World War I, Day 1 - Class Recap

Your anonymous feedback for what you like about this class! :-) 

Hello everyone,

Welcome to a new week and a new unit to study! Today, we started looking at World War I and making connections to what we have already learned about as far as imperialism in Rwanda, the Holocaust and the rise of Hitler, and everything else we have talked about. Here's what happened today:

Learning Targets:
Critical Thinking and Analysis LT 2: I can explain connections between events, issues, problems, and concepts.
Knowledge LT 20: I can explain the impacts of nationalism and revolutionary movements.

Soundtrack: "Eleanor Put Your Boots On" by Franz Ferdinand. Selected for today because of the band name connection to the start of World War I. Lyrics here.

AGENDA 2/3/15:
News Brief - Jacki
Review Class Feedback
Ominous Beginnings PowerPoint
Murder of the Archduke

Homework: Read the blog! Finish the reading questions if you did not in class. Next news brief: Maddy and Jacki.

News Brief: Jacki had the news brief today, but was not here at the start of class, so I filled in and selected this article to talk about: CNN.com - Japan: 'We will never, never forgive' ISIS for apparent beheading. We talked about this as another very tragic story involving ISIS. We also talked a bit about the Super Bowl and what we did over the weekend. Finally, we watched VICE News for the day.

Maddy (volunteered) and Jacki (making it up) was selected to do the next news brief.

Review Class Feedback: Before this, I wanted to talk a little more about how that Socratic Seminar last class went, so I asked for a few thoughts from students. I know it was challenging to do - I am hoping that we can try it more, later in the year! I like it when students get to process information and think for yourselves, instead of me just telling you all of this information.

After that, we looked at the anonymous feedback that students gave me about how the class was going, and how I am doing as a teacher. Here it is again if you want to check it out:

Google Drive - Period 2 January Class Feedback

Some observations:

1) It looks like students feel like the class is fun and we enjoy what we learn about!

2) The class knows it could get better at being on time and focus.

3) You like that I am good at being fun and enthusiastic.

4) However, some students feel like I could do a better job of explaining and with notes (if anything at all).

Ominous Beginnings PowerPoint: I went over the definition of "ominous" and used the example of music in a scary movie: you know something bad is about to happen. The rest of the PowerPoint was about the M.A.I.N. causes of World War I. The class took Cornell Notes on each slide - which will come in handy at the end of this unit. Please review the presentation if you missed class, or did not have enough time to finish up your notes:

Google Docs - World War I: Ominous Beginnings PowerPoint

Thank you so much for your focus during this part of class! You all seemed to really be getting what I was talking about, which is great to see.

Murder of the Archduke: I passed this document around, and we used popcorn reading to have the class read it aloud - Borijove Jevtic: The Murder of Archduke Franz Ferdinand at Sarajevo, 28 June 1914. This is the story of how World War I started. I had the class answer the analysis questions at the end, as well. It is such an important event in history - all set up by the MAIN causes of World War I.

This was what we ended class with! Thank you for your participation and focus today! :-)