Welcome to another class recap!
Did you know that this week is only the second since I took over as your full time teacher in early December that we have had a week with three A days? At least, I'm pretty sure. It definitely feels like I do not get to see you guys enough - the breaks, days off, and quirks of the schedule have had some interesting effects on class time so far!
Today was another good day, though I must say that I was a little disappointed with the quality of the presentations (I'm not sure if we actually got anything at all from that exercise, which may be partly on me) and how it seemed like some of you STILL neglected to do the easiest homework assignment of all time. I'm not even sure what to say about that.
However, as always, I loved your questions and our interactions during the PowerPoint. Things like that make me excited to be a teacher - making a (hopefully) interesting lecture and diving right into new content that we get to break down in the upcoming classes. Woo hoo!
Essential Questions: How do different structures of power impact the people over whom they govern? What is a developed nation?
Soundtrack: "Man in the Mirror" by Michael Jackson. A great song about starting with yourself, instead of blaming others for not doing anything. "If you want to make the world a better place, take a look at yourself and make a change." Lyrics here.
AGENDA 2/9/09
News Brief
Finish Worksheets
Present Chapters
Developed vs. Developing
Debrief Homework
PowerPoint
Homework: Read article and write at LEAST two questions that arise from it. Be prepared to discuss Wednesday! Check blog!
--> The article that you are supposed to read can be downloaded here if you lost it or were not in class to pick a copy up:
Again, this is supposed to be controversial, and I want everyone to bring your thoughts, reactions, and most importantly, questions that it raises. I am anticipating an extremely interesting discussion - don't let me down! Also, I want you to really think hard about this. There is an obvious, easy reaction to much of what the author is writing, but does he make any points that need to be answered?
For additional context, here's the Wikipedia article for James Watson, whose claim the author is writing about: Wikipedia: James D. Watson - Race and intelligence.
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News Brief: I started off class by asking about everyone's weekends. I didn't really say much about mine, but on Saturday, I took a four hour long test - one of the many that we have to take in order to become licenced teachers. It was ridiculous! I also talked a little bit about Honors this year - please go see or write to Mr. Hardin ASAP if you are interested! Time is rapidly running out, and many of you are more than capable of taking on the extra load.
Scout brought in a very interesting and current news article about the fires in Australia: WashingtonPost: "Australian fire zone declared a crime scene"
It is interesting to consider the types of weather we are seeing all over the world. As Keirra put it very well, it is just weird. We have a whole lot of extremes. Frankly, it's a little scary, because part of climate change is extreme weather. Something to be thinking about. I hope that we get to talk about this a little bit later in the year! McKenzie, you are up for next class. Please bring in a current article about something outside the United States.
Finish Worksheets: I'm not sure how many of you actually used this time to work on your textbook worksheets for presentation, but it probably should have been a little more than you did. Part of that was due to people missing from class who had the paper, and part of that is that many of you just plain lost the worksheet, which I don't know what to tell you.
Present Chapters: As I said above, I think we could have done a little more with these. It didn't really seem like everyone really knew things about their chapter today. Some good basic facts, but that was about it. Hopefully the groups that are going next class can pick up the slack. It was definitely good to have a little reflection on what is going on around the world though - I wanted you to be thinking of how each of the areas were developing. The notes that you took will be useful in the future as you think about the question of: what is a developed nation?
Developed vs. Developing: I cut this for time, it was an activity that we will come back to at a later date.
Debrief Homework: I was very interested to hear what your family members had to say and the general impressions given! It was great to listen to the reasons given to why we are studying Nigeria. My question to you after today's presentation: why ARE we studying Nigeria? I'd be interested to hear your thoughts!
PowerPoint: This took up the last half of class. Like I said, I love these things - especially when I can make it interesting. I stated repeatedly that I did not want you to write out everything on every slide, but rather to get the most interesting or relevant information. For those that want to see it again (or did not see it at all, due to not being in class), here it is (remember, click "Save As" instead of "Open" - it is way faster):
A few things here. Someone asked (I think it was Scout) what the lowest Infant Mortality Rate in the world is. The answer can be found here: Wikipedia: Infant Mortality Rates. It looks like either Singapore or Iceland. Look at all those countries that have better IMRs than the US! Also, can you imagine living in Angola, where your child has about an 16-18% chance of dying before their first birthday? Just crazy. The IMR is really a key statistic for looking at the overall health of a country - it says a lot about the conditions and the health care available.
For those interested, I get my statistics for these presentations from The CIA World FactBook - which are far from perfect (and sometimes blatantly incorrect), but I always find it interesting to see what the U.S. Government says its data is.
In regards to colonialism, I said I would link to the Daily Show clip of John Oliver interviewing Kenya's ambassador to the UN. Really quite funny, but you can really see how seriously the ambassador takes the questions about colonialism. Generalizing, I think that most Africans would agree with him - an absolutely terrible era in world history that should never be revisited:
I also pointed out that the news coverage of Nigeria is overwhelmingly negative right now. Why? Is that a legitimate thing? Search "United States" on Google News - what do you get?
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That should do it for now. Please be reading that article (multiple times) and bring in your thoughts and questions for next class! Remember that it is linked above should you need to download it. As always, please comment below or e-mail me if you have any questions, comments, or concerns. Have a wonderful evening!
Late addition: It is SNOWING at my house right now! Not sticking, but still, nice! :-)
Thanks for the comment about my very interesting article i have to agree with you completly about it. But ok for the article we read do we ask questions that can be answered in the article or that we want to know?
ReplyDeleteHi Scout!
ReplyDeleteFor the article reading, I want general questions that you want to being up to the class. For instance, one (that you can't use) would be: is there an element of truth to this or not?
Basically, I want questions that will spark debate and more questions. Not questions that can be answered just by looking in the article, like: where was the article published? That would not be good.
Does that make sense? Thanks for the comment! :-)
Here's the link to my article...
ReplyDeletehttp://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/europe/7879664.stm
AHHH!!! I am SO excited to read the article. Haven't started but i will be tonight! SUPER excited!
ReplyDeleteQuestion...ok just looking back at all your entries kind of wows me because it is alot of writting...question is, how do you get it done? Is it like after your classes are done you just start wrtitting your blog? I don't know it is way cool but just wondering how you have been doing it?...
ReplyDeleteGreat question Jazmyne!
ReplyDeleteI get the chance to write a lot (each entry takes about an hour to an hour and a half) because your class is the only one I currently teach. Later in the year, I take over both of Mrs. DeFrance's other classes and I anticipate that the length of the entries will probably go down.
I just thought that if I have the time, I might as well do everything I can to help you guys out. Just another great reason to be in the first ever class that I teach! :-)
Basically, I am only at Westview for 15 hours a week right now, which is less than you may think. I leave around lunch each day, drive back home, make my own lunch, watch a little news, then get down to writing the post, which usually goes up around 2:30.
Great question though - I'm glad you've noticed the effort!
That is way cool. It is really nice being able to look back to see what you have done since you started the class. It is also really helpfull to remeber what went on in class. I was talking to my dad today about the discussion on the parent quiz. My dad is a very intelegent person. He always has something big to say and was talking to me about more things that he knows. Anyway kind of lost track....blog very helpful! its realy nice being able to get a hold of what we talked about in class, and its all right there for us. Honestly I don't see how people can even get a grade lower than an A in your class. I mean everything isn't just in notes in class it rewritten and links are all availabe. about EVERYTHING we talk about in class. i guess it just kind of gets me fired up that people can't handle it.. i dont know..ha ha ha
ReplyDeleteI know, right? That's why it constantly amazes me that people haven't done the homework, especially when there are like at least 5 different avenues open (in person, blog, comment, e-mail, or through other teachers) to ask questions and get a hold of me.
ReplyDeleteFor the most part, I'm just glad that some people appear to be reading and interested in what we are doing in class, because I know I am! I'm excited to hear what you think of the article!
Back to watching 24...
Yeah! kind of disapointing.
ReplyDeleteIm really excited to talk about it! it should be verry interestin
Hi Mr. Fritz,
ReplyDeleteUmm, about the whole textbook worksheet we did, I kind of have to agree that I didn't learn much and I felt like I was just answering the questions very straightforward just because I had to. I mean, thats on our group too, because we could've added more if we wanted to. But anyway, do you think I should read over and add more to the sheet so that when we present tomorrow, it will go on smoother and we will have more info about what we read about?
thanks,
Archana
p.s. I enjoyed reading the article you handed out for hw!
Archana,
ReplyDeleteI'm glad to hear your thoughts on the worksheet. It is definitely hard for me to know how to go about doing those, because I really dislike teaching directly from the text. It is necessary in this case, because the point will be that the textbook really does not tell us much about developing countries, in all these sorts of situations.
Basically, it was kind of a similar activity (except longer) to the start of the Rwanda unit when we saw that the textbook barely mentioned it, and when it did, it couldn't even be consistent.
As for your question about tomorrow, no, don't do any extra work. I just want to see some sort of understanding that you actually read the text, which is obvious that your group did. I'm MUCH more concerned about having a good discussion on the article, because oh my goodness, do we have things to talk about. :-)
See you in the morning!
Oh ok, sounds good! And I am soooo happy you do not teach straight from the textbook! And yes, I remember how it had very limited info on Rwanda.
ReplyDeleteAlrighty, thank you!