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,

Today was the start of a really big assignment: the historical investigation that all freshmen need to do at Westview (most sophomores will, as well). Here's what happened in class:

Learning Targets:
Knowledge LT 19: I can explain the impacts of nationalism and revolutionary movements.
Communication LT 1: I can communicate effectively, both verbally and in writing.
Research LT 1: I can effectively conduct and apply research.
Critical Thinking LT 2: I can explain connections between events, issues, problems and concepts.

Soundtrack: "At the Beginning" from Anatasia. Selected for today because of the movie's connection to the Russian Revolution, and our work starting on the Historical Investigation. Lyrics here.

AGENDA 3/9/16:

News Brief - Ethan

The Historical Investigation
Part A Research
Library Computers

Homework: Read the blog! Come prepared with a revolution in mind to investigate. You will be finishing your Part A paragraph in class. John has the next news brief.

Here is the calendar for where we are at with the historical investigation.

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News Brief: Ethan had the news brief today and selected this article to talk about: CNN.com - Weapons seized by Australia may have come from Iran, intended for Houthis. We found Australia on our world map and talked about the situation in Yemen for a bit, with Iran and Saudi Arabia fighting a "proxy" war inside the country.

We checked in about the upcoming weekend and what people were up to.

John was selected for the next news brief.

We also watched the one minute BBC World News update. Here's the link to see the latest one minute update, at any time of day (it will probably be different from what we watched in class):

BBCNews.com - One-minute World News

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

1) The "simple" explanation sheet, with the possible revolutions to research on the second page:

Google Drive: Historical Investigation Basics

2) The more in depth assignment, with all of the learning targets and step by step process for Part A (on the second page):

Google Drive: Historical Investigation Assignment In Depth

We went through both of these thoroughly (at least 20 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 5, the rough draft of this will be due on April 7th. The final draft will be due the next class after that, which is April 11th.

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, as well as working very hard in class on it.

3) 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.

Part A Research: Today's assignment was to start working on Part A - Framing the Issue. This means that you need to find a revolution that you are interested in, then narrow down a specific research question about that revolution. If you were not in class, or did not have 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?

To start this section, and thinking about what good research questions and sources look like, we analyzed four different Historical Investigations from other classes (note that these were not about revolutions, as yours is required to be). Students looked at what was good, what needed work, and tried to give a score on the Research LT. This was to help with what the research might look like. We shared out as a class and tried to determine what each paper should get.

Library Computers: For the rest of class, we headed up to the Library 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! :-)