What's new

It's hard to believe that this semester is half way through. Everyday I come to class and feel like there is something new I want to teach each day. Just having a hard time with the students following. Kind of funny. But seriously this week is going to be a tough one I used to have an easier time with our next unit "Imperialism" but for some reason I can't get in the groove. Ever have one of those weeks? I think that I want to have the students develop a presentation of countries that took a piece of Africa and see what that particular country's history has to say about that point in their history. If there is a justification and is there still a secondary type of interest in that country. Kind of like the US's interest(s) with Puerto Rico. I'm sure I could find something.
On the student front. One student who was particularly tough to work with this year has just transfered out of school. In all of my short five years of teaching I never had a student like him. He would blatantly cheat in front of me and when I confronted him he would seriously argue with me. That has never happened. I'm pretty strict in my room. Come to find out he did that with all of his teachers. So, when we did an "intervention" with his mom he admitted what he did and he signed a contract stating that he would never do it again and would show up to his classes. The next day he forgot to show up to his classes. Now he's gone. Funny how things work.

My 504

Last week I had my first 504 meeting in long time. Maybe 3 years. And I remember why I don't like them. It was for one of my students whom I like very much. I already know about his issues but I've never had a problem with him. As a matter of fact he is a great student. I think that he has been tremendous in class and he works well with others. I don't get why he has his issues.
My guy has ADHD and turrets. You could only imagine the thoughts I got when I received the letter about him. After a couple of weeks with him I realize that I had his older sister a couple of years ago. She was a great student too. I also figured out that after parents night where he got his issues from when his dad high five'd him when he thought that his son was a trouble maker. After that night, the next day as a matter of fact, he came up to me and told me how his dad always embarrasses him. I understood right away he feared his dad enough so that he would make his dad think he was a clown so as not to get in trouble. Sounds crazy I know but I understood it rather quickly the way that dynamic worked.
Anyways back to the meeting. I walked a little late and the first thing I saw was my student hanging his head low in shame. That really upset me. The other teachers were just railing against him and had nothing positive to say about him. I was getting so angry I could feel my skin getting hot. When it had been my turn to speak, I made my student hold his head up and I told everyone what a great student he is. He started to smile and then I laid the boom on everyone and made him laugh. I could tell that he felt assured I was on his team and was going to help him with anything. Then I noticed this really thick book he was reading. "The Rise and Fall of the Third Reich", World History. I realize just then I was doing something right. It ain't no light reading....

Let the Web-Quest begin

Well this week and next, my students are plunging into the Web-Quest world. I'm so excited! I think that this is going to be a great experience for them. Let me share what they're doing. First they are utilizing Google docs and they are building their Webquest via that program(I wonder where I learned about that?:)) We are in the Industrial Revolution Unit of our year and one of the things we focus on is Inventions from 1750-1900. So, what each of the students are doing, they are choosing an Inventor and they will become an expert by creating the webquest.
The kicker is that they are allowed to do someone, if they so choose, that is of their ethnic background and/or gender. So I had a lot of girls choose to do women inventors. I was so excited to see that they wanted to explore that direction of their project. One of my girls lives in a two-mom home and she was very excited about her research and the freedom I have given to her. The rest of the class was excited as well. Of course it was only the first day of research, I will be interested to see how the rest of the week goes with this.
The next coming two days I will give them, time to work on their project in two of their next classes. I have them three days this week. The last day(Friday) it is due. And they will present it. This is what I'm looking forward to. I think that I might have each student grade each other. Since a Webquest has an evaluation page each student can evaluate each of their peers Webquest. I'll let you all know. I look forward to the week!!!!

As much as I love the tech stuff nothing beats a good ol' DBQ

This week we're in the Industrial Unit. Inventions and new technology. I have found that utilizing the internet I can do so much with prior document based questions. Much to my students dismay. I don't purposely try to make them suffer, it just happens. I had each student develop an argument for each side of the Enclosure Movements people that it had effected. There were the peasants whom got land taken away from them and were forced to move to the cities to work, and there were the English Parliament types who took the land in order to move forward for the country.

This was a stretch for the students I must admit but they handled it in stride. They had to write a five paragraph essay defending both sides. Then they had to choose a side and again defend their position in an in class debate. They had to find all of their resources via reputable internet sites(not wikipedia). I gave them two class periods in which to find their arguments. They got it! And they really enjoyed it.
This is going to set very nicely for one of their web-quest that they to create. They are getting practice to develop their web-quest and become experts with their project, they just don't know it yet.

I'm glad that we have to do these once a week now because in my class it's going to get more intense with computer geek stuff and the students have been responding very well. Something I'm very thankful for. I have had classes were the students just whined about every little thing. This class isn't like that they perform very well. As a matter of fact the class had a 100% pass rate with their benchmark. Great students!