Monday Mar 31st

from guest blogger Joyce


Monday, March 31

Before starting work today, we discussed various deadlines for our group projects.

All our individual work, such as the separate summaries along with the questions.

Note that the group posters should be completely ready to be presented as well.

Also, students should remember to print out the comparison chart and diagram.

(Never mind that those papers should have been printed out days ago)

After establishing the deadlines, students were free to work all period.

REMINDER: Mr. Gillis should have a copy of the questions for each group

--

Joyce

I made a checklist sheet for this project as a reminder of items both individuals and groups should complete. ( get checklist here )

Friday March 28th

From guest blogger Joyce

Friday, March 28

Today in class was another work day. The projects should be far along, and in a state so that they can be completed on Monday. Students to remember to print out the comparative chart and the Venn Diagram (which was technically supposed to be printed out two days ago, but we learned through our project that deadlines mean absolutely nothing to some people. But yay, teamwork)

--

Joyce

From Mr Gillis - 

A few things to consider. Most of school is about individual assignments, tests, reports, hw, etc. It's really a "survival of the fittest" "king of the hill" "everyone for themselves" mentality. Unfortunately, this mindset does not prepare students for the requirements of the 21st century work world. Collaboration is an essential skill to all work outside of the traditional classroom. Groups projects always cause anxiety, to the "hyper-intensive control every decision student" to the "whatever, I really don't care student", and yes, every class has both, as well as many versions in between. Adjustments and extensions have been made along the way, to respond to some of the challenges this project has provided. In the end, the way each group navigates the challenges it encounters will serve as experience and "lessons learned" when approaching other projects in school as well as outside the classroom.

Hang in there, do your part, contribute where needed, and support where needed. Leadership is developed in these challenging situations.

Thursday March 27th

Today was a work day. All groups should continue to make progress toward their religion posters as well as their summary questions.

Tomorrow will also be a work day. Posters need to be finished, group questions should be submitted, comparative chart should be printed and brought to class ( here ), as well as the Venn Diagram ( here )

Wednesday March 26th

Today was a work day. Many students need to remember to keep their group responsibility and bring their required materials.

Tomorrow (Thursday) students will once again have access to the Chromebooks in case their are still summaries/questions/images that need to be completed.

Students should bring to class tomorrow the Comparative Religion chart ( here )
also the Venn Diagram Chart ( here )

Lastly, each groups questions and answers should be compiled onto a single page(s). Questions on one page, answers on another.

Tuesday Mar 25th

From guest student blogger Joyce….

Tuesday, March 25

Today in class, we began to work on the religion posters. Those who had actually done their work from the night before, summarizing their sections, collaborating creatively with their group, communicating to learn more about the different cultural aspects in order to become better global citizens (totally.) while also thinking very critically about those who didn't do their work (Yes). Tomorrow will also be spent working on our posters as well.

--

Joyce

Monday Part 2 from student blogger Joyce

Monday, March 24

We productively spent our time in class (or more accurately, the computer lab,) working on our religion projects. Zero period was especially full of sunshine, love, understanding, and cooperation that yielded wonderful results. (Hint: Do your work. We still expect high quality work even if you were one of the brilliant people who just whined all period, and that strenuous exercise of your mouth rendered you incapable of typing, that's entirely your problem.) The website links to use (use BBC first) are posted on the class website. Tomorrow will be an in class day to compile and organize the posters.
--

Joyce

Beautifully put Joyce, bravo! (Mr G)

Monday Mar 24th

Today marks day 1 of the Comparative Religion project. Students will spend the day in the iMac lab gathering their assigned information summaries and creating questions regarding their groups assigned religion.
Tuesday will be spent in class assembling their summaries into categories to be placed on their poster. Each poster will be adorned with images of various aspects of the faith, to include the symbol used by followers of the faith placed in the middle of the poster.
Each student should be ready to contribute to their teams poster in some way.

Here is the directions link for Day 1 - ( directions link )

Friday March 21st

Today was a class period spent assigning students to their comparative religion project groups.

Each student was assigned to either Islam, Christianity, or Judaism. The groups assembled and assigned the categories of their project to individual student members.

Each student will be responsible to write a summary about their assigned category, by accessing the website link provided by Mr Gillis.

 Islam link ( here )
 Christianity link ( here )
 Judaism link ( here )

Thursday March 20th

Today we returned and went over the results from the Chapter 23 Test. Hari Krishna was the first student to receive a perfect score on the test, and set the curve.

Way to go Hari

Wednesday March 19th

Today we took the test on Chapter 23

Tuesday March 18th

Tuesday, March 18

Class was spent playing a Jeopardy study game (or "expressing oneself by drawing smiley faces next to the points chart") in order to prepare for the test tomorrow. All members of the winning team will receive 5 points on the test tomorrow (YES). Remember that the work for this section is due tomorrow, on the day of the quiz.

Herei s the link to the jeopardy game in PowerPoint (click here)

Here it is as a pdf - (click here)

--

Joyce

Monday March 17th

Monday, March 17
Happy St Patrick's Day

Today in class, zero period finally realized the greatness of the generation gap when Mr. Gillis decided to play his favorite songs, "classics", (from such artists as the Little River Band, the Eagles, Hall and Oats, Men at Work, etc) instead of the usual Disney music. We also worked very diligently on the work left, both textbook pages and pdfs in preparation for the test on Wednesday. Horrible children who have not been turning their work in should remember to check the PIV for what they are missing. Tomorrow may be an in class Jeopardy study game in order to prep for the Wednesday test.

Happy Monday. 

Friday March 14th

Today we continued on the Middle East presentation taking the class up to the ending of WWII, and the Partitioning of Palestine into a 2 state area (1 for the Jews people and 1 for the Arab Palestinians).

here is a link to the presentation ( get it here )

Thursday March 13th

Thursday, March 13

In history today, Susan B. Anthony died, Uranus was discovered, and Arab nations decided to end the oil embargo against the United States. In history class, we learned more about the Post WW1 Middle East situation in our presentation, banana seats, and sissy bars. The remainder of the period was spent working on the homework for tonight, page 487 #1-6, and some catch up work (such as the Balfour Agreement SOAPST).

--

Joyce

Wednesday March 12th

Today in class we used the new chromebooks to take the student climate survey. The survey took half of the period and when we were finished, we returned to the Middle East history presentation and got through the Faisal-Weizmann Agreement - full text of the agreement can be found here - ( agreement here )

Tuesday March 11th

Tuesday, March 11

Class started off today with a two short clips on an interview with Kimberly Marten, a professor who explained the current Crimea situation on the Daily Show (which can be viewed here). Afterwards, we spent the remainder of the period working on our Middle East summaries and timeline, picking Disney music, finishing the textbook homework from the night before, listening to Disney music, working on the Balfour Agreement SOAPST, and singing to Disney. The homework for tonight is textbook p 481 #1-5.

--

Joyce

Monday March 10th

Today was spent reviewing information about the two summary questions and the timeline that are due by Wednesday. We went over the CLAIM, EVIDENCE, and SUPPORT process that is used to build a foundation for your summary question answers.

Friday March 7th

Today, Friday March 7th -

The class was filled with info today. We introduced the Balfour Agreement  including a background summary ( get the summary here ), as well as the actual text of the agreement - ( get text here ).

In addition to those texts, we introduced the UN Mandate on the area -( get Mandate here )

Next, we watched a short informative video about the region's history - ( watch video here )

Lastly, students began the process of writing their summaries and timeline for the objectives - ( get Objectives here )

Thursday March 6th

Today was a continuation of the previous days activities analyzing the articles related to Damascus Protocol.
In addition, we watched a historical summary animation/video of the challenges and conflicts of the Middle East regarding The Jews of Israel and the Palestinians of Palestine.

We also covered the Sykes-Picot agreement and identified on a Middle East Map the way the French and English divided the region into several parts.

Tomorrow will be used to go over the Balfour Agreement ( a promise to establish a home land for the Jews in Palestine) as well as the UN Mandate addressing the 2 State Solution which had been proposed before.

Wednesday March 5th

Today was the (not so) happy anniversary of the Boston Massacre, Churchill's "Iron wall" speech, and the death day of Joseph Stalin. Today in class, however, was a joy filled day of educational enlightenment from the second our dedicated students walked out of the grey world and into the smiling, cheery fluorescent lights that shone over the desks (like how the sun should have been doing over the world, but wasn't because we wake up at some strange hour in the morning that even the sun is a stranger to). We worked together on the worksheets that we printed out for homework, and answered the first set of questions together. The remainder of the papers and questions should be completed as homework.

-- 

Joyce

Today was spent introducing the class to the various political and economic factors in place within the Ottoman Empire upon its entrance into WWI. The role of the Arab people within the Ottoman Empire to its eventual defeated was established.

Students analyzed documents regarding the decisions behind the Damascus Protocol, as well as the agreement between Great Britain and the Sharif of Mecca to collaborate on the defeat of the Ottoman's in return for an Independent Arab State.

Tomorrow will be a continuation of these documents as well as the Sykes-Picot agreement in regards to the land previously promised for an independent Arab State.

Here were the docs reviewed today - (Damascus Protocol), ( Ottoman Empire Map )

Tuesday March 4th

From guest Blogger Joyce

March 4, Tuesday

Today in history, the Constitution was put into effect, Vivaldi was born, Charlie Chaplin was knighted, and New York schools banned whipping students. In class, we corrected our tests from yesterday (and also corrected the key). Afterwards, we listened to a lovely song rewritten just for Sun, sang by our virtuosic  Mr. Gillis from the bottom of his heart. The central message moved us into silence, at a loss for words (or maybe it was the comebacks that did that.)

We also started on a presentation about the situation in the Middle East, which will be continued tomorrow with the papers that we all have most definitely printed out as part of the homework yesterday.

 

--

Joyce

Monday March 3rd Chapter 21 Test

Today, March 3rd -

The Chapter 21 test was today, and all seemed to go rather well (no complaining that the test was too difficult)

For tonight, please print out and bring to class tomorrow these two items
Damascus Protocol
as well as
(Ottoman Empire Map)