned and things my students pointed out.

For Teachers:
Likes: 

• LIGHT WEIGHT - the Chromebook is uber light and really easy to transport home compared to a traditional lap top.  
• GOOGLE - it allows me to access my google account for drive, website, e-mail, etc. and allows for each navigation on the web for web quests, etc.
• Easy to Use and can add Apps (Quizlet) really easily 
• USB Port!!! It has it (which the iPads do not) 

Dislikes:

• No matter whether you want it to be a laptop or not - it is not and you can not access your grade book on it
• No CD drive or Ethernet slot - I go to an office during my planning with no wireless connection and it has a port on the wall, but with no matching port on the Chromebook there's no internet while in the office (you can however work online as long as you didn't close it before entering the office)

For Students:

Likes:

• Keyboard - My students loved that there was a keyboard - even when they were doing assignments where you didn't need a keyboard more than typing in a login they still liked the keyboard
• Angles - My students like that you could adjust the screen to multiple angles (on my iPads they use the case to support them so they have three options - flat, slight or more slanted)
• Speed - some felt the Chromebook was faster (I don't think that was really a difference, just certain periods the network seems to work faster)
• Weight - Light weight

Dislikes:

• Weight - some of my students felt it was too light and would be too easy for them to break it
• Projects - when asked if they'd like it for everything in class they said they'd want the iPad for projects like iMovie and Voicethread (But they'd like the Chromebook for Quizlet and Web Quests)
• Google Sign In - some didn't remember their sign in, some had never signed into their google account at all so another sign in (it is somewhat long for students) and a password; the iPads don't have a sign in unless they're using a specific program

Overall:

My students were split and for multiple reasons whether they'd want to give up the iPads for Chromebooks or vice versa (not that they have the choice or option to do so - we have what we have). A couple things that surprised me - 1) Status symbol - some of the students considered the iPads to be a status symbol and would simply want the iPads because they're iPads;  they felt the Chromebook wasn't to the same level of status as an iPad; 2) Want Both - they said they'd want both for their group so they could bounce between the two and utilize each for their benefits (Chromebook - Keyboard and Research; iPad - iMovie and projects)  I pointed out that that seemed a little greedy/expensive, but that didn't seem to change their opinions.