Per. 2
The first thing I did was started gabbing with them the first few minutes. This is a tactic that my teacher uses every class, where he puts himself into their discussions and whatnot. They were talking about driving today, so I started talking about my driver’s ed experiences, and all the speeding tickets I got as a young teen. Its silly, and I probably exaggerated a few points, but the point is it gets them comfortable with me, which is something I need to do.
I started out today by doing a review. I realized the mistake I had been making…I was teaching history as if they were 7th graders, focusing on silly little facts and whatnot. However, they are 11th graders, and the point is not to know what the Tea Act did or when the Committees of Correspondence were founded, but to know the big picture. So rather than knowing why the colonists did the Boston Tea Party, its more important that they get the big picture, which is that the British passed all these taxes and laws in an attempt to control the colonial economy, and the colonists realized this and want to have control their own economy. So I spent a good 25 minutes hitting this point home.
After this, I decided to introduce the Boston Massacre in a different way. Rather than use the John Adams DVD, I had them re-enact the effects of the Boston Massacre. I brought in three blankets, three Wii guns, and I made some paper balls to represent snowballs. I got volunteers, and then had the remaining students go into the hall. I had a problem getting enough volunteers, until I said that the people in the hall would have to do more work, and then I got a few more. Three students laid dead on top of the blankets on the ground, three students stood over them with guns, and the other volunteers stood looking at the screen saying “what happened?” I placed the snowballs all around the area, and had one of the soldiers put a paper ball in her arm, so it appeared as if she got hit by it.
I then had the students in the hall come in, and each of them had to describe something they noticed. I put all their observations on the board, and then had everyone sit down in their seats and lead them through it and draw connections. Before the bell rang I was able to get them to draw the conclusion that the colonists were upset over the Boston Massacre because armed soldiers who were there to protect the colonists had fired their guns into a crowd of people who did not have guns. Tomorrow I will have them read some documents on the testimony of what happened.
Per. 5
Once again, this class proved to be the more rowdy/rambunctious one. I think it is definitely that they must be coming right from lunch or something, because their energy level is off the wall. So I started by doing the same thing as period 2, where I really pushed on them how important money and economy was in the cause of the American Revolution.
I then finished up talking to them about the Boston Massacre, and then moved on to talk about Lexington and Concord, and started explaining the type of warfare that would come to be in the American Revolution. Tomorrow I will get to the Declaration of Independence.
My first observation by my District Supervisor is tomorrow. He will be coming into my per. 5 class, so I’m kind of nervous about that.
