Lambs to Lions

It is not just my students that suffer from the lack of knowledge.  I’m sure most adults would not even know this much.  Very few people would realize that Sudan is in the wrong place.

As I was working on my “Where in the World” country profiles I came across the following in a BBC country profile for Japan: “Japan’s relations with its neighbors are still heavily influenced by the legacy of Japanese actions before and during World War II. Japan has found it difficult to accept and atone for its treatment of the citizens of countries it occupied.”

This reminded me of a story from Character Counts (the same place that I found the article “Menschidictorian”):

There once was a little boy who had a bad temper. His father gave him a bag of nails and told him that every time he lost his temper, he must hammer a nail into the back of the fence. The first day the boy had driven 37 nails into the fence. Over the next few weeks, as he learned to control his anger, the number of nails hammered daily gradually dwindled down. He discovered it was easier to hold his temper than to drive those nails into the fence.

Finally the day came when the boy didn’t lose his temper at all. He told his father about it and the father suggested that the boy now pull out one nail for each day that he was able to hold his temper. The days passed and the young boy was finally able to tell his father that all the nails were gone.

The father took his son by the hand and led him to the fence. He said, “You have done well, my son, but look at the holes in the fence. The fence will never be the same. When you say things in anger, they leave a scar just like this one. You can put a knife in a man and draw it out. It won’t matter how many times you say I’m sorry, the wound is still there.

 This story not only applies to countries, but to people.  We live in a time when some believe that they can do and say the meanest things possible and that they should be forgiven if they speak the word, “Sorry”.

The process of building my first unit called Social Studies Workshop is going along fairly well.  I have  been working on a new expectation for the memorization of countries adding in “Where in the World” activities for those countries in the news (one of my favorites is Ghana which I added because of the world cup and its preoccupation with coffins).  I forget how much work all this stuff is to create, but luckily I just plug away at the kitchen table while drinking coffee. 

The workshop focus is one economics, geography, basic social studies vocabulary and South Africa (for the emotional factor is history).  My goal is to be done in less than 9 weeks so that I can move into my other areas.  For those of you that know me realize that a timetable is not always good with my teaching.

At the Armstrong Retreat, one of the new Armstrong teachers used this little tool.  It was EXACTLY what I have been wanting in my classroom.  I would also like theme music when I enter the classroom, but I’m working on that little problem also.

Brian Nash and Austin Hepp (former Tecumseh counselor) created a senior thesis project called Foundations of History–http://www.foundationsofhistory.org/.  It stars a lot of teachers from Hamilton Southeastern.

Okay so after an unfulfilling year of teaching where I felt my focus was off, my focus is back.  I’ve made some changes.  First, I restructured my year into four major sections: (1) Social Studies Workshop — a skill building unit revolving around economics and South Africa, (2) Ancient Civilizations and What They Leave Behind, (3) The World in 1800 — Imperialism, and (4) The More Modern World.  I have taken the state standard and divided up everything into these four categories.

The next change involves my interactive notebook.  I’m going to four notebooks–there are some procedural changes that align a bit more with Dave Broviak. 

Next, I’m working on bringing a more visual and dynamic presentation into my class through video.  In Laurel Schmidt’s book she called it advertising your class.  So I’m working on building previews of my class–a lot of fun, but a ton of work.

Lastly, comes the part where I have accepted that my teaching style does not lend itself to the demands of testing, coverage, and common assessments.   I choose my students over the test.  I have created my own comprehension element that I will discuss later on; if it is good enough for the best prep schools in the country, it is good enough for my students.

Inspiration many times leads to perspiration.  After spending the weekend with some terrific teachers at Indiana University’s Armstrong Fellowship, I feel the need to become better.  After 13 years of teaching and having some measure of success, I feel that this is a year of transition.  This transition will involve all new lessons, new approaches, self-reflection (aka this blog), and hopefully an impact on my students’ learning.  I will offer more details after my softball tournament this weekend.