Period 4: Historical Investigation, Day 1 - Class Recap

Today we started the Historical Investigation project, which is about revolutions. You cannot pick the American Revolution, but here is a lasting reminder of it: the Washington Monument in Washington, D.C.! I took this picture during Spring Break in 2010.

Hi everyone,

As promised at the start of class, there was quite a bit we had to do today. A little fun mixed with some serious business. Please read on to go over the historical investigation and what you need to be working on!

Essential Questions: What brings people together? What tears people apart?

Soundtrack: “I Was Here” by Beyonce. Selected for today because you should want to leave your mark with this big project: let it be known that you were here and existed! Lyrics here.

AGENDA 3/20/13:
News Brief/Blog Recap
Finish The Coup
Historical Investigation – Part A
Computer Lab Time

Homework: Keep working on Part A - be ready to finish it next class. Show your parents the calendar! Read the blog. Next news brief: Brennen and Alyssa.

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News Brief: Today's articles were brought in by Kyra and Rachael. Here is what they selected: NBCNews.com - Cyprus crisis deepens: bailout rejected, banks may not reopen and NZWeek.com - Mongolia holds water-saving exhibition to raise awareness. This brought up a discussion about bailouts in general, then a fun talk about where our water comes from (after which, multiple students seemed to be quite thirsty). :-)

Finish The Coup: Ahh, yes. The calm before the storm. I heard a lot of laughs during this, and hopefully some more understanding about the elements of a revolution. At the end of the episode, we talked for a bit about how Dwight's revolution was influenced by political (power), economic (money), and social (other people) motives. He probably would have been a good example of a dictator, if he had been allowed to continue running the office.

Historical Investigation - Part A: Alert, alert! This is the start of a massive assignment. Here is what I passed out in class today:

1) The Historical Investigation Assignment. We went through this thoroughly (at least 10 minutes) in class. Basically, the assignment consists of five parts. The back side of the paper has a list of possible revolutions to choose from. If you want to choose one that is not on that list, you must clear it by me first. This is NOT a partner assignment. In fact, if you choose the same revolution as someone else, I am going to make sure that you have completely different research questions and sources.

For Period 2/4, the rough draft of this will be due on April 17th. The final draft will be due the next class after that, which is April 19th.

***If you are a TAG student (or want a challenge, if you are not): all of these elements must be combined together into one paper. If you are not, it is okay if you have each element in a separate area for the project.***

As I was saying in class: if you want to do well on this project (and you should, considering it is one of the biggest assignments of the entire year), you will probably have to be working on it at home.

2) A calendar of the plan for the next month. Remember that we will be doing other activities than just the historical investigation. This calendar has all of the major due dates on it. Note that Part A is due at the end of next class! We will go to the computer lab for most of next class, but you need to have a plan of attack going in.

3) The grading rubric for the historical investigation. This is how I am going to assess your work on this project. Note that each section of the project can be directly related to proficiency in at least one learning target. One of the main points here is that we are hoping to finish this project and have them all graded before Mrs. DeFrance-Gilman gets back on April 25th, so she does not have to worry about it (since it is a lot of work).

Today's assignment was to start working on Part A - Framing the Issue. If you were not in class, or did not write down the questions you will be answering in your one paragraph for this, here they are:

1) Why is this topic important?
2) Why did you choose this particular question?
3) What kinds of sources might you plan on using in your research?

Computer Lab Time: At the end of class, we headed up to N210 computer lab to start researching revolutions and choosing which one you are going to investigate. This is a major decision - do not take it lightly! For next class, please come in with a good idea about what you want to investigate. Again, this needs to be a focused question. Instead of "what happened in the Russian Revolution?" think more along the lines of "How did Vladimir Lenin lead the Bolsheviks during the October Revolution in Russia?"

Please let me know if you have questions, comments, or concerns! I would be happy to help you begin this project. I am confident that all of you will do well on this! :-)