Before I dig into the areas I plan on working on for future practice, I want to quickly review the outcomes of each unit’s inquiry and the lessons I learned from each unit. I will then take those lessons and discuss specific ways I want to change my future practice.
My Oppression/Advocacy Unit taught me that creativity is an excellent and approachable way to engage students. Giving students the opportunity to express themselves around a topic of injustice will engross students quickly and will hold their attention. However in order to make this unit more academically rigorous better essential questions are needed, and there needs to be more work with examples of cyclical history around these areas of injustice. I made the mistake of working too quickly through the patterns and students would have had the chance to absorb more if I slowed down the lessons. |
The Greed Unit taught me that what I really want to talk about with students is not always what is best for them. I choose a very theoretical article to read and instead of spending time discussing where we see imperialism today, I spent the entire discussion helping students understand what the author was saying. If I had brought in a social justice element, Picower writes that students will be more likely to engage and connect on a personal level. (Picower, “Using Their Words: Six Elements of Social Justice Curriculum Design for the Elementary Classroom”)
My Crisis of Capitalism Unit taught me that talking about themes is a great way to help students see cyclical patterns in history. Taking historical themes and applying them to modern day connects students to the past but it is important to ground those connections in facts and not just student accounts. If I had changed the Spoken Word assignment to require students to talk about the Harlem Renaissance in addition to writing about a theme from the Harlem Renaissance in their lives, it would have been intellectually more challenging and helped students to connect the past and present better.
The WWII Unit taught me that students do not have to only be creative in order to make meaningful connections between the past and present. Responding to the Thompson letter had students working on an academic assignment while still understanding and pointing out the
Click on the links below to see how I would address the three main problems I see in my practice and what specific tools and tactics I will use inf future practice to try to fix some of those problems.
My Crisis of Capitalism Unit taught me that talking about themes is a great way to help students see cyclical patterns in history. Taking historical themes and applying them to modern day connects students to the past but it is important to ground those connections in facts and not just student accounts. If I had changed the Spoken Word assignment to require students to talk about the Harlem Renaissance in addition to writing about a theme from the Harlem Renaissance in their lives, it would have been intellectually more challenging and helped students to connect the past and present better.
The WWII Unit taught me that students do not have to only be creative in order to make meaningful connections between the past and present. Responding to the Thompson letter had students working on an academic assignment while still understanding and pointing out the
Click on the links below to see how I would address the three main problems I see in my practice and what specific tools and tactics I will use inf future practice to try to fix some of those problems.
Personals connection are not enough |
Juxtapose historical and current events |
Social Justice needs to play a larger role |