Thursday, March 21, 2019

Historical Investigation/Cold War, Day 2 - Class Recap


The Great Wall of China! I will be traveling to China over Spring Break with my wife and visiting Hong Kong, Shanghai, and Yunnan Province. Photo taken in 2014.

Dear class,

Welcome to your Spring Break! We started the major assignment of the semester today in class, but don't worry - I'm not asking everyone to do much aside from think about it a little. Here's what happened in class today:

Learning Targets Addressed:
Knowledge LT 8: I can identify how technological knowledge and innovation shapes a society, place, or region.
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.
Research LT 1: I can effectively conduct and apply research.

Soundtrack: "Red Eyes" by The War on Drugs. Selected for today because of the "red dot" activity we did in class, simulating the red scare of people fearful of Communism. Lyrics here.

AGENDA 3/21/19:
News Brief - Dahson
Spring Break
Red Dot
Historical Investigation

Homework: Read the blog! Continue to think of what you want to do for your Historical Investigation! Next news brief: Mr. Fritz.

News Brief/Spring Break: Dahson had the news brief today and selected an article about this story to talk about: NBCNews.com - National Guard called into Houston after chemical fire, residents told to stay inside. After discussing the story, we also checked in to see if anyone was up to anything interesting or fun outside of class over the break. I will be going to China! Here's the map of where we are going.

I was assigned 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):


Red Dot: The activity in today's class was a simulation of the "red scare" of McCarthyism in the 1950s. Here's the PowerPoint we went through:


I hope everyone enjoyed trying to figure out who was a dot and who was not! After the activity, we debriefed as students were given this sheet for notes on the House Un-American Activities Committee:


We will continue looking at the Cold War and the fear of Communism in the weeks after Spring Break, in both American Studies and Lit and Comp.

Historical Investigation: This will be the major assignment of the semester, which will involve quite a lot of research time inside and outside of class. Here's the assignment overview:


We went through this together in class. The first step is to choose a research topic that has to do with a time of mass hysteria in the United States. There are a range of examples on page 2 of the document. When we get back after Spring Break, I will ask students to turn in part A on the Wednesday we meet (so, you will also have the Monday we get back to work on this, if you don't want to think much about it over the break).

Here's the calendar for the next month and what we will be doing - be aware that this is subject to change and revision!


For the rest of class, I asked students to start researching and thinking of topics that might be interesting. If students want to try and complete Part A already, great! I will give an example of what it could look like when we get back from break.

Have a restful and wonderful Spring Break, everyone! I'm looking forward to seeing you in April!

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