New Mexico: 7th-Grade Standards

Article Body
  • Strand: History

    Content Standard I: Students are able to identify important people and events in order to analyze significant patterns, relationships, themes, ideas, beliefs, and turning points in New Mexico, United States, and world history in order to understand the complexity of the human experience. Students will:

    • Grade 7 Benchmark I-A—New Mexico:

      Explore and explain how people and events have influenced the development of New Mexico up to the present day.

      Performance Standards

      1. Early civilizations of the eastern hemisphere (e.g., Sumerians, Babylonians, Hebrews, Egyptians) and their impact upon societies, to include:
        • a. effect on world economies and trade;
        • b. roles of people, class structures, language;
        • c. religious traditions and forms of government;
        • d. cultural and scientific contributions (e.g., advances in astronomy, mathematics, agriculture, architecture, artistic and oral traditions, development of writing systems and calendars);
      2. Describe the characteristics of other indigenous peoples that had an effect upon New Mexicoís development (e.g., pueblo farmers, great plains horse culture, nomadic bands, etc. - noting their development of tools, trading routes, adaptation to environments, social structure, domestication of plants and animals).
      3. Explain the significance of trails and trade routes within the region (e.g., Spanish trail, Camino Real, Santa Fe trail).
      4. Describe how important individuals, groups and events impacted the development of New Mexico from 16th century to the present (e.g., Don Juan de OÒate, Don Diego de Vargas, pueblo revolt, PopÈ, 1837 revolt, 1848 rebellion, treaty of Guadalupe Hildago, William Becknell and the Santa Fe trail, buffalo soldiers, Lincoln county war, Navajo long walk, Theodore Roosevelt and the rough riders, Robert Goddard, J. Robert Oppenheimer, Smokey Bear, Dennis Chavez, Manuel Lujan, Manhattan project, Harrison Schmitt, Albuquerque international balloon fiesta).
      5. Explain how New Mexicans have adapted to their physical environments to meet their needs over time (e.g., living in the desert, control over water resources, pueblo structure, highway system, use of natural resources).
      6. Explain the impact of New Mexico on the development of the American west up to the present, to include: availability of land (e.g., individual, government, railroad, tribal, etc.); government land grants/treaties; transportation (e.g., wagons, railroads, automobile); identification and use of natural and human resources; population growth and economic patterns; and cultural interactions among indigenous and arriving populations and the resulting changes.
    • Grade 7 Benchmark I-B—United States:

      Analyze and interpret major eras, events and individuals from the periods of exploration and colonization through the civil war and reconstruction in United States history.

      Performance Standards

      1. Analyze United States political policies on expansion of the United States into the southwest (e.g., Mexican cession, Gadsden purchase, broken treaties, long walk of the Navajos).
    • Grade 7 Benchmark I-C—World:

      Compare and contrast major historical eras, events and figures from ancient civilizations to the age of exploration.

      Performance Standards

      1. Compare and contrast the influence of Spain on the western hemisphere from colonization to the present.
    • Grade 7 Benchmark I-D—Skills:

      Research historical events and people from a variety of perspectives.

      Performance Standards

      1. Analyze and evaluate information by developing and applying criteria for selecting appropriate information and use it to answer critica questions.
      2. Demonstrate the ability to examine history from the perspectives of the participants.
      3. Use the problem-solving process to identify a problem; gather information, list and consider advantages and disadvantages, choose and implement a solution and evaluate the effectiveness of the solution using technology to present findings.
  • Strand: Geography

    Content Standard II: Students understand how physical, natural, and cultural processes influence where people live, the ways in which people live, and how societies interact with one another and their environments.

    • Grade 7 Benchmark II-A:

      Analyze and evaluate the characteristics and purposes of geographic tools, knowledge, skills and perspectives and apply them to explain the past, present and future in terms of patterns, events and issues.

      Performance Standards

      1. Describe ways that mental maps reflect attitudes about places.
      2. Describe factors affecting location of human activities, including land-use patterns in urban, suburban and rural areas.
    • Grade 7 Benchmark II-B:

      Explain the physical and human characteristics of places and use this knowledge to define regions, their relationships with other regions, and their patterns of change.

      Performance Standards

      1. Select and explore a region by its distinguishing characteristics.
      2. Describe the role of technology in shaping the characteristics of places.
      3. Explain how and why regions change, using global examples.
      4. Describe geographically-based pathways of inter-regional interaction (e.g., the Camino Realís role in establishing a major trade and communication route in the new world, the significance of waterways).
    • Grade 7 Benchmark II-C:

      Understand how human behavior impacts man-made and natural environments, recognize past and present results and predict potential changes.

      Performance Standards

      1. Explain how differing perceptions of places, people and resources have affected events and conditions in the past.
      2. Interpret and analyze geographic information obtained from a variety of sources (e.g., maps, directly witnessed and surveillanced photographic and digital data, personal documents and interviews, symbolic representations - graphs, charts, diagrams, tables, etc.).
      3. Recognize geographic questions and explain how to plan and execute an inquiry to answer them.
      4. Explain a contemporary issue using geographic knowledge, tools and perspectives.
    • Grade 7 Benchmark II-D:

      Explain how physical processes shape the earthís surface patterns and biosystems.

      Performance Standards

      1. Explain how physical processes influence the formation and location of resources.
      2. Use data to interpret changing patterns of air, land, water, plants and animals.
      3. Explain how ecosystems influence settlements and societies.
    • Grade 7 Benchmark II-E:

      Explain how economic, political, cultural and social processes interact to shape patterns of human populations and their interdependence, cooperation and conflict.

      Performance Standards

      1. Analyze New Mexico settlement patterns and their impact on current issues.
      2. Describe and analyze how the study of geography is used to improve our quality of life, including urban and environmental planning.
      3. Explain the accessibility to the New Mexico territory via the Santa Fe trail and the railroad, conflicts with indigenous peoples and the resulting development of New Mexico.
    • Grade 7 Benchmark II-F:

      Describe how natural and man-made changes affect the meaning, use, distribution, and value of resources.

      Performance Standards

      1. Describe and evaluate the use and distribution of resources and their impact on countries throughout the world.
      2. Describe how environmental events (e.g., hurricanes, tornados, floods) affect human activities and resources.
  • Strand: Civics and Government

    Content Standard III: Students understand the ideals, rights, and responsibilities of citizenship and understand the content and history of the founding documents of the United States with particular emphasis on the United States and New Mexico constitutions and how governments function at local, state, tribal, and national levels.

    • Grade 7 Benchmark III-A:

      Demonstrate understanding of the structure, functions and powers of government (local, state, tribal and national).

      Performance Standards

      1. Explain the structure and functions of New Mexicoís state government as expressed in the New Mexico constitution, to include:
        • a. roles and methods of initiative, referendum and recall processes;
        • b. function of multiple executive offices;
        • c. election process (e.g., primaries and general elections);
        • d. criminal justice system (e.g., juvenile justice);
      2. Explain the roles and relationships of different levels of the legislative process, to include:
        • a. structure of New Mexico legislative districts (e.g., number of districts, studentsí legislative districts, representatives and senators of the studentsí districts);
        • b. the structure of the New Mexico legislature and leaders of the legislature during the current session (e.g., bicameral, house of representatives and senate, speaker of the house of representatives, senate pro tem).
      3. Compare the structure and functions of the New Mexico legislature with that of the stateís tribal governments (e.g., pueblo Indian council; Navajo, Apache and Hopi nations).
    • Grade 7 Benchmark III-B:

      Explain the significance of symbols, icons, songs, traditions and leaders of New Mexico and the United States that exemplify ideals and provide continuity and a sense of unity.

      Performance Standards

      1. Explain the concept of diversity and its significance within the political and social unity of New Mexico.
      2. Describe ways in which different groups maintain their cultural heritage.
      3. Explain how New Mexicoís state legislature and other state legislatures identify symbols representative of a state.
      4. Identify official and unofficial public symbols of various cultures and describe how they are or are not exemplary of enduring elements of those cultures.
    • Grade 7 Benchmark III-C:

      Compare political philosophies and concepts of government that became the foundation for the American revolution and the United States government.

      Performance Standards

      1. Compare and contrast New Mexicoís entry into the United States with that of the original thirteen colonies.
      2. Understand the structure and function of New Mexico government as created by the New Mexico constitution and how it supports local, tribal and federal governments.
    • Grade 7 Benchmark III- D:

      Explain how individuals have rights and responsibilities as members of social groups, families, schools, communities, states, tribes and countries.

      Performance Standards

      1. Explain the obligations and responsibilities of citizenship (e.g., the obligations of upholding the constitution, obeying the law, paying taxes, jury duty).
      2. Explain the roles of citizens in political decision-making (e.g., voting, petitioning public officials, analyzing issues).
  • Strand: Economics

    Content Standard IV: Students understand basic economic principles and use economic reasoning skills to analyze the impact of economic systems (including the market economy) on individuals, families, businesses, communities, and governments.

    • Grade 7 Benchmark IV-A:

      Explain and describe how individuals, households, businesses, governments and societies make decisions, are influenced by incentives (economic as well as intrinsic) and the availability and use of scarce resources, and that their choices involve costs and varying ways of allocating.

      Performance Standards

      1. Explain how economic and intrinsic incentives influence how individuals, households, businesses, governments and societies allocate and use their scarce resources.
      2. Explain why cooperation can yield higher benefits.
    • Grade 7 Benchmark IV-B:

      Explain how economic systems impact the way individuals, households, businesses, governments and societies make decisions about resources and the production and distribution of goods and services.

      Performance Standards

      1. Identify governmental activities that affect local, state, tribal and national economies.
      2. Analyze the impact of taxing and spending decisions upon individuals, organizations, businesses and various government entities.
      3. Explain the relationship of New Mexico with tribal governments regarding compact issues (e.g., taxes, gambling revenue, rights of way).
    • Grade 7 Benchmark IV-C:

      Describe the patterns of trade and exchange in early societies and civilizations and explore the extent of their continuation in todayís world.

      Performance Standards

      1. Explain how specialization leads to interdependence and describe ways most Americans depend on people in other households, communities and nations for some of the goods they consume.
      2. Understand the interdependencies between the economies of New Mexico, the United States and the world.
      3. Understand the factors that currently limit New Mexico from becoming an urban state, including: the availability and allocation of water, and the extent to which New Mexico relies upon traditional economic forms (e.g., the acequia systems, localized agricultural markets).
      4. Describe the relationship between New Mexico, tribal and United States economic systems.
      5. Compare and contrast New Mexico commerce with that of other statesí commerce.

Alabama: 7th-Grade Standards

Article Body

AL.7 Standard: Geography

In this one-semester geography course, students increase their knowledge about the physical and human nature of the world and about relationships between people and their environments. Interwoven throughout the course are the three interrelated components of geography. These components include Earth as a physical object, a physical environment, and a place in which humans live; geographic skills; and spatial and ecological perspectives.

7.1

  • 7.1.1 Students will:

    Describe the world in spatial terms using maps and other geographic representations, tools, and technologies. (Economics, Geography, Civics and Government)

  • 7.1.2 Students will practice:

    • Explaining the use of map essentials, including type, projections, scale, legend, distance, direction, grid, and symbols
      • Grade Level Example:

        type—reference, thematic, planimetric, topographic, globes and map projections, aerial photographs, satellite images
        direction—lines of latitude and longitude, cardinal and intermediate directions
        distance—fractional, graphic, and verbal scales

    • Identifying geospatial technologies to acquire, process, and report information from a spatial perspective
      • Grade Level Example:

        Google Earth, Global Positioning System (GPS), geographic information system (GIS), satellite remote sensing, aerial photography

    • Utilizing maps to explain relationships and environments among people and places, including trade patterns, governmental alliances, and immigration patterns
    • Applying mental maps to answer geographic questions, including how experiences and cultures influence perceptions and decisions
    • Categorizing the geographic organization of people, places, and environments using spatial models
      • Grade Level Example:

        urban land-use patterns, distribution and linkages of cities, migration patterns, population density patterns, spread of culture traits, spread of contagious diseases through a population

7.2

  • 7.2.1 Students will:

    Determine how regions are used to describe the organization of Earth’s surface. (Economics, Geography)

  • 7.2.2 Students will practice:

    • Identifying physical and human features used as criteria for mapping formal, functional, and perceptual regions
      • Grade Level Example:

        physical features—landforms, climates, water bodies, resources
        human features—language, religion, culture, economy, government

    • Interpreting processes and reasons for regional change, including land use, urban growth, population, natural disasters, and trade
    • Analyzing interactions among regions to show transnational relationships, including the flow of commodities and Internet connectivity
      • Grade Level Example:

        winter produce to Alabama from Chile and California, poultry from Alabama to other countries

    • Comparing how culture and experience influence individual perceptions of places and regions
      • Grade Level Example:

        cultural influences—language, religion, ethnicity, iconography, symbology, stereotypes

    • Explaining globalization and its impact on people in all regions of the world
      • Grade Level Example:

        quality and sustainability of life, international cooperation

7.3

  • 7.3.1 Students will:

    Compare geographic patterns in the environment that result from processes within the atmosphere, biosphere, lithosphere, and hydrosphere of Earth’s physical systems. (Geography)

  • 7.3.2 Students will practice:

    • Comparing Earth-Sun relationships regarding seasons, fall hurricanes, monsoon rainfall, and tornadoes
    • Explaining processes that shape the physical environment, including long-range effects of extreme weather phenomena
      • Grade Level Example:

        processes—plate tectonics, glaciers, ocean and atmospheric circulation, El Niño long-range
        effects—erosion on agriculture, typhoons on coastal ecosystems

    • Describing characteristics and physical processes that influence the spatial distribution of ecosystems and biomes on Earth’s surface
    • Comparing how ecosystems vary from place to place and over time
      • Grade Level Example:

        place to place—difference in soil, climate, and topography
        over time—alteration or destruction of natural habitats due to effects of floods and forest fires, reduction of species diversity due to loss of natural habitats, reduction of wetlands due to replacement by farms, reduction of forest and farmland due to replacement by housing developments, reduction of previously cleared land due to reforestation efforts

    • Comparing geographic issues in different regions that result from human and natural processes
      • Grade Level Example:

        human—increase or decrease in population, land-use change in tropical forests
        natural processes—hurricanes, tsunamis, tornadoes, floods

7.4

  • 7.4.1 Students will:

    Evaluate spatial patterns and the demographic structure of population on Earth’s surface in terms of density, dispersion, growth and mortality rates, natural increase, and doubling time. (Economics, Geography, History, Civics and Government)

    • Grade Level Example:

      population structure—age and sex distribution using population pyramids
      special patterns—major population clusters

  • 7.4.2 Students will practice:

  • Predicting reasons and consequences of migration, including push and pull factors
    • Grade Level Example:

      push factors —politics, war, famine
      pull factors—potential jobs, family

7.5

  • 7.5. Students will:

    Explain how cultural features, traits, and diffusion help define regions, including religious structures, agricultural patterns, ethnic enclaves, ethnic restaurants, and the spread of Islam. (Economics, Geography, History)

7.6

  • 7.6.1 Students will:

    Illustrate how primary, secondary, and tertiary economic activities have specific functions and spatial patterns. (Economics, Geography, History, Civics and Government)

    • Grade Level Example:

      primary—forestry, agriculture, mining
      secondary—manufacturing furniture, grinding coffee beans, assembling automobiles
      tertiary—selling furniture, selling coffee latte, selling automobiles

  • 7.6.2 Students will practice:

  • Comparing one location over another for production of goods and services
    • Grade Level Example:

      fast food restaurants in highly accessible locations, medical offices near hospitals, legal offices near courthouses, industries near major transportation routes

  • Analyzing the impact of economic interdependence and globalization on places and their populations
    • Grade Level Example:

      seed corn produced in Iowa and planted in South America; silicon chips manufactured in California and installed in a computer made in China that is purchased in Australia

  • Explaining why countries enter into global trade agreements, including the North American Free Trade Agreement (NAFTA), the Dominican Republic-Central America Free Trade Agreement (DR-CAFTA), the European Union (EU), the Mercado Común del Sur (MERCOSUR), and the Association of Southeast Asian Nations (ASEAN)

7.7

  • 7.7.1 Students will:

    Classify spatial patterns of settlement in different regions of the world, including types and sizes of settlement patterns. (Economics, Geography, History, Civics and Government)

    • Grade Level Example:

      types—linear, clustered, grid
      sizes—large urban, small urban, and rural areas

  • 7.7.2 Students will practice:

    • Explaining human activities that resulted in the development of settlements at particular locations due to trade, political importance, or natural resources
      • Grade Level Example:

        Timbuktu near caravan routes; Pittsburg, Pennsylvania, and Birmingham, Alabama, as manufacturing centers near coal and iron ore deposits; Singapore near a major ocean transportation corridor

    • Describing settlement patterns in association with the location of resources
      • Grade Level Example:

        fall line settlements near waterfalls used as a source of energy for mills, European industrial settlements near coal seams, spatial arrangement of towns and cities in North American Corn Belt settlements

    • Describing ways in which urban areas interact and influence surrounding regions
      • Grade Level Example:

        daily commuters from nearby regions; communication centers that service nearby and distant locations through television, radio, newspapers, and the Internet; regional specialization in services or production

7.8

  • 7.8.1 Students will:

    Determine political, military, cultural, and economic forces that contribute to cooperation and conflict among people. (Economics, Geography, History, Civics and Government)

  • 7.8.2 Students will practice:

    • Identifying political boundaries based on physical and human systems
      • Grade Level Example:

        physical systems—rivers as boundaries between counties
        human systems—streets as boundaries between local government units

    • Identifying effects of cooperation among countries in controlling territories
      • Grade Level Example:

        Great Lakes environmental management by United States and Canada, United Nations (UN) Heritage sites and host countries, Antarctic Treaty on scientific research

    • Describing the eruption of territorial conflicts over borders, resources, land use, and ethnic and nationalistic identity
      • Grade Level Example:

        India and Pakistan conflict over Jammu and Kashmir, the West Bank, the Sudan, Somalia piracy, ocean fishing and mineral rights, local land-use disputes

7.9

  • 7.9. Students will:

    Explain how human actions modify the physical environment within and between places, including how human induced changes affect the environment. (Economics, Geography, History)

    • Grade Level Example:

      within places—construction of dams and downstream water availability for human consumption, agriculture, and aquatic ecosystems
      between places—urban heat islands and global climate change, desertification and land degradation, pollution and ozone depletion

7.10

  • 7.10.1 Students will:

    Explain how human systems develop in response to physical environmental conditions. (Economics, Geography, Civics and Government)

    • Grade Level Example:

      farming practices in different regions, including slash-and-burn agriculture, terrace farming, and center-pivot irrigation

  • 7.10.2 Students will practice:

    • Identifying types, locations, and characteristics of natural hazards, including earthquakes, hurricanes, tornadoes, and mudslides
    • Differentiating ways people prepare for and respond to natural hazards, including building storm shelters, conducting fire and tornado drills, and establishing building codes for construction

7.11

  • 7.11.1 Students will:

    Explain the cultural concept of natural resources and changes in spatial distribution, quantity, and quality through time and by location. (Economics, Geography, History)

  • 7.11.2 Students will practice:

    • Evaluating various cultural viewpoints regarding the use or value of natural resources
      • Grade Level Example:

        salt and gold as valued commodities, petroleum product use and the invention of the internal combustion engine

    • Identifying issues regarding depletion of nonrenewable resources and the sustainability of renewable resources
      • Grade Level Example:

        ocean shelf and Arctic exploration for petroleum, hybrid engines in cars, wind-powered generators, solar collection panels

7.12

  • 7.12. Students will:

    Explain geographic contexts that influenced historical events. (Economics, Geography, History, Civics and Government)

    • Grade Level Example:

      physical features—fall line, Cumberland Gap, Westward Expansion in the United States, weather conditions at Valley Forge and the outcome of the American Revolution, role of ocean currents and winds during exploration by Christopher Columbus
      environmental issues—boundary disputes, ownership of ocean resources, revitalization of downtown areas

AL.7 Standard: Civics

Seventh grade students should be able to assume more responsibilities in their family, school, and community roles. To address this concern, students are given opportunities to apply civic knowledge to problem-based learning situations in the community and to other activities that foster increased personal responsibility.

7.1

  • 7.1. Students will:

    Compare influences of ancient Greece, the Roman Republic, the Judeo-Christian tradition, the Magna Carta, federalism, the Mayflower Compact, the English Bill of Rights, the House of Burgesses, and the Petition of Rights on the government of the United States. (History, Civics and Government)

7.2

  • 7.2. Students will:

    Explain essential characteristics of the political system of the United States, including the organization and functions of political parties and the process of selecting political leaders. (History, Civics and Government)

    • Grade Level Example:

      Describing the influence of John Locke, Thomas Hobbes, Jean-Jacques Rousseau, Thomas Paine, Niccolò Machiavelli, Charles de Montesquieu, and Voltaire on the political system of the United States

7.3

  • 7.3.1 Students will:

    Compare the government of the United States with other governmental systems, including monarchy, limited monarchy, oligarchy, dictatorship, theocracy, and pure democracy. (History, Civics and Government)

7.4

  • 7.4. Students will:

    Describe structures of state and local governments in the United States, including major Alabama offices and officeholders. (Economics, History, Civics and Government)

    • Grade Level Example:

      Describing how local and state governments are funded

7.5

  • 7.5.1 Students will:

    Compare duties and functions of members of the legislative, executive, and judicial branches of Alabama’s local and state governments and of the national government. (Economics, Geography, History)

  • 7.5.2 Students will practice:

    • Locating political and geographic districts of the legislative, executive, and judicial branches of Alabama’s local and state government and of the national government
    • Describing the organization and jurisdiction of courts at the local, state, and national levels within the judicial system of the United States
    • Explaining concepts of separation of powers and checks and balances among the three branches of state and national governments

7.6

  • 7.6.1 Students will:

    Explain the importance of juvenile, adult, civil, and criminal laws within the judicial system of the United States. (History, Civics and Government)

  • 7.6.2 Students will practice:

    • Explaining rights of citizens as guaranteed by the Bill of Rights under the Constitution of the United States
    • Explaining what is meant by the term rule of law
    • Justifying consequences of committing a civil or criminal offense
    • Contrasting juvenile and adult laws at local, state, and federal levels

7.7

  • 7.7.1 Students will:

    Determine how people organize economic systems to address basic economic questions regarding which goods and services will be produced, how they will be distributed, and who will consume them. (Economics, Geography, History)

  • 7.7.2 Students will practice:

    • Using economic concepts to explain historical and current developments and issues in global, national, or local contexts
      • Grade Level Example:

        increase in oil prices resulting from supply and demand

    • Analyzing agriculture, tourism, and urban growth in
      Alabama for their impact on economic development

7.8

  • 7.8.1 Students will:

    Appraise the relationship between the consumer and the marketplace in the economy of the United States regarding scarcity, opportunity cost, trade-off decision making, and the stock market. (Economics, History, Civics and Government)

  • 7.8.2 Students will practice:

    • Describing effects of government policies on the free market
    • Identifying laws protecting rights of consumers and avenues of recourse when those rights are violated
    • Comparing economic systems, including market, command, and traditional

7.9

  • 7.9. Students will:

    Apply principles of money management to the preparation of a personal budget that addresses housing, transportation, food, clothing, medical expenses, insurance, checking and savings accounts, loans, investments, credit, and comparison shopping. (Economics, Civics and Government)

7.10

  • 7.10.1 Students will:

    Describe individual and civic responsibilities of citizens of the United States. (History, Civics and Government)

    • Grade Level Example:

      individual—respect for rights of others, self- discipline, negotiation, compromise, fiscal responsibility
      civic—respect for law, patriotism, participation in political process, fiscal responsibility

  • 7.10.2 Students will practice:

    • Differentiating rights, privileges, duties, and responsibilities between citizens and noncitizens
    • Explaining how United States’ citizenship is acquired by immigrants
    • Explaining character traits that are beneficial to individuals and society
      • Grade Level Example:

        honesty, courage, compassion, civility, loyalty

7.11

  • 7.11.1 Students will:

    Compare changes in social and economic conditions in the United States during the twentieth and twenty-first centuries. (Economics, History, Civics and Government)

    • Grade Level Example:

      social—family values, peer pressure, education opportunities, women in the workplace
      economic—career opportunities, disposable income, change in consumption of goods and services

  • 7.11.2 Students will practice:

    • Determining benefits of Alabama’s role in world trade
    • Tracing the political and social impact of the modern Civil Rights Movement from 1954 to the present, including Alabama’s role

7.12

  • 7.12.1. Students will:

    Defend how the United States can be improved by individual and collective participation in civic and community activities. (Economics, History, Civics and Government)

  • 7.12.2 Students will practice:

    • Identifying options for civic and community action
      • Grade Level Example:

        investigating the feasibility of a specific solution to a traffic problem, developing a plan for construction of a subdivision, using maps to make and justify decisions about best locations for public facilities

    • Determining ways to participate in the political process
      • Grade Level Example:

        voting, running for office, serving on a jury, writing letters, being involved in political parties and political campaigns

7.13

  • 7.13. Students will:

    Identify contemporary American issues since 2001, including the establishment of the United States Department of Homeland Security, the enactment of the Patriot Act of 2001, and the impact of media analysis. (Civics and Government)

Understanding Civic Republicanism

Image
Photography, Athena at Parliament, 6 April 2009, Alisha Rusher, Flickr CC
Question

Can you provide a few examples of how to teach civic republicanism to California middle-schoolers?

Answer

California State History-Social Science Content Standard 8.1.4: Describe the nation’s blend of civic republicanism, classical liberal principles, and English parliamentary traditions.

There is a famous story about the day the Constitutional Convention ended in September 1787. Benjamin Franklin was walking out of Independence Hall, and a woman ran to him and asked, “Dr. Franklin, what kind of government have you given us?” He replied, “A republic, if you can keep it.” Whether apocryphal or not, this statement shapes the definition of active citizenship in this country. At the heart of Franklin’s challenge is the idea of civic republicanism. The notion that it is imperative for people of this country to remain attentive and devoted to the maintenance of our institutions for their sustainability is still one of America’s cherished ideals.

The idea of civic republicanism is not meant to be a one-shot assignment that can be covered with a worksheet.

The California State History Standards ask that the background of civic republican traditions be covered during students’ 6th, 7th, and 8th grade years. A student begins the middle years with Greek and Roman political contributions, continues with the Enlightenment’s influence on democratic thought and its links to Greek, Roman, and Christian pasts, and then blends those ideas with the evolving republic of the United States. In other words, the idea of civic republicanism is not meant to be a one-shot assignment that can be covered with a worksheet. It is an ongoing theme and discussion throughout the middle school years. While the various ideas that emanate from civic responsibility can certainly be weighty to teach, their density is manageable if presented consistently over the years. Since the traditions of civic republicanism extend back to colonial America, it is fitting that they should be enmeshed in the curriculum throughout the students’ 8th-grade year of study.

What Are Some of the Ideas Related to Civic Republicanism?

Students must understand that while citizenship is a right it is also a responsibility. We all have responsibilities to our families, communities, schools, places of worship, the state, the country, the world, and, especially, our descendents. Many schools now require students to complete a set number of hours for community service. A discussion about why it is important to complete community service is a great place to start when tackling the ideas of civic republicanism with eighth graders. Before moving on to the relationships between our government’s structure and how it is influenced by past traditions, it is useful to conduct a discussion or writing assignment about what students do to make their communities better, why it is important to do so, and what benefits result from such participation.

Resources

Many textbooks have sections regarding the roles of citizenship that can prove quite useful when introducing the concept of civic republicanism. This lesson plan and this plan, both from the Center for Civic Education, can be used to help students explore and identify what it means to play an active role in our republic. This would also be an appropriate time to review ideas from students’ 6th- and 7th-grade classes, such as Pericles’s praise of public service and the Roman Republic’s expectation of its citizens to perform public service, and various Enlightenment ideas from thinkers like Locke, Rousseau, and Montesquieu.

This handout can be used as part of a class discussion. The first page would be done by students in groups or as an entire class while sharing common ideas. (It may also be helpful to identify pages in your textbook that can help students answer these questions.) The second page includes some of the content that could come out in the discussion of the second question and particular principles.

An Important Idea!

Again, this concept is not an easy one to teach, especially with the limited time our school schedules are allowing year after year. While teaching our subject matter is essential, we must remember that ultimately our responsibility as educators demands that we are constantly guiding our students to be active citizens who are energized by their potential to play a part in achieving a better society. Citizens in a republic must stay engaged in the social fabric of making their institutions better. Our students must be reassured and impressed with the idea that civic participation has benefited civilization since ancient times, as can be seen throughout their studies of history in the middle years.

For more information

Students can learn more about the responsibilities of modern-day citizens and the workings of U.S. government at iCivics. Online games explore the responsibilities of citizens and each of the three branches of government.

What resources can you use to teach about civics and civic republicanism? A previous Ask a Master Teacher shares more suggestions.

Do you teach ELL students? You don't need advanced English comprehension to learn about the rights and responsibilities that are part of living in a republic! Michael Long shares a teaching strategy.

Elizabeth Schaefer on Facebook in the Classroom

Date Published
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Photo, Facebook, Jan. 26, 2010, Colevito Mambembe, Flickr
Article Body

Many teenagers spend much of their free time in a virtual world, and the school world can be peripheral to the connections they make through TV or a computer screen. As our society becomes more and more driven by social media, Facebook opens a door to meet students where they are and to create informal educational connections outside of the classroom.

Why did we become history teachers? For me it was because I love exploring this country and its past. I take great joy in visiting museums and historic sites to learn about hidden pieces of our past. I spend time every year experiencing different states and growing my understanding of how geography and regional culture shaped past events and affect politics today.

Unfortunately, all of those verbs—"exploring," "visiting," and "experiencing"—have limitations in the school system, so as teachers we need to look for new and creative tools that are within our reach. Since I began teaching, my students have been on my mind during my adventures, especially those within my own city—Washington, DC. I wish that they could have the experiences that I have, or at least be aware that these experiences exist. It was somewhere along this line of thought that I realized my guilty pleasure, Facebook, could actually be a useful academic tool. I started a project to learn more about Facebook's potential to engage and nurture lifelong historians.

Utilizing Facebook Academically

To preface, this project will be described as an addition to classroom learning. For those John Dewey enthusiasts squeezed out by test prep, Facebook offers an opportunity for your students to explore and engage at will. Rather than mandating participation, the teacher enters the students' world and offers various resources that students may choose to read and interact with. Here are some of the many ways that Facebook can be utilized:

Sharing Visual Aids
My original idea was primarily to utilize Facebook for my visual learners, to help support vocabulary and historic concepts. Images can be found on Google within seconds, but presenting images from your own life provides relevance and tangibility. A smartphone is helpful to upload pictures as you take them and therefore to also model that history is alive and active in your life.

Examples: If we were studying city life during the colonial period and I traveled to Boston, I would upload a photo of a historic building to demonstrate the small windows and brick-laying techniques. As a nature lover in a city school, uploading photos has been especially helpful with geographic terms, such as "marsh" and "plains," that the students are unfamiliar with.

Modeling a Love For History
All of our cities and towns have their own unique history and hidden treasures. While I spend a great deal of time in local parks and museums, my students, like many teenagers, repeatedly tell me that they spend weekends at the movies, sports, or the mall. I do not think this is simply because they are not interested or cannot get to cultural sites, but because it does not occur to them to go. Post a status update saying that you are listening to a presidential address or watching a historical movie. Let them know you are at a museum or just heard a fun fact. Take pictures on a trip when you stumble upon an old cemetery or find a family heirloom. Let the students know when you feel excited about being a history nerd!

Highlighting Current Events
Those less practiced in Facebook may not realize that it can literally be a newsfeed. By clicking to post a "link" instead of "status," you can link your students to any online news source. These could be articles that you think they should all be aware of or articles that may interest a particular group of students.

In addition, any number of politicians, NGOs, and national celebrities have Facebook pages, and this Facebook world is likely not the one that your students pay attention to. If they see that you are "Facebook friends" with Barack Obama and John Boehner, this might prompt them to check both Facebook profiles out and learn more.

Creating Interactive Puzzles
I get the best response when I post interactive puzzles for the students. They can be about anything you are studying or a review throwback to the beginning of the year.

Examples: In the Smithsonian American Art Museum, there is a piece that combines license plates from all 50 states that spell out the words of the Declaration of Independence. I took a quick picture and then posted this up with "Who can tell us what this is?" Several students chimed in.

Questions and puzzles like this can come in many forms, and do not need to relate to museums. For instance, a new movie is coming out called Jumping Over the Broom and I plan to post a link to the movie and ask if anyone remembers the historic significance of this tradition to slave life.

Expanding Student Choices
Most students love activities which involve the computer and social media, and the more we can do to spark interest, the better. There are many ways to use Facebook for turning in assignments or expanding on in-class participation.

Example: When discussing slavery, I asked students what one carries with them when deprived of everything. The students had to go home and look for skills or knowledge that the enslaved could have brought with them across the ocean. They were invited to either bring in items or describe what they had found. As another option, students could post what they found on Facebook. I also posted my own pictures that weekend: a drum, a quilt, and a woven basket to show that the skills brought by the enslaved Africans are seen everywhere.

Giving Shout-Outs and Recognition
Up to this point, you may be able to complete the same goals with a blog—but a unique aspect of Facebook is public recognition. Your teenage students are used to sharing their happiness and sadness and pride across a computer screen so go ahead and jump in! For those wary of causing embarrassment, I recommend sticking to recognizing the whole class. This is fun because it gathers lots of "likes" and revs up the competition.

Building Community
Facebook was designed as an online community and is therefore built to create feelings of belonging. Teachers can share pictures of field trips the students went on, follow along with a topic important to the community, and create special groups relevant to school. Some of my students who are shy in class seem to have a different online personality and are more likely to comment and join in through the computer.

Encouraging a Sense of Ownership and Interest in Our Country
In teaching history, we are passing on ownership of this country, but many students in many cities and towns have not been more than one or two states away. If my Washington, DC students skim pictures of the Oregon coast, Arches National Park, or a New Mexico Indian reservation, my greatest hope would be that the pictures make them want to visit more of our amazing country. Even if they are content where they are, they can at least be more culturally aware and form a broader definition of national diversity.

Ensuring Security and Consent

Securing Privacy
In setting up this project, the first thing to do is to establish a secure Facebook page at www.facebook.com. I recommend the following steps to ensure privacy:

  • Separate this account from any other Facebook account that you have.
  • Add only the information that you are comfortable with. I added my favorite books, some inspirational quotes, and a few historical movies to my profile. In this account, I also chose to include some pictures of myself and my family and created a couple of photo albums with facts about places I had been.
  • Ensure that all of your security settings are set to "Friends Only." This is for the security of the students who "friend" you. It allows only those students who have friended you to have access to your page and your pictures.
  • If you do have a personal Facebook account, I recommend double checking that your settings on it are secure before going online with your teacher account. I temporarily switched my personal profile picture to a landscape so that if the students were searching for me, they would select and friend my teacher account, which had a photo of me as the profile picture.

Ensuring Consent
Before just "friending" all of your students, there are a couple necessary steps to take. First, I sought approval from the principal and then I sent a letter home for all of the parents. The parents had to sign the permission slip before any online contact could be established. In this letter, I welcomed the families to join my community on Facebook if they were uncomfortable with their children doing so. Within this letter, I included an additional item about whether I could post pictures of the kids on Facebook. Most parents who agreed to let their children participate in the project agreed to let them participate in all of its aspects.

Project Challenges

Facebook has so much potential for being an educational tool, but I cannot claim I have had full success quite yet. I plan to continue experimenting until this initiative matches the vision that I have for it. Here are some of the challenges I faced.

Encouraging Buy-In
Once everything was set up, then I needed to hook my students. If they did not want to join in, everything was for naught. To present the project to them, I emphasized the "shout-out" portion of the activity and told them that I would offer some project options only on Facebook. I only received about a 40% opt-in rate. On the plus side, the kids who participated were probably the most likely to actually search out the educational articles and pictures that I posted. Next year, I plan to start this project with the beginning of the year paperwork to see if that increases participation.

Creating Routine
It was very difficult for me to create a routine that involved regularly updating my student Facebook account. Facebook is justifiably blocked on my school network so this always had to be an outside-of-work project. Everything I did for the project therefore felt like extra. Next year, I plan to start from the beginning with a commitment to posting biweekly to create more of a routine for myself and the students.

Maintaining Distance
I recommend avoiding skimming your students' pages. There is just information out there that we do not want to know. I requested from the students and in the parent letter that students only allow me access to their Limited Profile, a setting that does not allow me full access to the students' conversations.

Also, be aware that commenting on your students' status may be seen as invasive. I have commented now and then when it was relevant specifically to school or current issues involving social studies or social justice. In my opinion, especially early in the year, teachers may be better off viewing Facebook interaction as one-way.

Facing the Inequity of Computers
Utilizing media outside of the classroom involves inevitable inequities. Since Facebook is blocked at most schools and some students cannot leisurely browse the Internet at home, this project does give some students an unfair advantage. I have not found a way to work around this.

Starting Your Own Projects

I hope that other teachers experiment with this online tool, and would love to hear about any successes or receive feedback. For the first time in history, teachers can reach their students during the after-school at-home hours to build community, provide historic resources, and truly offer the type of engagement that allows us teachers to declare ourselves lifelong learners.

For more information

Get more ideas on using social media with your students in Digital Classroom. You can read more about Facebook, or watch an example of how one teacher used it to engage her students in the lives of historical figures.

Confronting the "Official Story" of American History

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"Washington Crossing the Deleware". Emanuel Gottlieb Leutze. 1851 oil on canvas
Article Body

Keith Barton of Indiana University and Linda Levstik of the University of Kentucky wanted to understand the "official" story of American history so often presented in classrooms and textbooks. What happens to aspects of history that don’t fit the way we usually teach U.S. history? And how do students respond?

Barton and Levstik interviewed 48 children, grades 5–8, to see how middle-schoolers understand the significance of particular events. Students were asked to choose from a number of historical events in order to determine which eight to include on a timeline of the last 500 years.

Many students alighted on a central theme in U.S. history: steadily expanding rights and opportunities. While stories like this help structure students' thinking about American history, traditional themes (such as perpetual progress or expanding freedoms) left them ill-equipped to deal with issues like racial inequality or political dissent.

While stories . . . help structure students' thinking about American history, traditional themes . . . left them ill-equipped to deal with issues like racial inequality or political dissent.

This study suggests that middle-grade students may need help grasping the complexities of the past or finding a place for stories that don’t fit common narratives. The authors proposed that teachers expose students to more complex and diverse perspectives by identifying what such narratives leave out. How has progress not been achieved? Where have freedoms not been expanded? What are the exceptions, the outliers, the cases that don’t fit? The researchers believe that students can learn traditional thematic narratives, while at the same time exploring the richness and complexity of history.

Thematic Trends

When Barton and Levstik interviewed the students, they found a core group of themes emerged from the events students chose as the most significant. Stories of national origin, American exceptionality, expanding freedoms, and technological progress consistently appeared among the students' choices. Such themes represented an "official version" of American history that all students seemed to recognize.

Alternative Stories

Some students viewed events as important despite the fact that their themes did not easily fit into the more popular narratives. Racism and sexism directly contradict themes of progress and expanding freedoms. Other events like the Great Depression and the Vietnam War fly in the face of American exceptionality. In both cases, however, students found it challenging to explain why they found these events significant. While students were convinced of the importance of such events, they struggled to reconcile them with common themes of U.S. history.

Two Ideas in Their Minds

American history presents a wide variety of events and themes. Some, like our nation’s heritage regarding race, class, and gender, pose particular challenges. Accustomed to justifying the importance of events by referencing a few common themes, many students find themselves at a loss when confronted by events they know are important, but which don’t seem to fit the stories they are used to hearing. Lacking an overarching framework to help make sense of such events, they develop overly simplistic explanations to reconcile jarring events with the official story. As the sample application below shows, their explanations may put events together, but at the expense of historical accuracy.

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Photomechanical print, Progress, Keppler & Schwarzmann, c. 1901, LoC
In the Classroom
  • Have students create a timeline of important events in American history, asking them to explain why they make particular choices.
  • After students create their timeline, discuss the major themes that arise from their picks. Do they seem to represent an "official" history?
  • Once they have identified common historical themes, ask students to pick out events that don’t fit the "official story." What might explain this lack of fit?
Sample Application

When learning about the Great Depression, one group of students demonstrated a characteristic dilemma. As far as they knew, throughout its history the United States had been on a steady march of economic progress. Consequently, students weren't sure how the Great Depression fit into this story:

  • "It wasn't a good part of history."
  • "It was something to learn from."
  • "It was the first time our country had become really poor."
  • "They realized that they weren’t the god of all countries."
  • "It’s not going to be perfect all the time."

As these quotes demonstrate, students had accumulated a wide range of conceptions about the Great Depression. They knew bad things had happened, but thought these occurred uniformly to all Americans. As a result, they concluded that the nation had been punished for being too prosperous or self-satisfied. They entirely missed the fact that the Great Depression occurred for many specific and complex reasons, and affected different Americans in dramatically diverse ways.

Bibliography

Keith C. Barton and Linda S. Levstik, "'It Wasn’t a Good Part of History': National Identity and Students' Explanations of Historical Significance," Teachers College Record 99, no. 3 (Spring 1998): 478–513.

Stories in History: Is Narrative an American Approach?

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An eigth grade teacher reading a childrens book to her class. NHEC
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In "A Sociocultural Perspective on Children’s Understanding of Historical Change: Comparative Findings From Northern Ireland and the United States," Keith Barton, a professor at Indiana University, looked at how children in different countries learn history, specifically the role played by narrative.

Barton observed that American students learn the "story" of American history, more often than not, as one of perpetual progress. In Northern Ireland, history is seen as relationships among social institutions over time, not a story about progress.

Barton wondered about the effects of such an approach. To that end he interviewed 121 students, ages 6–12, in four schools across Northern Ireland, asking how and why life had changed over time. Along with classroom observations and collecting data from history-related settings like museums, Barton’s interviews demonstrated how students in a non-American cultural context learn about history.

When he compared these to studies done in the United States, Barton found that American students portray historical change as straightforward, linear, and generally beneficial progress, while the Irish students saw history as either random and ambiguous, or cyclical. The American students studied tended to focus on accomplishments of historical figures, whereas students in Northern Ireland often discussed the role of societal and economic forces.

Narrative in American History

The "story" of history taught to American students frequently takes the form of a "quest-for-freedom" narrative in which life slowly but surely gets better for all Americans. This serves to unite a diverse society, such as is found in the U.S. By contrast, in Northern Ireland, where Protestants and Catholics remain divided, the narrative form creates the potential for opposing sides to take aim at each other. Consequently, in Northern Ireland, the primary emphasis in history is on societal relationships—relationships between different groups, as well as between people and institutions.

The "story" of history taught to American students frequently takes the form of a "quest-for-freedom" narrative in which life slowly but surely gets better for all Americans. This serves to unite a diverse society, such as is found in the U.S.
The Individual in American History

History classes in the United States also tend to focus more on the role of exceptional individuals in driving history forward. In this version of history prominent figures initiate a series of events which follow a causal chain to bring about significant change. For example, the American students learned that the civil rights movement was the product of Martin Luther King, Jr.’s genius rather than a broad range of social and institutional forces. In Northern Ireland, the students focused less on individuals and more on issues relating to social and economic structures. Barton suggests this may be because Americans are more comfortable dealing with individuals and their stories than with issues such as social class and prejudice. Conversely, there are few historical figures taught in Northern Ireland classrooms who don't represent a political position of one kind or another. Thus, while the Northern Irish are comfortable discussing social class, for instance, they have less experience examining the influence of particular individuals.

Progress in American History

Barton's study showed that narratives about American history are frequently positive stories about the triumph of progress: as time passes, technology improves, freedoms expand, and life gets better. In Northern Ireland, stories about progress are much less common. Time goes on and life changes, but they do so in unpredictable ways. Barton argues that while a focus on progress may be positive, giving students a feeling of shared identity and inspiring their belief that Americans can learn from their mistakes, relying solely on such a narrative doesn't acquaint students with the effects of societal forces on individual actions or the diversity that exists at any given time in history.

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Poster, Forging Ahead, Harry Herzog, 1936-1941, Library of Congress
In the Classroom

Help students understand that the passage of time doesn't always bring what is commonly viewed as "progress."

  • Begin with contrasting images—a rural village and a large city—and ask students to explain the relationship between the two.
  • Students will likely explain how the village became the city. This is a good jumping-off point to helping them see that the "story of history" is not always simple or straightforward.
  • Next, explain that villages and cities have often existed simultaneously.
  • Spend some time discussing why and how cities first began to emerge. While urban centers may look like signs of "progress," students should be made aware that there is a more complex relationship between villages and cities.
  • Suggest to students that historical development doesn't occur in a simple progressive sequence, and that historical periods can't be boiled down to a single image. While many people in the past lived in villages, there are also cities that date back thousands of years. And even though today many people reside in cities, villages are far from extinct.
Sample Application

In interviewing students in Northern Ireland, Barton gave them a number of exercises. One asked the students to explain why British students were once caned—hit with a reed or branch—by their teachers, and why the practice ceased. In answering, one third of the students attributed the change to inevitable progress:

Because over time they realized that they should be less strict.

They just found out that it’s really, really bad, and they’re thinking of other people’s feelings now.

In explaining how things change, these students didn't mention collective action or how institutional change can bring about social improvements. However, the rest of the students—two-thirds of those interviewed by Barton—pointed to changing social relations, collective action like strikes and protests, and evolving legal and government institutions:

Because if you cane them, you could get sent to jail. . . it’s against the law to hurt somebody that you don’t know.

New people came in. . . and they made new rules like child abuse, like jails, and all that kind of thing.

For these students, caning ended not because of inevitable progress, or even due to a change in attitude; instead, the changing attitudes themselves led to collective action, that in turn produced new laws and regulations.

Bibliography

Keith Barton, "A Sociocultural Perspective on Children’s Understanding of Historical Change: Comparative Findings From Northern Ireland and the United States," American Educational Research Journal 38, no. 4 (Winter 2001), 881-913.

Amy Trenkle's Be the Blogger!

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Blog, Lincoln Logs, http://stampslincoln.blogspot.com/, Amy Trenkle
Blog, Lincoln Logs, http://stampslincoln.blogspot.com/, Amy Trenkle
Article Body
Beginning to Blog

During the 2008–2009 school year, in an effort to integrate more technology into my classroom I started blogging with my students about history class. Because I was pretty new to blogging and wasn’t sure how it would go, I did one collective site for the 8th grade. Basically, the students wrote and I uploaded it to the blog. As the year went on, I logged in for students and they took over the maintenance of the site. Sometimes the writing was an assignment and I chose the best ones to post. Other times, I offered extra credit if they posted about a topic provided. And still other times I loved what a student wrote and typed it up for the blog. This site ended up being a wonderful compilation of our year come June. I still use it as a preview site for students, parents, and pre-service teachers I work with, as to what we do during the year. The blog can be viewed at http://shmshistoryclass.blogspot.com/.

That same year, an after-school group that is co-sponsored by myself and a friend from the National Park Service took a cross-country trip for Lincoln’s Bicentennial. I created another blog for the students to document their adventures and for friends and family back home to be able to find us. What was nice was that because I had been working with the blog in history class, my students were aware of how a blog works and were familiar with how to write for it and their audience. Each student was required to write three times for the blog during the course of our week-long adventure. Each night after our full day they would write on either paper or share the two laptops we brought for blogging. Before going to bed each night I would upload any remaining blog entries. The system proved effective for sharing our adventures and for students documenting their days. The site has also become a great way for Jen Epstein, my National Park Service co-organizer, to share what she is doing in schools for outreach. View it here: http://stampslincoln.blogspot.com/.

Blogging Expanded

With two school group blogs under my belt, I decided to ramp it up for the 2009–2010 school year. I wanted students to be able to learn how to blog . . . not just post, but learn the process. I set out the planning of it before school started. Basically, I decided to have students choose their groupmates in the class they were in. I have approximately 100 students each year and about 25 per history class. I asked them to be in groups of three or four students.

I wanted students to be able to learn how to blog . . . not just post, but learn the process.

Once they chose their groups (and we discussed the characteristics of a quality groupmate, both in a group partner and as a group partner—they are 8th grade after all!), I gave them a sheet that asked them to record their group member names, create a name for their blog, and to write a username and a password that they would remember (not one that was already in use by one of the group members!). I created Google accounts for each student using the information provided, noting on their sheet, if a username was taken, the reassigned username.

Generally, I’ve found that it takes about a week for me to set up the 30 or so email accounts and blog sites. I introduce the blog and what it will be about, how it will be used, etc., and then come back to it about a week later once I’ve created the accounts and site. We spend a full double block learning to log in, changing the appearance of the blog, and learning to post. We generally do the first blog post together. We discuss the elements of a quality blog post—what am I looking for? Points I stress are that it is still for class—correct English grammar must be used. For all intents and purposes, I am their audience (so it should remain as formal writing), and the blog is only for history class. I do not want to read about their weekend experiences on this blog.

Usually, after a guest speaker they have a blog update to do. Sometimes they turn in an assignment and then I ask them to cut and paste what they have typed and to post it. Other times I have them work as a group to post a response to something in class.

Points to Consider

I find that they’re pretty excited about the blogs and they like to write on them. I’ve learned that a clear rubric is key to success—for the students but for my grading as well. Just as any teacher would do for a writing assignment, it is important to lay out the criteria for the post in advance. Am I grading on content? Spelling? Grammar? Reflection? When grading 30 blogs, it becomes ultra important to be able to know what I’m looking for, especially because their posts can vary so much.

I find that it is important to be very clear with parents about expectations as well.

Another important note to consider is deadlines. Because students aren’t turning in a physical paper, it’s easy for them to forget deadlines and to overlook them. I find that it’s important to have a final cut-off date for grading blogs . . . along with a lot of reminders. Many parents are not familiar with blogging and so I find that it is important to be very clear with parents about expectations as well. Last year I ran a parent workshop and walked parents through the what, how, and why of blogging so that they could better support their children at home . . . and because I was getting a lot of questions!

I’m fortunate enough to have a classroom set of laptops and a relatively new and working internet system. However, the number of computers is what has dictated my choices for class blog site vs. small group blog sites. When I started in 2008, I had only two laptops and a desktop, with no permanent and/or regular access to a classroom set of computers.

My recommendation would be to start small—either with a classroom blog or with a select group of students. Simultaneously, I was blogging on a personal blog and it helped for me to play around with my own blog. I found the Google help site for Blogger very helpful when teaching my students. Pages can be printed and copied for students and then put in their notebooks to be referenced. (Editor's note: If you're using a different blogging service, look for that service's support documentation.)

The Advantages of Blogging

For me, blogs are really flexible—for both time and content. While I’ve used them for the duration of a school year, they would be great for a unit project or a semester project. And for those students who are really savvy, it’s a great way to engage them by having them add other multimedia objects to their blogs and to embed links to related content material.

Just remember to give yourself a head start and don’t be afraid to play around!

The ideas truly are endless! The winter break and other school breaks really lend themselves to my own exploration time on the blog. It allows me to see what I could implement with my students and to think about how it might further benefit what I am teaching in the classroom. Just remember to give yourself a head start and don’t be afraid to play around! Blogging can be wonderful for both you and the students!

For more information

Curious to learn more about blogs and blogging? Our Tech for Teachers entry on blogs looks at some possible platforms, and, in a Teaching Guide, high-school teacher Kyle Smith details one way of using a blog in class.

Read other ideas from Amy Trenkle in her blog entries on teaching Christopher Columbus with monuments and celebrating the First Amendment.

Diana Laufenberg on the Power of Visuals

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Image, Tablue Data Visualization, Apr. 14, 2010, courtneyBolton, Flickr
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History teachers (tend to) love history. Students do not (often) love it so much. This is a perplexing situation that I have bounced around in my brain for the past two decades. When I was a student, I liked the teachers and felt as though I was being educated, but I did not love my history classes. That is until I enrolled in a special freshman seminar at the University of Wisconsin-Eau Claire: "Medieval Foundations of the Modern West," co-taught by a history professor, Dr. Thomas Miller, and an Academic Adviser with an art degree, Jeannie Harms. This course was about nurturing freshmen as students but also approaching history from an interdisciplinary angle. It was incredibly unconventional and I loved every minute of it. There was a significant 'visualness' to the history—we were constantly digging into paintings and illustrations and artifacts of the era to extract their history, for ourselves.

The Need for Images

As I developed my own classroom practice, it occurred to me that I needed to include that compelling visual component in my teaching as much as possible. Some years I have been more successful than others at achieving that balance, and there have been years when I was more acutely aware of the need. Consider this student: a 12-year-old girl with a 2nd-grade reading/writing level, identified with a specific learning disability in both areas. She is in my classroom in adherence with the inclusion model. I quickly realize that her struggles with the written word have nothing to do with her capacity for logic and critical thinking. She is bright and actively participates in class discussion, but is left out of the conversation much of the time because the reading and writing stand between her and the ideas. To address her identified areas of struggle, she is scheduled into small, intensive remedial classes, but much of the content is well below her actual intellect; she is bored.

I began to realize that if I introduced the concepts visually, this student was much more motivated to attempt the assignment even though she struggled. In addition, her ability to engage verbally in the discussion and group work related to the content improved. Here's the other bonus moment—introducing concepts in a visual way motivated most of the kids. It helped them to access the ideas or get hooked by the story so that they then wanted, all on their own, to know more, inquire, and dig. Two minutes of historical video on the Space Race can get a room of 13-year-olds completely rapt and intrigued. A famous political cartoon with clever components can provoke a stream of compelling questions. An infographic comparing unemployment rates in the Great Depression to those today can link the personal experiences of the students today to the historical concept of the Great Depression, helping them look for commonality and divergence in the events. As teachers of history we often place reading and writing before discussion, leaving behind those students averse to or struggling with the written word. By flipping the compelling component to the front of the day or lesson, students are much more likely to buy into the learning. I learned this all those years ago in that freshman seminar.

Data Visualizations

As technology advanced and I began to use more video, I also stumbled across the occasional data visualization. My interest was piqued. These visualizations were not just a way to capture interest but also a way to introduce highly complex ideas and relationships quickly, so as to elevate the level of dialogue and inquiry. One such example is GapMinder from Hans Rosling. If you have never investigated this tool, I dare you to spend less than an hour on your first visit. Watching the bobbing and weaving of country data through time makes the data beautiful and meaningful to many students and fills them with curiosity. The visualizations created by Slate and The Guardian for the unrest in North Africa and the Middle East deliver a deluge of rich information to the learner in forms that suggest connections between events, geography, and time. Tools like these can include the vast majority of learners, regardless of reading ability, in a dialogue of ideas and critical thought.

Accessing and Assessing in Many Ways

This is not to say that we shouldn't work with students on their areas of struggle, but we can teach students to access and assess content in more ways than just reading and writing. That 12-year-old girl taught me that seeing a student as a voraciously curious brain and not just a reader/writer was critically important. We teach the whole child, not just the parts that decode letters. Our history classrooms have the ability to become fertile ground where citizens engage in truly enriching dialogue about issues of import. I want to involve all of my students in the conversation, not just those interested in the history or those that can access the reading, but all the students, their interests piqued by engaging and relevant resources about which they can ask thoughtful questions.

For more information

Our Tech for Teachers section introduces you to visualization tools like Many Eyes and Wordle.

Mind mapping and mental mapping are data-visualization techniques students can embrace, and English language learners can also benefit from bringing more visuals into the classroom.

Handbook of Texas Online

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two Texas militiamen from the Civil War
Annotation

With more than 25,000 articles and 3,000 authors, this website offers students and teachers a broad scope of topics, with in-depth analysis from scholars and amateur historians across dozens of universities and historical associations. Material on the site can be accessed alphabetically, or by browsing articles using the left-hand navigation column ("title", "what", "when", "where", and "who"). In addition, the site contains three major subsections: "The Handbook of Civil War Texas," "The Texas Lighthouse Series," and "The Handbook of Texas Music." Visitors can also subscribe to the site’s RSS feed to receive a "Texas Day by Day" feature.

The Education section offers teacher resources and more than 20 lesson plans. Most of these materials are for grades four and seven (state history), but they have applications across grade levels. Lesson plans are arranged by topic, grade level, and state standards—useful for educators in Texas and across the country.

Due to the sheer volume of entries in this site, becoming familiar with the dozens of subcategories in the left-hand column is a good place to start. The search engine may also prove helpful when looking for a keyword or phrase.