Period 4: Turmoil in the Middle East, Day 13 - Class Recap

Faraj Adnan, one of the people in the movie Promises that we finished today. The picture can be found here. Also, here is a site that tells you a little bit about what happened right after the movie. Faraj is now 24. Should you feel so inclined, here is Faraj's MySpace, and here is his FaceBook. Also, while you are at it, here is Yarko Solan's FaceBook. Certainly something that connects cultures and countries - social networking sites! :-)
Good afternoon, Period 4!

That was a really interesting class - it showed me how nice it would be if class sizes were small all the time! I appreciate all of you that came, and for those of you that elected to do the walk-a-thon for autism, way to go! Hopefully we will have everyone checking out this post, as there is a lot going on to talk about and go over! Let's get to it!

Essential Questions: In what ways are cultures and countries interconnected? How can the Middle East be stabilized?

Soundtrack: "Sweet Child O' Mine" by Guns N' Roses. Lyrics here. Chosen because we finished watching a film about Israeli and Palestinian children today in class.

AGENDA 5/20/09:
News Brief
Finish Promises
IP Project Work
Final Paper Bibliography

Homework: Israeli-Palestinian projects/presentations AND explanation papers due next class! Read blog recap!

We talked about this in class, but yes, your presentations and explanation papers will due in class next Tuesday. I feel no sympathy if anyone was surprised be this, considering it has been your homework for the last two weeks to be continuing to work on. For those needing the assignment again, here it is to download:

Israeli-Palestinian Project Assignment Sheet
For those needing further clarification about what I am asking you to do:

For the paper, please type at least a page, and show your understanding of the conflict. This can best be accomplished by using the "who, who, when, where, why" and sides to the debate that we wrote in class in your skills packet. Then, tell me how your creative product (below) is related to the conflict and will make people come together. Explain it to me!

For the product, you have hopefully picked an activity or some sort of presentation that you can use to come before the class and explain how Israelis and Palestinians should come together and connect (building off of the essential question for the unit). This needs to have some sort of emotional response to the conflict and be able to actually be used. It should also last for at least 2-3 minutes. You will be presenting in class next Tuesday!

So, to recap: I need your paper, presentation, and skills packet turned in during class on Tuesday. Let me know if you need any help with this at all!

News Brief: Chris (I think) led this off with a crazy story about a child being found buried in a playground in Albuquerque, New Mexico. Here is that story: CNN.com - Police release composite photo of boy buried in playground sand. Wow.

There were other stories, but nothing I wrote down to post about. Armando brought in the following news article, talking about people in Great Britain: DailyMail.co.uk - Middle-class debt epidemic: Wealthy plunged into crisis by recession.

Really interesting! I talked about how the world economy is very much impacted by what happens here in the United States, and gave some statistics that I would love to back up here.

Basically, don't start knocking on the United States, yet. Here are some lists of the biggest GDP (Gross Domestic Product - basically, the value of every good and service in a country for one year). Sources: Wikipedia - List of countries by GDP (PPP) and Wikipedia - List of countries by GDP (nominal).

A lot of mumbo jumbo that you almost certainly do not care about, but the basic gist of it all is this: The United States economy is over three times bigger/richer than the next biggest economy, which is Japan. Which is what I put up on the board - the nominal GDP statistic. Bobby asked what is the third richest country in the world. That looks to be either China or Germany, depending on what list you believe. You can see why when the U.S. has economic problems, the world does too, to a large extent.

Tyler, you are up to bring a news article about anything going on around the world (outside the U.S.) for next class on Tuesday. Thanks!

Finish Promises: I'm glad everyone participated in this! Even more so, I was really excited to hear your thoughts about all of it, especially about the innocence of children and the circumstances that they were born into. This was so related to the rest of the movie and the overall point!

By the way, now that the film is done, here is the trailer for the movie, and you can also watch the entire film on YouTube in 10 parts. That playlist can be found here.

I am very interested to see what you did with these conversations! I think it was a good way to approach watching the film. It is possible that we will do something next class with these as well. Again, thank you for your participation! I really liked all of the thoughts that we put on the board at the end of this as well! Thanks!

IP Project Work: For the rest of class, we discussed the Israeli-Palestinian project, which I recapped in some detail in the "homework" section above. Please look at that if you have any questions about what I am asking you to do, or if you need a particular thing for next class. If anyone is doing something electronic, I would appreciate if you e-mailed me the project so I know it is good to go.

Final Paper Bibliography: We did not get to this, but frankly, I am okay with it because I did not want to confuse you about what your main task for this weekend should be. We will come back to this next week.
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As I stated in class, this weekend I will be visiting my brother at college in Princeton, New Jersey, to help him pack up to come home for the summer. I am really excited! I am flying out on Friday morning and getting back on Sunday night. If you are at all interested, you can track my flights in the air here: Portland to Seattle (Horizon Air Flight 2172, 9:30 AM Friday), Seattle to Newark, New Jersey (Continental Airlines Flight 1680, 11:45 AM Friday), Newark to Phoenix, (US Airways Flight 77, 4:35 PM Sunday), and Phoenix to Portland (US Airways Flight 94, 8:10 PM Sunday).

Also, if you would like to see a really awesome website that has all of the flights I have ever taken in my life mapped out, check out this: FlightMemory.com - Ml007. I love flying! Looking forward to putting that Newark-Phoenix route on that page later! If you end up doing this, please post a link in the comments! I would love to see where you have flown to! :-)

Should be a great weekend. I will try to be available as much as possible to post and respond to comments or e-mails. However, try searching around the rest of the blog for answers if you can - there is a lot here!

Have fun out there, see you on Tuesday!