Government, Day 1 - Class Recap

On the roof of the Bundestag building in Berlin, Germany. This is where the government of Germany meets. Photo taken in 2013.

Hi everyone,

Welcome to a shortened week, with Veterans Day on Wednesday! I really enjoyed the discussion today in class. I'm sure it was a nice change from all of the writing students have had to do in the last few days for the class! Here's what happened in class:

Learning Targets:
Knowledge LT 17: I can explain how and why world societies organize themselves and how power is established and maintained.
Communication LT 1:  I can use language and  style that is appropriate to the content area.

Soundtrack: "The War Was in Color" by Carbon Leaf. The reason I chose this song for today is because it is all about a veteran describing war to his grandson. We have Wednesday off of school because of Veteran's Day and it is important that we honor the service of those in our armed forces. Lyrics (which I read part of in class) here.

AGENDA 11/9/15:
News Brief – Eric C.
Culture Presentations
Forced Choice
Reflection

Homework: Read the blog. Turn in any late/missing/incomplete culture work (especially DBQs). Next news brief: Ben P.

News Brief: Eric C. had the news brief today and selected an article about this story: CNN.com - Athletics doping: Ban Russia from athletics, says report. We found Russia in our world maps and noted that we did a news brief on the country. This could end up being a really big deal in terms of international sporting events, especially for next year's Olympics, and the World Cup in 2018, as it appears that there has been systematic doping (steroid use) in Russia. I am sure that this continues to be a worldwide problem.

Ben P. was selected to do 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

I also asked about the weekend and what people were up to, before moving on.

Culture Presentations: Because I wanted to give as much time in class last time to writing the DBQ, we did not have the time for presentations (for the students who chose to do a presentation for the culture project). I enjoyed everyone that went today! Thank you for your effort in crafting great presentations and visuals.

Forced Choice: This is one of my favorite activities of the year. I had the class answer the following questions and choose YES or NO to each of them. Then, we split up the class so that two sides were facing each other. With each question, students moved to the side they felt best represented their opinion on the matter. These are difficult ethical questions and I am glad that we have the type of classroom culture that students feel able to talk about them! The questions were:

1. Giving up some of our rights (like our phones being searched without a warrant) is necessary for our own protection.
2. Everyone in the US should have the right to own guns if they want.
3. Private businesses should be able to choose to not employ people who have a sexual orientation they disagree with.
4. Marijuana should be legalized everywhere for recreational use.
5. Public schools should strictly enforce a standardized dress code.
6. Organized prayer in public schools should be allowed.
7. The government of a country should be able to make unpopular decisions.
8. Should the motto “In God We Trust” be removed from our currency?
9. I agree with the death penalty option for convicted murderers.
10. People in power are always corrupt in some way.

We only made it through question 2 today, so I will pick and choose next class as to which questions we will discuss and debate, before writing a reflective piece about the experience. I love these discussions and I think we did a great job of following the Ground Rules that we established at the beginning of the year.

As a note from the class discussion, a student made a statement that more people are killed each year by hammers than guns, and I said that I would look up that information. Here is the latest data the federal government has available on homicides (this does not include suicides or accidental deaths, which would surely increase the balance in favor of more gun deaths):

FBI.gov - 2014 Crime in the United States: Murder Victims by Weapon

It appears that, last year, 8,124 people were killed by guns in the United States, and 435 people were killed by blunt objects, such as hammers, clubs, baseball bats, etc. Obviously, the vast majority of those gun deaths were due to handguns, so if someone wanted to be specific, there were less gun deaths due to rifles or shotguns, for instance, than blunt objects. But definitely not all guns.

Thank you for your participation, everyone! Be ready to keep talking next time.