Wednesday, October 24, 2018

Native Americans, Day 9 - Class Recap


Looking out over modern day Astoria, which is where the Columbia River meets the Pacific Ocean.

Hi everyone,

Today was our first open walled class of the year, as we prepared to start the Documents Based Question next class with Mr. Puterbaugh. Here's what we did today in class:

Learning Targets Addressed: 
Behavior LT 2: I can manage my responsibilities as a student.
Critical Thinking LT 5: I can justify and support arguments or interpretation with appropriate evidence.
Communication LT 1: I can communicate effectively, both verbally and in writing.
Knowledge LT 16: I can explain the process of change and continuity in a society, place, or region.

Soundtrack: "Coyotes" by Don Edwards. Selected for today because the song is about the loss of culture, people, and a way of life as connected to the West. Lyrics here.

AGENDA 10/24/18:
News Brief - Logan
Chief Joseph Questions

Prep for DBQ
Reservations/Assimilation

Homework: Read the blog. Turn in all missing work ASAP. Bring your Chromebook fully charged next class! The next news brief is assigned to: Josiah.

News Brief: Today's news brief was brought in by Logan, who selected an article about this story: BBC.com - Man starts California flat fire 'by burning spider'. We discussed this story for a bit and then moved on.

We also checked in briefly to see if anyone was up to anything interesting or fun outside of class.

Josiah was selected to do the next news brief.

As part of the news brief, we also watched the one minute BBC World News update. Here's the link to see the latest one minute update, at any time of day (it will probably be different from what we watched in class):


Chief Joseph Questions: Last class, we watched clips from the Ken Burns documentary "The West: Episode 6 - Fight No More Forever" (available on YouTube here - queued to start at the main segment we watched). The lesson we followed (roughly) is available on the supplemental materials to the documentary, here (just Activity I). As we watched the film, we paused to have discussions based on the questions posed. I also had students answer these questions as we watched:


After the film, I showed this map, which will be related to a question on the DBQ (Documents Based Question) that students will be completing, starting on Friday:


Today in class, we went over the questions from the film and continued to talk about war vs. nonviolent action.

Prep for DBQ: The rest of class was spent looking at the list of possible sources to use for the DBQ from our unit on Native American issues in both American Studies and Lit/Comp 10. Here are the resources that you should come prepared with and ready to potentially use on Friday:

American Studies
Lit/Comp 10
Cultural Appropriation Notes
Sherman Alexie’s “Indian Education”
“30 Days on an Indian Reservation” Episode
Issues/Evidence
Sherman Alexie’s “Imagining the
Reservation”
Early Expansion Notes
Montana 1948, Larry Watson
Native American and US Government Events

Broken Treaties Notes

Native American Forced Assimilation
notes and sources (Grand Ronde letter)

Chief Joseph Notes


To start, we had students get out all of their notes and work from the Native American units in both Lit and Comp and American Studies (listed above).

Reservations/Assimilation: The next part of class was spent looking at the two major topics/questions that will come up in the DBQ: the impact and context regarding Native American reservations and assimilation.

To begin with this, we brainstormed issues that came up in our study in regards to reservations (your "30 Days" documentary notes were especially helpful here). We chose four to look at in depth as the "most important" in terms of understanding the topic, then had the other side of the room brainstorm issues that came up in our study of Native American assimilation. The top four issues from that conversation were selected, then we assigned small groups to look into the issues in depth and to try and add any details and notes that they could about a particular issue.

Here are the notes that we took down together (it is important that students have these notes ready to use on the DBQ next class):


Once the groups broke down the issues into smaller parts, we asked someone to write down on butcher paper for the class as to what they decided on were the key points to take away. These are the pictures of the different posters around the room, to help (green posters are for issues related to reservations, white posters are for issues related to assimilation):









This was it for the day. Next class, we will do some final review and prep, and begin the Documents Based Question! Thanks for a fun class today, everyone! See you on Friday!

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