Period 2: Turmoil in the Middle East, Day 16 - Class Recap

Peter's really amazing wallpaper that was his creative product! Formatted for screen resolution 1280x800, I believe. Seriously incredible! Click to view full size, then right click on the image and select "set as desktop background" and presto! :-)
Good afternoon class,

This was another really productive day of presentations and talking a little bit about the final paper for the entire year! Thank you for the good focus and attention, for the most part. You guys are sort of a bouncy group, but all in all, really fun to work with. I hope you enjoyed class as much as I did! On to the recap:

Essential Questions: In what ways are cultures and countries interconnected? How can the Middle East be stabilized?

Soundtrack: "Let Love In" by Goo Goo Dolls. Lyrics here. Really an excellent song. It can also definitely be related to the conflicts that we are studying!

AGENDA 5/14/09:
News Brief
Student Presentations
Final Paper Folders

Homework: Decide on what topic you want to do, bring a source to take notes on next class. Read blog recap!

This will be talked about a little more in "The Final" section. Basically, I want you to decide on what you want to investigate for your final paper, and bring one source in (like a news article, book, magazine, etc) that relates to your topic and that you can take notes on. We will help you do this in class! All I need for you to do is to pick a topic, and choose something to take notes on about.

For anyone that was not in class today, or that has lost (already) the assignment sheet, here it is to download:

Historical Investigation Research Project - Overview
Again, we will be talking about this much more. In fact, for the rest of the year, this is what we will be doing. As I noted in class, I am thinking that we will have about half the time devoted to a new unit, and the other half to developing this paper.

News Brief: We have really been struggling to find things to talk about recently! The two things that I took note of were:

The recent plane crash in Buffalo, which Amy mentioned, is something to really be interested in. A lot of things had to go wrong for that to happen. Source: ABCnews.com - Buffalo Crash: 'A Recipe for an Accident'. Basically, the pilots were sleep deprived, inadequately experienced, paid very little, and the icy conditions outside made it all come to a head. Really a sad story. Pilots do not get nearly enough credit for what they do.

Also, someone mentioned this story, about a police officer kicking a suspect in the head, while they were on the ground, then high-fiving his partner: LATimes.com - Experts say El Monte police officer's kick was unjustified. Bad times.

Yesenia brought finished this section of the class up with this article: CNN.com - Former Mexican president calls for legalizing marijuana. This is a pretty interesting take on the whole "war on drugs" issue. Someone else in class noted that some people are proposing to legalize marijuana in California and tax it, in order to help with the state's finances. A really interesting report on that was recently done by TIME Magazine, here: TIME.com - Can Marijuana Help Rescue California's Economy?

Breanna, please remember to bring a current news story about anything currently happening outside the United States, for next class on Monday. Thanks!

Student Presentations: These were pretty fun, again! Thank you to those who really put a lot of time and effort into creating something. I really respect your hard work! After everyone was finished, we turned in the following items, which I need from everyone ASAP if you did not turn it in today:

- Completed Skills Packet (which contained the Blazers recap and debates).
- Presentation Notes (for other students).
- Explanation Paper for your creative product AND
- Creative product, if it is something that can be handed in (like lines for a skit, or a PowerPoint, or a poster, etc). Again, I cannot grade your creative products without the explanation paper, so please get both in to me!

I hope that everyone enjoyed these presentations, and possibly learned a thing or two about interconnectedness as well. It was fantastic for me to be able to see you demonstrate your knowledge about the Israeli-Palestinian conflict!

Final Paper Folders: As I think I said in class, this "historical investigation" project is one that every freshman at Westview is working on, as part of the common assessment for Social Studies. If you remember, the first semester version of this was the visual metaphor. Thus, this is a really big deal!

I talked about Mrs. DeFrance's really amazing folder system for helping you write papers. Seriously, if I had this in high school, I think I would have written 10 page long papers with ease. It is really a pretty incredible way to keep track of everything. Please keep everything in that folder - including all the sheets of paper tucked inside!

I linked to the final paper assignment sheet above. We read that together in class, as I tried as best as I could to introduce this as something that you do not have to stress out about. Make it interesting to you! After reading everything together, we started brainstorming ideas for "issues of global significance" on the board. Here is a picture of what we came up with, to help you out if you need it:


Pick one of these, or any other issue for your homework, and bring in something to start you off on the project on Monday! I want you to be excited at finding out information about the world, that you may not have really had the chance to learn about in class this year!

Put it this way, there are entire college courses devoted to just these topics. In fact, I was in one last year at Western Oregon University! It was called History 492: World Problems. I ended up writing a 10 page paper on the search for Osama bin Laden. It was a really interesting class!

If you are still totally unsure about what to do, try a Google search for "world problems" or "globalization" or something along those lines. If none of that sounds interesting at all, come talk to me and I am sure we can get you started. :-)
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Other news of interest: Brandon Roy was selected to the All-NBA Second Team! This is a really huge honor! The first time a Blazer has made All-NBA since Clyde Drexler in 1992. Source: BlazersEdge.com. Brandon Roy is simply incredible. What a guy.

The Office Season Five finale is tonight (Thursday)! It is totally worth checking out, even if you have never seen it. The fun starts at 9:00 PM, on NBC (Channel 8 for most of you). The Office is my favorite television show of all time. I am really quite sad that the season will be over and we will have to wait until the fall for a new episode! Every year this happens, and there is a huge cliffhanger, and it just kills me.

There is a TON of sporting action going on. I am sure that Westview's spring sports are all worth checking out. Add to that two Game Sevens in the NHL, the Lakers-Rockets and Celtics-Magic series in the NBA (both Game Sixes), and Major League Baseball, all tonight. Wow. It is a great time to be a sports fan!

Tomorrow, I will be playing hoops during second lunch in the gym. Come sign up on the sheet in N116 if you want to play! I am excited about it!

With that, I think I will sign off! I hope everyone is doing well! Have a wonderful weekend! Keep in touch and keep working hard on everything we are doing!