Modern America, Day 1 - Class Recap

The outside of the Watergate office building in Washington, D.C. I mean, I'm a history teacher - I couldn't resist going to look at the building myself when I first visited the city in 2010!

Dear class,

Second to last weekend of the year! Today was another one day deep dive into a topic in the last century of American history - Watergate! What a super interesting piece of our history, at least to me! Here's the class recap:

Learning Targets:
SS.HS.KN.ALT.17: I can explain the process of change and continuity in a society, place or region.
SS.HS.KN.ALT.23: I can describe the influences, impacts and resolutions of historical conflicts.

Soundtrack: “Waterfalls" by TLC. Selected because today we learned all about the Watergate scandal in class. Lyrics here.

AGENDA 5/30/14:
News Brief
Watergate PowerPoint
The Final Report
Fall of the Wall

Homework: All late/make up/missing work (aside from Cold War newspaper) due by 11:59 PM tonight (Friday, May 30). My email is luke_fritz@beaverton.k12.or.us if you need it. Have a wonderful weekend! Read the blog! Next news brief: Miles.

News Brief: The news today consisted of the 20 minutes or so of Westview student elections campaign advertisements after Wildcat News. I passed out ballots for everyone to vote - I'm glad we get to participate in democracy!

Watergate PowerPoint: To start talking about Watergate, I asked the class about what a "scandal" was and gave some examples of scandals. Many scandals have names that end in -gate, due to this scandal! After the video (we switched up the order, due to the long campaign ads), I went through a PowerPoint. I tried to go fast on this, because there are a bunch of slides and I really just want students to get the main points of what happened for the upcoming multiple choice final. Here is the presentation again if you missed class or wanted to read through it at your own pace:

Google Drive - The Watergate Scandal PowerPoint

Some of the main points not covered by the documentary we watched were about President Nixon's Vice President, Spiro Agnew, resigning due to unrelated corruption charges. This also went more into depth about how President Gerald Ford got to be President without ever being elected to the Executive Branch, and the pardon he gave President Nixon.

The Final Report: Before the PowerPoint, I showed a National Geographic documentary on what happening in the Watergate scandal. These were the questions to answer in class:

Google Drive - Watergate: The Final Report Video Questions

Here is the video we watched in class:

Again, I find the entire story so interesting! This was a President of the United States, who had to resign, because he was connected to all of these crimes! I hope everyone understood the importance of this, especially in connection to what we were learning about the Cold War and the Vietnam War as a part of it. The result was really deep dissatisfaction and distrust about the U.S. government.

Fall of the Wall: We did not get to this in class. Next time! Quite a lot to pack in: I want to talk about the fall of the Berlin Wall, along with our modern "War on Terror," too. Looking forward to these last few days of teaching you! Have a great weekend and come back ready for one last full week of the school year!

StEPP Career Ed Day, Class Recap

Before coming to Westview I worked at Marshall and Madison High Schools in Portland, for the "Step Up" program, which was largely after school tutoring and mentoring. This is a picture from one of the summer camps we did, which relates to the "StEPP" day, but your future after high school, too!

Hi everyone,

Today's class was almost entirely devoted to going to the Computer Lab with a Westview counselor to complete (or at least start) your StEPP Career Education objectives for 10th grade. Here's the recap:

Soundtrack: "Step in the Name of Love (Remix)" by R. Kelly. Selected because of the "step" connection! Lyrics here.

AGENDA 5/28/14:
Newspapers Back
StEPP (Computer Lab with Westview counselor)

Homework: All late/missing/incomplete/revised work due Friday (with the sole exception of the Cold War newspaper, which I am giving everyone another week to revise, if needed)! Read the blog! Next news brief: News brief: Lauren

Newspapers Back: No news brief today, due to me wanting to give you as much time as possible to complete the career ed materials in the Computer Lab. I did pass back all of the completed grades for the Cold War newspaper project, which I did over the weekend. Your grades should now be completely up to date and you should know what you need to work on!

Here's how I graded the rubric for the newspaper project (definitely come see me if you have further questions):

ALT.17 – Explain process of change and continuity
Describes specific events in editorial, in chronological order, with context of what is going on in the Cold War and how America is changing.

ALT.23 – Influences, impacts, and resolutions of historical conflicts
Depth of description/how well the newspaper describes what has happened in the Cold War up to the date of the newspaper.

ALT.05 – Support arguments with evidence
Range of examples for editorial on who is winning the Cold War, who is losing, why.

ALT.09 – Technological knowledge and innovation shaping society
Analyzes different technologies and their effects during the Cold War period, as appropriate for the time of the newspaper.

Thanks for your hard work on these! I had fun looking through them all! :-)

StEPP: The rest of class was spent with a Westview counselor in the Computer Lab, working on your career ed materials for 10th grade. You need to complete this in order to graduate, so if you did not finish in class, please do so ASAP at home, then turn it in to the career center! Thanks!

Cold War America, Day 12 - Class Recap

The soundtrack for today was "Wonderwall" by Oasis, because of the way in which we presented the newspaper project, and because it reminded me of when the song played at London 2012 Summer Olympics, on August 12th. Congratulations on being done with your last major assignment in class this year!

Hi everyone,

Welcome to your Memorial Day weekend! Thank you all for your hard work in class. If you did not finish your Cold War newspaper, you definitely need to email it to me - luke_fritz@beaverton.k12.or.us - as soon as possible. With that, here's the recap:

Learning Targets:
SS.HS.KN.ALT.09: I can identify how technological knowledge and innovation shapes a society, place, or region.
SS.HS.KN.ALT.17: I can explain the process of change and continuity in a society, place or region.
SS.HS.KN.ALT.23: I can describe the influences, impacts and resolutions of historical conflicts.

Soundtrack: “Wonderwall" by Oasis. See photo caption above for reasoning. Lyrics here.

AGENDA 5/22/14:
News Brief
Finish/Print
Gallery Walk
Debrief

Homework: Turn in all missing/late/make up work by May 30 (next Friday). Have a great weekend! Next class: StEPP career education day in the lab.

News Brief: Israel had the news brief today and chose this story to talk about: CBSNews.com - Calif. kidnapping suspect charged in 10-year abduction case. Obviously a disturbing case. I remarked in class that sometimes humanity can be really awful.

On the other side, we also talked about the Beaverton School District bond measure passing, what it might mean for Westview, and my being hired as a full time probationary (somewhat permanent) teacher at Westview (these two news items are unrelated). Happy days!

Finish/Print: As promised, we went to the computer lab next to class for about 30 minutes or so, just to finish up (if needed) and print your Cold War newspapers. My thinking here was that I really wanted everyone to have at least something to put up on the wall, and I know that often, it is difficult to get everything printed and ready at home. I was glad to see this time seemed to be utilized well!

Gallery Walk: When we came back to class, I had everyone tape at least the front page of their newspaper to the wall around the room ("wonder wall" - get it?). Then, we spent 10-15 minutes just walking around and looking at what everyone had created. I really loved seeing what everyone had done, and having students be interested in it, too!

Debrief: After the gallery walk, we talked about specific newspapers we really liked in class, and how the assignment went in general. It is always good to hear this information, to help improve in the future!

Thanks again for all of your hard work! Have a wonderful long weekend!

Cold War America, Day 11 - Class Recap

A few students are working on Cold War newspapers in relation to the United States dropping the atomic bomb on Japan. This is the Meiji Shrine in Tokyo. Photo taken in January, 2014.

Dear class,

Our last full day of work on the Cold War newspaper assignment today! Here's what class looked like:

Learning Targets:
SS.HS.KN.ALT.09: I can identify how technological knowledge and innovation shapes a society, place, or region.
SS.HS.KN.ALT.17: I can explain the process of change and continuity in a society, place or region.
SS.HS.KN.ALT.23: I can describe the influences, impacts and resolutions of historical conflicts.

Soundtrack: “I Ka Barra (Your Work)” by Habib Koite. Selected because this was the last full in class day of work on your Cold War newspaper project, due next class.

AGENDA 5/20/14:
Wildcat News Brief
Newspaper Overview
Computer Lab S210

Homework: Finish newspaper (we will have about 30 minutes in the lab to finish and print, but please come with it done, if possible). Read the blog! Next news brief: Israel.

Links to homework assignment and grading rubric:

Google Drive: Cold War Newspaper Final Project Assignment

Google Drive: Cold War Newspaper Final Project Grading Rubric

News Brief: Brooklyn had the news brief today and talked about the legalization of same sex marriage in Oregon yesterday. I made sure to go over how this happened and some of the reasons why a judge was able to declare the Oregon constitution invalid. An important day in our history, for sure. Thanks, Brooklyn!

Newspaper Overview: I wanted to talk about the basics of the assignment, one last time. This is what I read in class:

Article 1: From the date that you are choosing to publish your paper, who is “winning” the Cold War? Why is the other side not? What is changing in America at this point?

Political Cartoon/Visual Metaphor that relates to your headline, with caption that explains what it is about.

Article 2: An overview of how technology is shaping the war at the time you are publishing the newspaper. Be sure to address the Nuclear Arms Race, and the Space Race if possible. You could also talk about technology within specific wars.

Make sure to cite your sources if you use out of class information! Your in class notes do not need to be cited.

Computer Lab S210: The rest of class was spent on the computers. Please work hard on this, to be able to turn it in next class! This is your final really big assignment of the year - do not neglect to do it! Make sure to ask me in the comments or with an email if you need help!

Cold War America, Day 10 - Class Recap

Sometimes, to make art (like this couple I saw at the John Lennon Wall in Prague, Czech Republic last summer), you need a bit of help. That's what I tried to do today in class!

Hi everyone,

I hope you are as excited as I am about this newspaper assignment! The ideas for cartoons today should be pretty fun to see! The recap:

Learning Targets:
SS.HS.KN.ALT.09: I can identify how technological knowledge and innovation shapes a society, place, or region.
SS.HS.KN.ALT.17: I can explain the process of change and continuity in a society, place or region.
SS.HS.KN.ALT.23: I can describe the influences, impacts and resolutions of historical conflicts.

Soundtrack: “Killer Tofu" by The Beets. Selected because this song is from the cartoon "Doug" and we were working on political cartoons today in class. Listen to it again, here.

AGENDA 5/16/14:
Robin's Uncle
Bitstrips/Google Drawings
Blog Precap
Computer Lab S219

Homework: Continue to work on newspaper assignment, which is due next Thursday, May 22. Read the blog! Next news brief: Brooklyn (again!).

Links to homework assignment and grading rubric:

Google Drive: Cold War Newspaper Final Project Assignment

Google Drive: Cold War Newspaper Final Project Grading Rubric

Robin's Uncle: Again, instead of a news brief section, Robin talked a bit about her uncle who served and was killed in Vietnam. She showed pictures, including her uncle's name on the Vietnam Memorial Wall in Washington, D.C. It is so powerful to connect with our personal history! Thanks for bringing it in, Robin!

Blog Precap: A "precap," because I showed this exact post, detailing how you could go about making your political cartoon!

Bitstrips/Google Drawings: I wanted to show the class a few ideas for how to do the political cartoon element that is required for your Cold War newspaper. I think you could have a lot of fun with this!

The first website I showed in class to help with creating a cartoon or visual metaphor for what is going on in the Cold War at the time you are making your newspaper is BitStrips.com/create/comic. I demonstrated a range of ways that website could be used! The only thing you need to watch out for is that in order to save, you need to sign up for the site. If you don't want to do that (it is not required for this assignment), you could either: 1) use the "Print Screen" function. If using a PC with this button, it acts like a screenshot of the entire screen, that you can paste in a Paint or Word document to edit or print. With a Mac, here is the guide to taking a screenshot:

Press the Apple key ⌘ + Shift + 4 all at the same time

You will see the cursor change to +

Drag a box around the section you want to copy and release the mouse

You will find a capture of the screen on your desktop again entitled ‘Picture _’

2) You could also just take a picture of the cartoon using your phone, and upload it to print by emailing it to yourself. This will almost certainly be low quality, though.

The second website I know of to create cartoons is the "Drawings" section of Google Drive. To get there, sign into your Google account, go to Drive, then click on "Create." This is what I am talking about:

That opens up a document that looks a lot like Paint, where you can insert images, play around with text and shapes, add lines, etc.

Basically, I want to see that you have a cartoon or visual metaphor that has some relation to what your newspaper headline and editorial is about. If you can try to make it funny (and be appropriate), that would be great! I am excited to see what you come up with! 

Computer Lab S219: This was entirely due to the generosity of Ms. Stewart letting us use this lab, when she had previously signed up, so be sure to thank her when you see her! You definitely need to be working on this assignment over the weekend, because we only have one more day (Tuesday) of in class work before this is due, next Thursday! Please let me know how I can help, if you need it!

Cold War America, Day 9 - Class Recap

Newspaper front pages around the world on September 12th, 2001. Photo taken at the Newseum in Washington, D.C. in 2010.

Dear class,

Here we go! Today was the first day of working on the last real major assignment of the year in class. Lots of links and resources follow! The recap:

Learning Targets:
SS.HS.KN.ALT.09: I can identify how technological knowledge and innovation shapes a society, place, or region.
SS.HS.KN.ALT.17: I can explain the process of change and continuity in a society, place or region.
SS.HS.KN.ALT.23: I can describe the influences, impacts and resolutions of historical conflicts.

Soundtrack: “Born in the U.S.A." by Bruce Springsteen. Selected because this is a song about the Vietnam experience - especially how bad it was upon returning home. Some people see this as a patriotic song. The lyrics (which I read out loud in class) suggest otherwise.

Soundtrack: “Bad News” by Kanye West. Selected because it may seem like today's assignment about making a newspaper is bad news, but it is not! Also, because it was the first clean song that came up under my iTunes when I searched for "news." Lyrics here.

AGENDA 5/14/14:
Gabby's Uncle
Cold War Newspaper Project
Templates/Read Write Think
Computer Lab N228

Homework: Continue to work on newspaper assignment, which is due next Thursday, May 22. Read the blog! Next news brief: Brooklyn.

Gabby's Uncle: Instead of the regular news brief, I wanted to give Gabby some time to share some of the amazing documents that she has from her uncle, who was killed during the Vietnam War. Her family just found these pictures, letters, and awards, and it was SO interesting (at least to me), to see how connected one of our students is to what we are talking about in class! Thanks for bringing everything in, Gabby. That was a really incredible start to the day. :-)

Cold War Newspaper Project: I had shown the class a version of this document before, but this time, I actually handed it out, so everyone should know what we are working on. Here are the two pages you are going to need in order to do this assignment:

Google Drive: Cold War Newspaper Final Project Assignment

Google Drive: Cold War Newspaper Final Project Grading Rubric

There are a lot of details on the assignment sheet, on purpose. I wanted to try to make it as detailed as possible. Basically, there are three main elements that I am going to be looking for:

1) An editorial about who is winning the Cold War (again, you could use almost any topic we have been learning about for the past few weeks) at the date that you choose for your newspaper, along with what is changing in American society.

2) A political cartoon or visual metaphor that helps visually explain what is going on at the time your newspaper is being published.

3) An article about the role technology is playing in the Cold War at the time your newspaper is printed, specifically referencing the Nuclear Arms Race and Space Race, if possible.

Finally, as I explained in class, there is no way you are going to be able to finish this all, plus the additional elements that might help it look more authentic, like advertisements or other stories, in class. You will need to be working on this as homework. I have not been giving daily homework throughout the semester because we work hard in class and you sometimes have these bigger assignments which require work out of class. I am hopeful that by getting this one out of the way before most of your final projects and tests are due in your other classes, you can devote a lot of attention to it.

Templates/Read Write Think: In order to do this assignment, I went over three possibilities in class for newspaper templates. You could obviously find your own, or just assemble different articles on a regular newspaper, as well. Here were the options I saw:

1) Use the Printing Press tool on the Read Write Think website. This lets you play around with different formats, add images from your files, and save your work as you go (using a .RWT file that you can only open on that website).

If you use Read Write Think, make sure to spell check your work, because it does not automatically do it for you through the website.

2) Select a template from Google Docs. Here is a link to at least 50 different formats you could try: Google Drive - Newspaper Template Options.

3) Download a template for Microsoft Word. I looked around and liked a few of the options here: ExtraNewspapers.com - Newspaper Template Pack. These will download as .zip files, then you have to open them up and select the Word documents to work with.

Do NOT pay for any templates or anything like that! I am sure that you can adequately complete this assignment without buying any.

Computer Lab N228: The rest of class was spent on the computers. I suggested using this blog and your in class notes to find resources to use, but you could also find other sources to help. From what I saw, most students were able to identify the topic for the newspaper and have a general idea for how they are going to accomplish it. Please be prepared next class to keep working on it! We only have two days devoted in class after today for work on this project before it is due.

Bring materials for working on your political cartoon/visual metaphor, as well! Feel free to post in the comments if you are looking for a particular resource that I can help you find here on the blog or elsewhere!

Cold War America, Day 8 - Class Recap

This is at the top of the highest mountain in Vietnam - Fansipan. It was quite the memorable journey to climb up (and down), let me tell you! Photo taken in 2011.

Hi everyone,

Welcome back! Today was the last full day of class content before we really move in to the last big project of the year - a Cold War newspaper that you will be working on creating. Start thinking about this!

Learning Targets:
SS.HS.KN.ALT.09: I can identify how technological knowledge and innovation shapes a society, place, or region.
SS.HS.KN.ALT.17: I can explain the process of change and continuity in a society, place or region.
SS.HS.KN.ALT.23: I can describe the influences, impacts and resolutions of historical conflicts.

Soundtrack: “Born in the U.S.A." by Bruce Springsteen. Selected because this is a song about the Vietnam experience - especially how bad it was upon returning home. Some people see this as a patriotic song. The lyrics (which I read out loud in class) suggest otherwise.

AGENDA 5/12/14:
Lyrics/News Brief
Vietnam War PowerPoint
Political Cartoons/Visual Metaphors
Letters Home 

Homework: Read the blog! Think about what you want to do for your newspaper date/topic! Next news brief: Brooklyn (because Eric was absent).

News Brief: Laura chose an article about this story: LATimes.com - Why study when 15,000 retweets can eliminate a high school final? No, I will not be making any of these deals with students! I have a twitter account and love it - I recognize the power of social media! Thanks, Laura.

Vietnam War PowerPoint: I started this section by showing this clip which highlights some of the basics of the war in Vietnam: History.com - Vietnam War History: The Road to War. Most of class was spent going through this. All of the pictures used in the presentation are my own - mostly from my trip to Vietnam to visit a friend in 2011. Also, I tried to listen to feedback about note taking, and made a template of notes for everyone to fill out.

Google Drive: The Vietnam War PowerPoint

Google Drive: The Vietnam War PowerPoint Notes Guide

I know this was a lot of information. I have have been saying that a lot recently. My hope is that by these big overviews, you will find something that you connect to and are passionate about exploring in more depth. I loved all the questions during this! The more, the merrier! Thanks for taking great notes!

Political Cartoons/Visual Metaphors: One of the elements in your upcoming Cold War newspaper assignment is thinking of a political cartoon or visual metaphor for what you are reporting on. I tried to give a bunch of different examples. Here are a few that I showed:

Political cartoon involving my mom (Portland City Commissioner Amanda Fritz) and her position on reservoir covers: OregonLive.com - Fritz Political Cartoon

Visual metaphor: the Earth melting like an ice cream cone (due to Climate Change).

Visual metaphor: bombs away at a toilet. (Eww.)

Next, I passed out examples of political cartoons during the Vietnam War and had groups of students do a quick analysis about what they were trying to say. Those examples can be found here: TeachingHistory.org - Vietnam War Cartoons.

Letters Home: We did not have the chance to look at a few letters home from soldiers during the war. There are plenty of resources online for you to do this, if you are interested! Thanks again for your focus! Let's get after it next class with the start of the project! :-)

Cold War America, Day 7 - Class Recap

This is a replica LEM (Lunar Excursion Module), like the one that the Apollo program used to land astronauts on the moon. Photo taken at the National Air and Space Museum Smithsonian in Washington, DC, 2010.

Dear class,

Wow, so I definitely tried to pack a TON into today, especially with the assembly shortened schedule. I am hopeful that you are here reading to catch up a bit and understand what I went through! Here's what happened today:

Learning Targets:
SS.HS.KN.ALT.09: I can identify how technological knowledge and innovation shapes a society, place, or region.
SS.HS.KN.ALT.17: I can explain the process of change and continuity in a society, place or region.
SS.HS.KN.ALT.23: I can describe the influences, impacts and resolutions of historical conflicts.

Soundtrack: “To The Moon & Back" by Savage Garden. Selected because we talked about the Space Race between the USA and USSR today in class. Lyrics here.

AGENDA 5/8/14:
News Brief
Bay of Pigs
Cuban Missile Crisis
The Space Race

Homework: Read the blog! Next news brief: Laura.

News Brief: Mahita had the news brief today and selected this story to talk about: CNN.com - Neo-Nazis feign remorse, taunt family of murdered sex offender. Miles correctly said today in class that this is an example of vigilantism - taking the law into your own hands and ignoring any process for justice that we as a society have agreed on.

The other part to the news brief section involved looking at a calendar for the rest of the semester (which I didn't pass out, because it is not set in stone yet) and the upcoming final project for the Cold War, which is creating a newspaper front page with three elements. I will definitely explain this in much more detail in an upcoming class, but I really wanted to be sure that everyone understood the importance of following along with what we are doing in class.

Bay of Pigs: Today's lesson was supposed to have a distinct flow to it - from this, the the Cuban Missile Crisis, to the Space Race. Basically, the Bay of Pigs fiasco was when President John F. Kennedy approved a CIA plan to let former Cubans try to invade and take back the country from Fidel Castro, in 1961. Here was the overview we watched in class (as with everything today, I asked students to follow along and take notes):

After the film clip, I talked about the impacts of this failed invasion of Cuba: 1) Castro needed to seek protection from the Soviets, thus eventually resulting in the Cuban Missile Crisis, and 2) President Kennedy looked like he had abandoned and betrayed the Cuban-Americans who invaded, which resulted in a very long resentment by Cuban-Americans of him and the Democratic Party that Kennedy was a part of. I pointed out that Marco Rubio, US Senator from Florida, is Cuban-American and a Republican.

Cuban Missile Crisis: Again, one of the results of the Bay of Pigs, and also related to the Space Race! Part of the Cold War between the USA and USSR was the development of rocket technology to be able to fire missiles at each other. When the United States discovered that Cuba had nuclear missile sites, being constructed with the help of the Soviets, the Cuban Missile Crisis started - 13 days of being at the very edge of nuclear war. Here's the clip we watched in class about this:

It is very important that we understand how close we were to all out war here. To look at what we were saying to each other, I guided everyone through a look at these primary source documents (just look at pages 3-6, with the questions on page 6 being what we filled out in class):

Google Drive: Cuban Missile Crisis Primary Source Documents

This looked at the deal we worked out with the USSR to end the crisis: we agreed to not invade Cuba (and none of our allies would, either) and also to secretly take our (or really, NATO) missiles out of Turkey, in exchange for the USSR agreeing to not invade Turkey and also to take their missiles out of Cuba.

The Space Race: Finally, we put it all together and learned about the background to the Space Race - how the USSR launched the first satellite, first dog, first man, first woman, first orbit, first spacewalk, etc, and how the US struggled to catch up at first, then eventually landed men on the moon, beating everyone to do it. Here was the PowerPoint (I apologize that some of the slides are a bit chaotic online with all the animations) I went through in class:

Google Drive: The Space Race and Cuban Missile Crisis PowerPoint

I know I went REALLY fast through this, and I apologize for that. It is important to me that everyone understands the content - I'm glad the blog is a resource for everyone to check in and read the recap!

To end class, I showed this video about the Space Race, which had a somewhat humorous look at what happened, with a good soundtrack:

History.com - The Space Race Video

Whew! And there you have it! A whole lot of content in one day. Thank you for your focus and effort in following along! Next class, we are going to talk about Vietnam, then we will get into the final project for the unit! Have a great weekend!

Cold War America, Day 6 - Class Recap

This is me hugging my mom after she won an election for Portland City Council in 2008. My mom is my role model, for sure. She not only provided for us every day, but she was (and is) very politically active! She used to be a nurse every other weekend, as well!

Hi everyone,

The start of a new week! Did you know that there are only 11 A days left before finals? I feel a bit overwhelmed with how much I want to cover in that time! Here's what happened today:

Learning Targets:
SS.HS.KN.ALT.09: I can identify how technological knowledge and innovation shapes a society, place, or region.
SS.HS.KN.ALT.17: I can explain the process of change and continuity in a society, place or region.
SS.HS.KN.ALT.23: I can describe the influences, impacts and resolutions of historical conflicts.

Soundtrack: “I've Got You Under My Skin" by Frank Sinatra. Selected because it is from the 1950s (1956). Lyrics here.

AGENDA 5/6/14:
News Brief
Women of the 1950s
Housewives
LIFE Magazines

Homework: Read the blog! Next news brief: Mahita.

News Brief: Eli had the news brief and chose this article to bring in: CNN.com - Climate change is here and action needed now, new White House report says. I referenced this last class - isn't it at the very least possible that in 40 years, people will look back and think how foolish we were as a society for largely ignoring this problem? Thanks, Eli!

Women of the 1950s: Today was chiefly concerned with the role of women in the United States during the 1950s. I began by asking for some brainstorming on two questions: What do you know about women in the 1950s? How does that role impact us today?

During the results of that, I mentioned that the sizes of mirrors in bathrooms tend to be different for women (larger/full body) vs. men (smaller/just face). Why is that?

Next, I passed out a class set of these documents (pages 3-7) to read over:

Stanford.edu - Women in the 1950s Primary Sources

The general questions that I wanted everyone to answer (just to ensure that you were getting the point of the readings) were:

1. Were housewives happy with their lives?
2. Were women in the 1950s just staying at home?
3. Documents A and B say women were staying at home; but Documents C and D say that women were politically involved and even working. Who should we believe?
4. Do you think African American, Latino, Asian American, and other women of color had similar experiences to those depicted in these documents?

We had a brief class discussion about this, then moved on.

Housewives: This was a nine minute video explaining a bit more about what the "Feminine Mystique" was (a quote from the book of the same name was included in the readings). If you missed class, or wanted to see it again, here it is: PBS.org - 1950 Housewives.

LIFE Magazines: The rest of class was spent doing some historical research in class, using actual magazines from the 1950s and early 1960s! I loved this so much! Here is the partner worksheet I passed out in class:

Google Drive - LIFE 1950s Magazines Partner Analysis Worksheet

Needless to say, there were some GREAT examples of gender roles in the magazines, which I was able to borrow from the library - I'm glad everyone was so careful with them! It was so interesting to see what everyone found! I hope that it was as interesting for you as it was for me. History is so great! Next class, we will move on into the 1960s and the Space Race a bit more.

Cold War America, Day 5 - Class Recap

Some of the "survival crackers" in the Western Oregon University fallout shelter. Note the date - 1964. There were a TON of these in the shelter. I took this picture in 2007.

Dear class,

I'm not sure about you, but I felt like this week was extra tiring, for some reason. I fell asleep at my desk at home last night! I was glad that we were able to finish strong today with an interesting documentary. Here's what happened:

Learning Targets:
SS.HS.KN.ALT.09: I can identify how technological knowledge and innovation shapes a society, place, or region.
SS.HS.KN.ALT.17: I can explain the process of change and continuity in a society, place or region.
SS.HS.KN.ALT.23: I can describe the influences, impacts and resolutions of historical conflicts.

Soundtrack: “Each Day Gets Better" by John Legend. Because of many different elements of getting better: the weather, your work, and hopefully the class and my job as a teacher! Lyrics here.

AGENDA 5/2/14:
News Brief
Review Class Feedback
Finish Atomic Cafe

Discuss

Homework: Read the blog! Next news brief: Eli.

News Brief: Robin had the news brief today and chose this article to talk about: CNN.com - 'Complete destruction': 2 die, dozens hurt as explosion shatters Florida jail. We wondered in class if this was at all related to the huge amount of rain on the East Coast this past week. Some pretty crazy weather, with a 90 degree day here on the First of May, too!

Review Class Feedback: It was great to go over this with everyone! Here were the questions I asked students to anonymously respond to:

1. What do you like about this class and what is this class good at?
2. What does the class need to improve on?
3. What do you like about Mr. Fritz as a teacher?
4. What can Mr. Fritz get better at?
5. How is Mr. Fritz doing at communicating and assessing learning targets for proficiency grading?

Here's what your feedback looked like:

Google Drive: Period 3 Class Feedback PowerPoint Presentation

As usual, this was a mix of funny and serious responses. My takeaway is that we like discussions, know that phones need to be put away way more, that my energy is good, and that I could probably go slower and explain a bit more from time to time. Thanks for the feedback, everyone!

Finish Atomic Cafe: I passed out a more general sheet of questions to respond to for the second half of the movie, which can be found here:

Google Drive: Atomic Cafe Part II Questions

Here is the film to watch again, if you were interested or missed class (we started at about 35:00 in and finished it in class):

Discuss: At the end of class, we had a few minutes to go over different responses. I really liked hearing your suggestions for activities that we do today that might seem crazy or silly in 40 years. History is so interesting!

Have a wonderful weekend, everyone!