Author: molersmusings

December, so far, has been the longest month ever. In my past 11 years of teaching, I can count on one hand how many times I’ve missed school. This year, this semester, I have missed 15 days, A combination of sick, personal, and professional.

Since Thanksgiving it’s been a multitude of issues – flu, covid, pink eye, other random viruses, the axle broke on my car during rush hour, and a death in the family. I finally got around to getting a Christmas tree – the $2.99, tabletop special from Kroger.

Chances are it will go without lights, but we’ll put some ornaments on it. However, that tree seems pretty symbolic of my December…so far.

Now, back to school. This week my goal was to finish the Constitution unit. I had two more remaining items – popular sovereignty and federalism. I was hoping to try some new things with these topics, but that wasn’t the case. I decided to stick with what I knew, and what I had available. As a result, we go through popular sovereignty, federalism, and did a review for the Constitution unit.

By the end of the week, I gave my Constitution citizenship test again. I asked the same 10 questions I asked three week ago. I like to take the first results and compare them to the second, or last, results after the students learned basic principles of government within the Constitution.

Due to some of my absences, I offered different challenges for students with the Citizenship test. I made a fil in the blank version with Quizizz and a multiple choice version. The results were great considering I felt like I did a poor job with this unit.

Monday – Popular Sovereignty CyberSandwich, Fast and Curious

Tuesday – Federalism Mystery Box Sketch and Tell, Federalism Notes

Wednesday – Resource Rumble Review

Thursday – Branches of Government Breakout, Citizenship Test (version 1, version 2)

Friday – Gimkit Reviews

Monday

Popular sovereignty was up first this week. The goal for this lesson is to have students understand the idea of popular sovereignty, and to have students identify the idea of popular sovereignty in the words of founding documents. I began class with a Quizizz that had students show their understanding of the definition for popular sovereignty and examples of popular sovereignty. The class averages were as follows: 45%, 50%, 55%, 47%, 65%. After the quiz finished, I asked all my classes, “What is the commonality among all the questions?” Each class was quick to understand the word ‘people’ in all the questions.

Next, I had a reading about popular sovereignty. I chose to read this article because I like to read to the class. Plus, Story Time with Moler is a crowd favorite. Some students also had the opportunity to watch a video about popular sovereignty. I scaffolded the CyberSandwich with these questions:

1. What is popular sovereignty?
2. List 3 ways popular sovereignty is expressed in a democracy.
3. Include 1 quote from a founding document that shows popular sovereignty.

At the conclusion of the reading, I had students complete a Sketch and Tell for their summary. I think it’s important for them to take this abstract idea and construct it with an image. With their summary writing, I offered these four things to focus on:

1. Define popular sovereignty.
2. One way in which it is expressed today.
3. A quote from a founding document.
4. Concluding sentence

Here are some students examples:

After the CyberSandwich, we took the Quizizz again and the class averages were as follows: 80%, 88%, 93%, 95%, and 98%. This lesson is what I consider to be simple and basic, but it’s pretty powerful and produces consistent results.

Tuesday

The lesson on Federalism is one of my favorites. I set up this lesson as a mystery box lesson. I was hoping to combine the mystery box with a CyberSandwich, but I didn’t have time to set it up this year. In years’ past, however, I have run out of time for the Sketch and Tell portion. As a result, I cut out the Quizizz this year.

Here is the set up:

1. Students come in and I have Oreo’s hidden in a mystery box.
2. I have a guided notes sheet and I go through notes on Federalism.
3. I start off the lesson with a hint to the mystery box: the number 3
4. I go through expressed, concurrent, and reserved powers.
5. At the end of the lesson, I give more hints to the mystery box – stuff, milk, filling, and Sam Porcello.

By the end of the lesson, students usually guess what’s in the box. They completely understand why the Oreo relates to Federalism. Last year, I had students create a picture with the Oreo. This year, some of my classes created pictures with Oreos representing expressed, concurrent, and reserved powers. Other classes I had them use Google shapes. Some classes I trust, some I don’t – it’s that kind of year. Here are some students samples:

Wednesday

Wednesday began with a student asking me, “Moler, can we do something where we get up and move?” I replied, “Yep.” Then I changed my entire lesson plan. I asked the class to give me five minutes as I wrote down eight review questions for a resource rumble.

All of the questions related to branches of government, checks and balances, popular sovereignty, and federalism. Basically, anything on the Citizenship test I was going to give to them again.

I can’t dive into the details, and set up of a resource rumble, but it was a fun time. The students love that review game and I’m glad a students spoke up.

Thursday

Thursday I was away from school for a funeral. So, I left the Citizenship test and a branches of government break out. (The branches of government breakout was a file I purchased on TPT about 7 years ago – therefore I can’t share it. I’m ashamed I admitted that 🤦‍♂️).

When I gave the citizenship test 3 weeks ago, I told the students the goal was to get six or more questions correct. Here are the results from the first time:

1st – 2/18 got six or more correct, 26% class average.

3rd – 0/29 got six or more correct, 24% class average.

5th – 2/24 got six or more correct, 25% class average.

7th – 2/20 got six or more correct, 27% class average.

8th – 3/14 got six or more correct, 34% class average.

After three weeks of lessons involving oreos, sketch and tells, choice boards, CyberSandwiches, and other EduProtocols, here are the final results:

1st – 18/18 got six or more correct, 89% class average.

3rd – 25/29 got six or more correct, 83% class average.

5th – 20/20 got six or more correct, 92% class average.

7th – 16/20 got six or more correct, 81% class average.

8th – 13/14 got six or more correct, 96% class average.

The caveat to this is it’s a combination of fill in the blank and multiple choice quizzes. However, I set up the Quizzes like this:

1. Fill in the blank – students could take this quiz up to two times.
2. Multiple Choice – students could take this quiz once.
3. They could not take both quizzes. I encouraged them to challenge themselves and go for the fill in the blank.

Most students, however, chose the multiple choice test. In fact, 65% of my students chose the multiple choice, while 35% chose to do the fill in the blank.

Friday

Friday, I was out for the funeral again. Last day before winter break – I didn’t know what to do. I created a Friday Check In and put together a Gimkit of all first semester material. A very last minute, cliche thing to do, but I was making this in the hotel lobby at 10:30 PM. Story of my life – constantly finding ways to get things done, barely keeping my head above water. However, I usually manage to find a way.

With that – happy holidays!

This week we continued our unit on the Constitution. I focus on the principles of the Constitution – separation of powers, checks and balances, individual rights, popular sovereignty, federalism, judicial review, and limited government.

This week’s focus was on individual rights and judicial review. I was hoping to get to popular sovereignty, but a calamity day and a sudden switch to remote learning changed my plans.

Overall, it was a good week. Teaching the Bill of Rights is one of my favorite lessons. I try to find ways to help students engage and connect with government.

With my judicial review lesson, I used to have students go through Supreme Court cases. However, I needed a change. I put together a lesson with some EduProtocols. I was able to lead one, 48 minute class through a Fast and Curious (twice), Frayers, and a reading paired with a Thick Slide. The rest of my classes, with my absence, struggled to get through a Fast and Curious and Frayers.

Monday – Bill of Rights lesson

Tuesday – A modified version of a Resource Rumble (EMC2Learning)

Wednesday – Fast and Curious, Frayer, Thick Slide

Thursday – Calamity Day

Friday – Review Gimkit

Monday

On Monday, I began with a Fast and Curious Quizizz with the Bill of Rights. Most people remember the first two amendments, then it goes downhill from there. My Quizizz is ten questions long. The beginning class averages were the following: 45%, 42%, 38%, 25%, and 51%.

Next, I handed out a paper I created using Google Docs – it contained ten empty boxes for students to take notes. I asked the students to number the boxes and they could write notes or draw pictures. Whatever helped them the most. Then I proceed to act out the first ten amendments. I give the students ways to remember the ten amendments. I received from Dave Burgess a long time ago. Here are two examples of what I do:

1. 3rd amendment – I talk about the story Goldilocks and the Three Bears. Goldilocks made herself at home and the 3rd amendment prevents the quartering of soldiers.
2. 6th amendment – I show a clip of a pick six interception by Mike Hilton against the Steelers from the 2021 Bengals season. Then I mention how you need to be speedy to get a pick six. This leads to a fair and speedy trial.

I can’t share the rest of this because it’s Dave’s lesson. This lesson is one of my favorites. It’s engaging, the students laugh, I laugh, and it works. As I’m acting out the amendments, I keep coaching the students and reminding the students how to remember the amendments.

At the conclusion of the lesson, I have the students put away their amendment notes. Then I start of the fast and curious Quizizz again. I listen for the students making connections as the questions come up. For example, 3 bears, no quartering of soldiers, 3rd amendment. The class averages were the following after the lesson: 83%, 83%, 91%, 97%, 100%.

Tuesday

The day after the Bill of Rights lesson, every class begins with that fast and curious Quizizz from the previous day. I gave the students 3-4 minutes to answer the ten questions. The class averages were as follows: 80%, 81%, 85%, 88%, 95%. A slight drop, but still awesome class averages.

Now that we learned about the Bill of Rights, I wanted students to be able to apply the amendments to real life Supreme Court cases. I found a bunch of cases involving students and schools. Here are some of the examples I found:

1. West Virginia State Board of Education v. Barnette (1943) – Pledge of Allegiance
2. Mahanoy Area School District v. B.L. (2021) – Freedom of Speech with Social Media
3. Ingraham vs. Wright (1977) – School Punishment

Around the room, I had eight envelopes up. Six of the envelopes contained Supreme Court Cases. Two of the envelopes had some checking for understanding stuff – a Quizizz and EdPuzzle. The EdPuzzle was a quick 2 minute video on how a case gets to the Supreme Court.

The students worked in groups of three to four and had forty minutes to complete as many of the envelopes as possible. Each of the students had to do 2 things:

1. Discuss and guess which amendment was in question with each of the Supreme Court cases.
2. Guess how the court ruled in each case.

Each group brought their papers to me and they did a fantastic job guessing the amendments involved. They were all pretty surprised on how the Supreme Court ruled when I told them the results of each case. After I checked their papers, I gave each group a piece of a question. I typed out this question, “Which amendment gave 18 year olds the right to vote?” I cut the question into eight sections. The groups had to piece together the question, find the answer, and the answer unlocked a lockbox.

Inside the lockbox were ten QR codes. Nine of the QR codes were NOT winners. Only one QR code was the winner. Surprisingly, three groups actually chose the winning QR code. I have no clue how.

Now, eighth graders are pretty tricky and sneaky. I know they share my secrets. As a result, I changed the question and lock box code during the day. The other question I typed was, “Which amendment limits the president to two terms?”

Wednesday

The use of Supreme Court Cases on Tuesday leads to a lesson on judicial review. I found an article on iCivics about Marbury vs. Madison. The iCivics article was good, however, I put myself in my students’ shoes and realized I needed to clarify a few things. Basically, I took the articles and reworded some sentences, added a few sentences, and changed some words.

I don’t know why, but background information leading to Marbury vs. Madison is easy for me to understand. However, I have a hard time wrapping my mind around the ruling in the case. I had to read it a few times to process it, and figure out to explain it to 8th graders.

When students arrived in class, I had a Quizizz up on the board with 9 questions about Marbury vs. Madison. I’m only sharing one class in this post because I had to leave school early. The class average for the first quiz was 48%. I went over some important words and questions such as: writ of mandamus and judicial review.

Next, I had students use a Frayer with the Supreme Court and Judicial Review. They copied and pasted a Google definition, paraphrased that definition, added 4 characteristics, and added a meme or gif. The students had 8 minutes to complete both Frayers. I really liked how they used information from the EdPuzzle video about the Supreme Court. For example, many of them included that the Supreme Court only hears about 1% of cases that are submitted. Some included that nine justices serve for life.

Next I had the students read the article on Marbury vs. Madison. I also included a History Channel link to a 3 minute video on the case. Students had the option of reading or watching and listening. Many of them chose to do the reading.

The students read about Marbury vs. Madison, and highlighted, for 5 minutes. Then I challenged them to design a Thick Slide using recall with what they just read. Some of them answered the challenge, but most students did not. That’s okay. The Thick Slide had students sharing background information for the case, defining judicial review, including arguments, and decisions, and adding relevant pictures. Here are some samples:

After twenty minutes, we took the same Quizizz again and raised our class average to 83%. My main goal from this lesson was to have the students understand the importance of Marbury vs. Madison and understand Judicial Review. With understanding the importance of Marbury vs. Madison – 85% got that question correct. With understanding Judicial Review – 85% got that question correct as well.

Thursday

No school – calamity day. Staff had to report, but I had to stay home and take care of my daughter. This has been the month from hell with sickness – flu, pneumonia, coughing, and pink eye.

I used the opportunity to plan for our remote learning day on Friday.

Friday

Friday was a remote learning day. This means that I keep things simple. I put together a Constitution review Gimkit. The questions related to the branches of government, Bill of Rights, and the judicial review. For 2 weeks of material, the class averages were okay – 74%, 76%, 79%, 70%, and 84%. At the conclusion of the game, I reviewed the most commonly missed questions. The data was telling me, however, that I need to go back and reteach the Separation of Powers. I may have an Iron Chef or a Retell in Rhyme for next week.

Saturday night I began to feel weird. Sunday I felt even worse. I knew I wouldn’t be able to go to school Monday. It’s rare for me to get super sick, but it seems to be happening more frequently the last few years. Rather than being concerned for myself, I was more concerned how I would begin the Constitution unit being absent from school.

I thought about it, and decided the separation of powers would be the best way to go. Most students are familiar with branches of government, and I had a self-paced choice board. I reviewed the choice board and made a few slight changes. I replaced the Quizlet link with a WordWall link, I changed the Quizizz links, and I replaced the EdPuzzle link from last year with a new video.

Normally, I don’t like to begin the Constitution unit with the Separation of Powers, but it was the best option. With Thanksgiving break, typical school interruptions, and my absences this unit on the Constitution seems to be disjointed, piecemealed together, and rushed. I’m not liking it so far.

I need to slow down a bit and build in more review opportunities. However, I have 2 more weeks before winter break begins. (Last year I had 4 weeks for this unit) I also need to focus more on vocabulary. As a result, I’m currently stuck on:

1. Do I slow down by adding more gamified review opportunities and vocabulary review? – Doing this means the unit will not be finished before winter break. Our winter break lasts 17 days this year and that’s a loooong time and will affect their 2nd scores on the citizenship test.
2. Maintain my pace? – I do build in review opportunities with Fast and Curious, and I can get this unit finished by winter break. Most students will probably do well on the citizenship test when I give it again.

I think too much.

Monday – Separation of Powers Choice Board

Tuesday – Separation of Powers Choice Board

Wednesday – Separation of Powers

Thursday – Checks and Balances Breakout (Created by Dominic Helmstetter)

Friday – Choice Day – What Do You Need?

Monday, Tuesday, Wednesday

The easiest way to begin the Constitution unit, with my absence, was with the Separation of Powers choice board. I created this choice board last with intentional activities for multiple processing styles. The choice board includes different activities such as Frayer, create an infographic, concept sort, EdPuzzle, etc.

Last year’s version had a Quizlet, but I changed this to a WordWall. If you haven’t checked out WordWall, please check it out. I pay, out of pocket, for certain edtech tools (Gimkit, Blooket, Screencastify) and WordWall was instantly added to the list. This site can be used to turn content into review games. It also contains many premade games in the community. Since I already had a concept sort, I created a Separation of Powers game where students wager points before they know each question. They LOVED it.

With all of the activities, students had multiple ways to learn about the different branches of government. They had multiple ways to create learning artifacts they could use to design a superhero as the application activity.

The choice board also contains clear learning goals and an application activity. The learning goals are:

1. I can identify characteristics and powers of the executive branch
2. I can identify characteristics and powers of the legislative branch
3. I can identify characteristics and powers of the judicial branch
4. I can explain why we have separation of powers
5. I can create a representation of a branch of government through superhero

The application activity if one of my favorites during the year. I have the students choose a branch of government and turn it into a superhero. While I was out, they could draw a superhero and upload the picture to an action hero template from EMC2Learning. However, when I returned, instructed the students to do the activity on paper. Here are some superhero drawings:

Thursday

I followed up separation of powers with checks and balances. However, I needed something to get the students collaborating, communicating, and moving. With many lessons, I can easily think of something: CyberSandwich, lecture, some sort of a Gimkit assessment, etc… I needed something new.

As I mentioned at the top of this post, I think too much. I came in Thursday morning fully prepared to lecture and do a Gimkit. Then I remembered my friend, Dominic Helmstetter, has amazing government lessons that he does with his freshman class.

I opened up Twitter and found this amazing escape room that Dominic put together. The escape room had some review material, guided notes on checks and balances, a built in assessment, and four locks to solve on with a Google form.

I honestly couldn’t figure out the locks early on Thursday morning, so I made copies of all the files and reworked it for my class. I ended up creating a a 3 step process escape room. Here is what I changed/added:

1. Iron Chef Review – I took the branches of government review material and deleted the information. I turned it into an Iron Chef. Students worked in groups of 2 or 3 to complete the branches of government Iron Chef. Students had to complete their slides, with my approval, before I gave them the clues/notes sheets on checks and balances. This Iron Chef served as a review for Monday and Tuesday’s separation of powers choice board. If students understood the material, the Iron Chef was easy to complete and wouldn’t hold them back from escaping within 40 minutes. Groups that understood separation of powers finished their Iron Chef slides in under 10 minutes.
2. Clues/Notes Sheet – The clues/notes sheet is a fill in the blank sheet that paired with a checks and balances chart. I changed some of the blanks to fill in on the sheet. The blanks that students filled in actd as the Google form lock answers.
3. Assessment – The assessment contained questions relating to the branches of government as well as checks and balances situations. I had to change some of the wording for the questions. This was a nice assessment option to check for student understanding. At the end of the assessment the students got 4 words to unscramble. These words helped unlock one of the four locks on the Google Form.
4. Lockbox – I have a 3 digit lockbox that students were competing to unlock. If they successfully unlocked all four locks on the Google Form, I gave them a question to unlock the lock box. The question was, “How many total senators and representative make up Congress?” The lockbox code was 535.

When students came into class on Thursday morning, I gave brief directions and gave the students 40 minutes to escape/or breakout. They had a ton of fun. They were communicating, collaborating, engaged, and moving. I love breakouts!

Friday

Friday I was out again taking care of my family. Due to me being out for three days this week, students were ALL OVER the place in terms of work completion and understanding. I needed something to address all those needs. So, I stayed up late on Thursday night creating a Google Doc titled, Decide Where Are You and What You Need.

This doc had 4 parts/choices to it:

1. I need to finish the superhero drawing from lesson 4.1 as well as some other missing work.
2. I’m confused about Checks and Balances and need to learn more. (Choice Board inspired by Amanda Sandoval)
3. I understand Checks and Balances but want to explore how it applies to the real world. (Thick Slide news article summary)
4. I understand Checks and Balances, but I want to learn more about the importance of limited government. (Limited Government lesson created by Amanda Sandoval)

Each part contained a directions video and links for the assignments. Did students take advantage of the options? I have no clue and will know more on Monday. Until then, my beloved Bengals play the Chiefs on Sunday – Who Dey baby!!

What a week! This is going to be short post. I am usually an early riser and arrive at school by 6:00 AM…..most days/ On Monday morning, however, I just couldn’t bring myself to getting out of bed. I’m tired. Exhausted. Mentally exhausted. As a result, I arrived to school by 6:45 and was dragging.

Around 7:20 AM, twenty minutes before school began, the power went out. Was this a short power outage? Were we going home? Staff and students waiting….

Administration made a quick decision and decided to send everyone home. We had an unexpected day off!! It was much needed. I left school and drove to a local racquet club to watch my wife play tennis. I haven’t watched her play tennis in five years.

Monday – Day off…..no power.

Tuesday – Shortened class periods – we did some surprise Gimkits.

Tuesday

I hear it all the time, “These students just don’t know basic stuff.” I often think, “Well, okay, I agree. However, what are you doing about it?” I do know one thing, though; complaining doesn’t help. I’ve resorted to doing surprise Gimkits.

A surprise Gimkit is having the code up on the board, ready to go, and the students not knowing what the questions are about. I try to do this once or twice a week. The Gimkits are always with questions that address ‘basic stuff’ students should know. Here are my surprise Gimkits:

1. US States – many people complain that students don’t know their states. Here you go. We started the year with a low 60% class average. Now we are in the low to mid 80% range.
2. Citizenship Test – basic knowledge of government and history stuff.
3. Dad Jokes – this is great for working on context clues to choose the best punchline.
4. General Knowledge – math, science, history, ELA questions.
5. Are you smarter than a 4th grader? – 4th grade questions.
6. Who Is This President? – recognize presidents by picture

Rather than complaining, I try to address the issue with this simple, quick EduProtocol (Fast and Curious). Hopefully you can find some use with these. Have an awesome Thanksgiving!

In the last four years I’ve had a simple focus – how can I get students critically thinking, creating, collaborating, and communicating (The 4 C’s) with their learning? This is what drives my teaching with or without technology. However, when technology is used, I hope it’s intentional and ties to the 4 C’s listed above. This is why I love EduProtocols so much – it’s practical, intentional, ties to the 4 C’s, and provides consistency for the students and myself.

With the students I try to see each student as unique with their own set of strengths. One question that helps me with students – How can I give every student a chance to be successful? Everyone in this life deserves a chance to have fun and be successful with something and if my class is that one chance then I’m happy with that.

This week, we finished the Constitutional Convention, did a mini-lesson on Federalists and AntiFederalists, and we began one of my favorite units – The Constitution. The main goal of the Constitutional Convention was having the students analyze, and evaluate, compromises from the Convention. We used a 3xCER and Nacho Paragraph to complete this unit.

Following the Constitutional Convention, I do a mini lesson on Federalists and Anti-federalists. I created a choice board for this. The choice board has clear learning goals, an application activity, and an evaluative activity.

On Thursday, students wrapped up the Federalists/AntiFederalists unit. Then we began the Constitution Unit with a 10 question quiz from the United States Citizenship and Immigration services quiz. The goal is to reach six questions correct, which is rarely accomplished.

Monday – 3xCER and Nacho Paragraph, Fast and Curious

Tuesday and Wednesday – Federalist/AntiFederalist Choice Board

Thursday – Citizenship Test, Vocabulary Evaluation

Friday – Resource Rumble – Parts of the Constitution

Monday

On Friday, students completed a 3xCER evaluating why the founding fathers kept slavery in the Constitution. I wanted them to keep that practice going writing claims, evidence, and reasoning. With EduProtocols, reps are important!! On this 3xCER, the question was, “Should the Constitutional Convention be considered a success?”

On the CER doc, the first column had the students evaluate the convention as a success. The middle column had them evaluate it as unsuccessful. The third column had students create their own claim about the convention.

As we did this activity, I noticed that students are getting better at writing claims. The evidence piece needed some work. The students had trouble remembering the compromises and classifying them as a success or not. As a result, by 5th period, I created a concept sort to help students evaluate the compromises at the convention. I created a list of items and had students sort them into categories…

1. The Great Compromise
2. Small states and large states compromised to create 3 branches of government and set up our modern day Congress.
3. The Founding Fathers created a government that still exists today.
4. The 3/5th Compromise.
5. They had a chance to end slavery, but built slavery into the words of the Constitution.

This is just a small sample of the evidence I listed out for students to sort. This definitely helped the students create, and write, evidence which ultimately helped their reasoning skills as well.

After students wrote their claims with evidence and reasoning, I set up a Socrative short answer question and share the student login link. Students signed into Socrative and I had them use their last column of the CER to construct a paragraph. As students submitted their paragraphs, I was giving feedback on the evidence and reasoning.

After a short time, I hit the “start vote” button in Socrative and the students were able to read each other’s paragraphs. We voted for the best paragraph, then I created a new Socrative Short answer question.

I copied and pasted the best paragraph into the question box of the new Socrative short answer question. Students signed back into Socrative, and we did a Nacho Paragraph. I instructed the students to copy and paste the paragraph into their response box, and I was going to have them edit the paragraph. Here are the edits I had them do…(It’s important to teach them NOT to submit their response until you tell them to do so)…

1. Rewrite the claim so it still makes sense with the paragraph.
2. Add a transition word to the evidence. With this one, I heard, “How do I do that?” My response was, “Look it up.”
3. Add a concluding sentence to the paragraph.

At first, the nacho paragraph seemed like a lot to them, but they started getting the hang of it. The student whose paragraph we chose said they felt weird that everyone was editing their paragraph. This is definitely something I will have the students do again because this is phenomenal for working on writing skills.

At the end of class, I ran a Gimkit Fast and Curious that I told them was for a grade. It’s amazing how much the class averages shot up when I mentioned this! Every class average fell between 85% and 96%. Amazing stuff.

Tuesday and Wednesday

After the conclusion of the Constitutional Convention unit, I moved into a mini-lesson on Federalists and AntiFederalists. It’s funny because I often refer back to this blog to see what I did last year. When I saw I created a choice board, I was like, “Sweet!”

Before I had students get into Federalists and AntiFederalists, I had them look up the definition for the word “Federal.” Google provides three definitions so I asked them, which definition would work best to help them understand the word Federalist. They agreed that this definition would help, “relating to or denoting the central government of the US.”

My next question was, “Based on that definition, what do you think a Federalist was?” A proud teacher moment happened when a student who struggles with reading, inferencing, and making connections spoke up and said, “Oh, they supported a strong central government.” Then I asked, “What do you think an ANTI-Federalist was?” Another connection made, “They would not support a strong central government.” Then I asked, “Why not?” The response was, “Because they wanted strong state governments and would probably support the Articles of Confederation.” I cried 😭 a little.

Earlier in the week, I had a student request that I lecture and they could take notes. I asked, “Why would you want that?” The response was, “Because you’re good a telling stories and do a nice job of relating the stories to us.” The lecture style is more for students who need structure and certainty to help them process what they are learning. The choice board I set up had a variety of activities for all types of processing styles. The activities on the choice board included the following:

1. Quizizz for the check for understanding – students could take this twice.
2. EdPuzzle to take the place of a lecture style.
3. WordWall for practice – a concept sort.
4. CyberSandwich for those who want some partner work and discussion.
5. A student paced PearDeck – sketch and tell included.
6. Frayer Models
7. Primary Source analysis from SHEG.

The choice board also included clear learning goals:

1. I can identify and explain 2 differences between Federalists and AntiFederalists.
2. I can identify the compromise made between Federalists and AntiFederalists over the Constitution.

Finally, I also included four application activities on the choice board to choose from. The application activities included:

1. Imagine you are a Federalist or AntiFederalist – write a letter persuading people to accept or not accept the constitution. Include 4 or more important facts/reasons in your letter.
2. Select a Federalist or AntiFederalist – design an action figure (An example) (this is on paper – get the paper from me)
3. Story Cubes – relate 8 story cubes to the beliefs and characteristics of Federalists and AntiFederalists. (This is on EMC2Learning)
4. Choose a Federalist or Anti-federalist – if they got a tattoo, what design would they get and why? Draw your design on paper, take a picture and add it to the slide. Then fill in the missing details around it. (This is on EMC2Learning)

Over 2 days, students did geat completing the activities. The most chosen activities were the EdPuzzle, WordWall, and Quizizz. This was chosen the most because it was the quickest and easiest to do. However, I challenged the students to complete the Word Wall with 100% accuracy in under one minute.

Thursday

On Thursday, we began my favorite unit – The Constitution. I love government. I love teaching government. I love the challenge of taking something that is not exciting, not easy to connect with and making it exciting. Here are my two compelling questions for the unit:

1. How does the constitution limit government’s power?
2. What are 6 principles of government found in the Constitution and how do they relate to your life?

I always begin this unit with a citizenship test from the USCIS website. I ask ten questions that relate to the unit, and students need to get six correct. I ask the questions out loud and they need to write their responses on paper. I use this as baseline data for the unit. Here is my data:

1. First Period – 2/20 got six correct. 27% class average.
2. Third Period – 0/29 got six correct. 24% class average.
3. Fifth Period – 2/24 got six correct. 26% class average.
4. Seventh Period – 2/20 got six correct. 24% class average.
5. Eighth Period – 3/14 got six correct. 34% class average.

After the citizenship test, I have the students evaluate their own knowledge of vocabulary words from the unit. I had them go through 12 words and decide the following:

1. Know it – they could write a definition in seconds without looking it up.
2. Not sure – they have seen the word but don’t know how to define it.
3. Don’t know it – they have never seen the word before.

I noticed that some thought they knew Federalism. However, they confused this with the Federalists. Some thought they knew Bill of Rights and Republic but didn’t have keywords in their definitions. For example, for a republic, most students left out the words representative or elected. So, it’s important to circulate and give quick feedback during this activity.

With the time we had left, I ran a “secret” Gimkit on the states. Students like the secret Gimkit. Sometimes it’s a Gimkit about states, 4th grade trivia, or basic things they should know. I hear a lot of teachers complain that students don’t know “stuff” anymore. I would agree this is true, but why not use reps with Gimkit to address the issue? This is the 4th time my classes have used the Gimkit about states – we began the year with a 60% average, and we are now above 80% on state recognition.

Friday

Before I get into the principles of the Constitution, it’s important for students to understand the structure of the document. I gave students a choice: I could lecture on the Articles and amendments of the Constitution, or they could do a Resource Rumble.

The students chose the Resource Rumble. Students used the Constitution in the textbook to answer a variety of questions. As I approved the questions, they collected legos. At the end of the resource rumble, they had to build something with their legoe related to Article I, Article II, or Article III.

This week we began the Articles of Confederation, Shays Rebellion, and the Constitutional Convention. I love this unit. I saved a Google Classroom from last year that I often look at to reflect. I looked at last year’s lessons, and thought to myself, “How can I adjust this for the students this year?” I always think to myself, “How can I make it better?”

I started at the standards to revamp this unit. Here are those standards:

1. Analyze how the problems arising under the Articles of Confederation led to debate over the adoption of the U.S. Constitution.
2. Explain how participation in social and civic groups can lead to the attainment of individual and public goals.

After reviewing the standards, I broke the unit into 3 essential questions:

1. Why did the United States want to create a stronger national government?
2. Was the Constitutional Convention successful?
3. What were the differences between Federalists and Anti-Federalists?

From here, I thought to myself, “How would my students need to think in order to answer those essential questions?” So I made a list of items:

1. Students need to understand the Articles of Confederation was our first government to help us through the American Revolutionary War.
2. Students need to understand that we have state level and national level government (federalism).
3. It was intentionally made weak due to the abuses of power by King George III and the British Parliament.
4. The weaknesses led to problems like Shays Rebellion which exposed the Articles of Confederation.
5. The Northwest Ordinance was created under the Articles of Confederation – an ordinance is a law and helped territories become states (Ohio – 1803).
6. The Constitutional Convention brought together many political leaders to strengthen our national government by creating 3 branches but limiting its power.
7. From the Constitutional Convention, 2 groups emerged and ultimately created our first two political parties. The Federalists and Anti-federalists debated how strong the national government should be and how to protect people’s rights.

By doing this process, and looking at this unit through the eyes of a student, it helped me put together different activities, assessments, and questions with each lesson.

Monday – Fast and Curious Gimkit, Frayer Vocab

Tuesday – Iron Chef, Fast and Curious

Wednesday – Fast and Curious, Rolling Recap, Emoji Paragraphs

Thursday – CyberSandwich, Fast and Curious

Friday – Fast and Curious, Portfolio

Monday

For Monday, I began with a Gimkit of 15 questions about basic vocabulary related to the Articles of Confederation and Shays Rebellion. Many of the words relate to government and are unknown to most of the students. This was shown in the class averages of 52%, 54%, 50%, 33%, 58%.

At the conclusion of the Gimkit, I gave some feedback on most of the questions. We switched gears to a Frayer. I had students Frayer the word Articles of Confederation (@historysandoval Frayer template). Then I had them choose two other words they might have trouble remembering. Most students chose: ordinance, Northwest Ordinance, or central government.

Students took 15 minutes to complete 3 slides for their Frayer. The last 10 minutes of class were used to take the Gimkit again. Most scores were raised to a 60% and one class raised their class average to a 70%.

Personally, I felt like their scores should have been higher. I had a conversation with them that I played a Gimkit the previous week about Halloween trivia. The first 19 questions I missed (no joke). However, I read the correct answers and didn’t miss a question after that. Using the time, and effort, to read and understand why a question was missed is soooo beneficial.

Tuesday

To begin class, I used this awesome strategy I learned from Dominic Helmstetter. At MassCUE, Dominic told me he uses a “spot the differences” in pictures to begin class sometimes. He uses a site called Cleanup Pictures to create the differences, or remove items, from a picture. So, I used a picture I found on Google related to the Northwest Ordinance. I removed important items related to the day’s lesson. It was awesome, and students got so into it!! Can you spot the differences?

Last year I had students do a solo Iron Chef to learn about the Articles of Confederation and Shay’s Rebellion. I had them read a textbook section and design a slide. We set aside 15 minutes for each slide. I kept my timer going, and switched them throughout the class. It was okay, but there was no discussion.

This year, I had students create groups of three and share a slidedeck. I printed off paper copies of the textbook sections and handed them out. Students had 12 minutes to read and design a slide.

At the end of 12 minutes, I passed out a paper Frayer model to each student. Each box had a prompt for what I wanted the students to focus on in regards to the Articles of Confederation, Northwest Ordinance, and Shays Rebellion. I labeled each box with:

1. What were 4 weaknesses of the Articles of Confederation?
2. Describe the Northwest ordinance – territories becoming states and rules for the Northwest Territory.
3. Describe the importance of Shays’ Rebellion.
4. Five sentences – how did weaknesses of the Articles of Confederation lead to a new government?

I tried to have each student present their slide to a group – some did great, while most did not. But that’s okay. Some students like to work independently, work at their own pace, and write their own notes.

Some students complained about writing 5 sentences which gave me an idea for Wednesday’s class (stay tuned)…

Overall, for a 2nd Iron Chef, the students great. Awesome creativity, they were engaged, I may have went a bit too fast for some. However, there is always room for improvement. At the conclusion of class, we finished up with a Gimkit. The Gimkit results are a bit skewed, because I often keep adding new questions related to the content. Some class averages remained the same, and some went backwards.

I set up the Iron Chef differently for my 7th period class because I don’t fully trust them to share and work together cooperatively. As a result, I would read a textbook section to the class and added clarification along the way. Then I gave them 8 minutes to make their slide. Then I read another textbook section, and so on. Sometimes I am doing too much, but at the same time, I am saving my sanity and doing what I feel is right. It worked out much better for this class.

Wednesday

On Tuesday, I took the, “We can’t write 5 sentences,” as a challenge. I wanted to do some review of the Articles of Confederation, Northwest Ordinance, and Shays Rebellion. I also wanted to have a little fun.

To begin class, students did a 5 minute round of Gimkit. Class averages were okay. They ranged from the 57% to 80% range. After the Gimkit, we did more review with a Rolling Recap from EMC2Learning. I can’t really give this review activity away, but I roll four dice and ask random questions related to content. Students work together in groups of two to three and are totally engaged.

All of this review was working toward my big lesson of the day – Random Emoji Paragraph. The students said they couldn’t write five sentences, but they ended up writing 15 or more sentences by the end of class. Basically, they wrote three paragraphs. To access the Random E

I began the Emoji paragraph by having the random emoji generator on the board. If you want access to it, sign up for free at the EduProtocols website. This created intrigue and many questions. I explained the purpose of a paragraph – pursue an idea. Then we ran two practice rounds. The students loved it, couldn’t wait to share, and asked if we could do it again. Even if it’s not related to your content area, this is a great way to begin or end class to get students thinking, writing, and having fun.

The last round of the Emoji paragraphs, I challenged the students to relate the emojis to the Articles of Confederation, Shays Rebellion, or both. If students did a great job with the Gimkit, Iron Chef, and Rolling Recap – this was no problem. The students that didn’t bother to do much, really struggled. Relating random emojis to describe a historical topic requires some special creative thinking. Most students did great. They were engaged and couldn’t wait to share. What they came up with was pretty amazing:

Thursday

On Thursday, we were ready to move onto the Constitutional Convention. I used a Quizizz at the beginning of class. It was nine questions, and the class averages were as follows: 62%, 53%, 50%, 46%, and 60%. The Quizizz had basic questions about the Constitutional Convention.

Next, I had students read a section of the textbook and take notes using a Main Idea note taking strategy. I like this strategy for this particular CyberSandwich because it helps the students write their summary at the end.

The Main Idea note taking strategy has students turn the section title into a question. Then it has them write down who, when, where, why, and what. At the conclusion of the reading and note taking, I had the students select 4 of the most important facts they typed.

Choosing 4 important facts helps guide the discussion and comparison piece of a CyberSandwich. The discussion were MUCH better and organized with choosing 4 important facts. This also helped with the summaries at the end.

The summary for this particular CyberSandwich is a newspaper clipping the students create. They visit a newspaper clipping generator site and attempt to create a summary answering the question – What was the purpose of the Constitutional Convention? After students typed their summary, I had them check how many facts they had in their article using this self assessment doc. Here are some students samples:

At the conclusion of the lesson, we went back and did the same Quizizz again. This time, the scores went way up!

Friday

Friday was a weird schedule day. Each class was 30 minutes long. As a result, I had students complete the Friday Check In, Gimkit, and add to their Google Site Portfolio. I added the Thursday quizizz questions to the Gimkit.

For the Google Site Portfolio, I had students create a new page for the last unit – Unit 2 American Revolution. Then I had them select three items they created in unit 2 that they were proud of.

When I began teaching social studies, eight years ago, students seemed to have a good background and grasp of basic historical facts. Each year after that, the knowledge has been less and less. For example, I have some students who have never heard of George Washington, Ben Franklin, or John Adams. No joke.

I shared the above information because I feel like most of my lessons stay in the DOK 1, 2, and 3 range. The students are learning the background knowledge they lack, but sometimes I wish I could get to the DOK 4 level.

The units I have put together are structured, but I need to focus the essential questions more and tidy up the organization. I would like to get into more inquiry based lessons, PBL based lessons, but the lack of background knowledge trips me up. With that being said, it leads me to the end of the American Revolution Unit.

I needed an end to the American Revolution Unit, but it seemed like a conglomerate of lessons. As a result, I came up with a 2 part assessment that addressed all aspects of the unit. The next day we started a mini-unit on the Founding Fathers.

I created the mini-unit on the Founding Fathers because a student asked me if we could learn about them. Furthermore, it’s important for students to understand who some of these Founders were before diving into the Constitutional Convention. So, I put together some EduProtocols paired with some Emc2Learning materials. It ended up being a cool unit.

Monday – Resource Rumble for review

Tuesday – Final Assessment – American Revolution

Wednesday – Thin Slide, Fast and Curious Gimkit, Iron Chef/Archetype

Thursday – Frayer, NFL Draft Founding Fathers (emc2learning)

Friday – Fast and Curious, Finish up NFL Draft (Wasted day)

Quick Video Tip – Quickly change share settings for ALL students so they can see each other’s work.

Monday

After returning from a long trip (I went to MassCUE at Gillette Stadium), I needed a review activity for the students. I took a chance and did a Resource Rumble with my classes. The Resource Rumble is an engaging review activity for students.

The students were placed into teams of 3 to 4. I posted 8 questions around the room related to the material they learned last – Declaration of Independence, American Revolutionary War battles, life of Continental Soldiers, Taxation without Representation, etc. I wanted students to use some recall and retrieval practice. Some examples of questions I posted:

1. Write a Haiku about Taxation without Representation.
2. Write 3 rhyming couplets about the Declaration of Independence.
3. What are the natural rights listed in the Declaration?
4. Identify the first and last battles fought in the Revolutionary War. Who won the last battle?

Students did well with the Resource Rumble. They loved getting up and moving around. After the groups answered the questions, they brought their responses to me to check. I added in a new twist this year – okay responses received a 6 sided dice. Great responses received the 8-sided dice. One student rolls the dice for the group, and collect that many blocks. In the end the groups compete to build the tallest, freestanding tower. The tallest tower of the day was 38″ tall. Here are some pics:

Tuesday

For Tuesday I needed an assessment to wrap up the American Revolution Unit. I often have a million ideas constantly running through my head. I can never make up my mind. I knew what the students needed to know and be able to do, I just couldn’t make up my mind on how they could do it.

As I was driving to school, the idea came to me – a 2 part assessment. The first part of the assessment was a Gimkit. The second part of the assessment was a choice of familiar activities – Hexagonal Learning or Story Cubes. I told the students they had to finish every part of the assessment in class. Here was my deal with them:

1. 5 minute Gimkit. If everyone answered 25 or more questions, and the class average was 80% or higher, then everyone would a get a 10 out of 10 on that portion of the assessment.
2. The 2nd part of the assessment was a choice – Hexagonal Learning or Story Cubes. Hexagonal Learning could be with a partner or Story Cubes had to be individual.

On the Gimkit, the students rose to the challenge. Four of my classes received these class averages: 80%, 82%, 85%, 90% and one class received a 70%. For the choice assessment, most students chose Hexagonal Learning. Here are some of the I Can statements I listed out:

1. I can identify and describe 2 examples of taxation without representation that led to the Revolution.
2. I can explain how the Enlightenment influenced the Declaration of Independence and the American Revolution (natural rights, social contract).
3. I can explain why Thomas Jefferson wrote the Declaration of Independence.
4. I can identify principles of government within the Declaration (consent of the people).
5. I can identify, and explain, a group that contributed to the American Revolutionary War.

I shared my I can statements because I noticed some students were putting the Enlightenment, or natural rights with other ideas…….which is okay in some ways, I guess. However, I pointed out to the students the I Can statements. For example, I can statement number 2 literally has Enlightenment with the Declaration, natural rights, and social contract all in the same sentence. I asked, “Wouldn’t that clue you in to where those hexagons go?” I bring this up because I wonder how often I can statements are used and if students are taught to use them for guidance.

Along the lines of my assessment choices, I like these options for students because they are familiar with them. The Hexagonal Learning has the major concepts listed out for students to read. Whereas, the StoryCubes has students relating abstract images to concepts which leads to more recall and retrieval practice. Here are some examples:

Wednesday

Before beginning a new unit on the Constitutional Convention, I was inspired by a couple of students to create a mini-unit on the Founding Fathers. One student asked me if we could learn about the Founding Fathers. The other student that inspired me, way back in September, made a list of presidents that would make a great basketball team. He strategically placed them in different positions – point guard, shooting guard, etc. and began laughing. What he thought was a joke actually inspired my idea for this Founding Fathers unit.

To begin this unit (With EduProtocols, I planned this out, and created everything, in 10 minutes) I started with a Thin Slide. I simply asked the students look up a Founding Father, add their picture, add their name, add an accomplishment. They had 3 minutes to create their slide. When the timer went off, I shut down the editing rights and students presented their slide right from their desks. They included the usual suspects for Founding Fathers – Alexander Hamilton, George Washington, John Adams, Thomas Jefferson. Some students like to branch out and be different – those students shared John Jay (who apparently looks like me I guess).

The next step of the lesson was a Fast and Curious Gimkit. The Gimkit had fifteen questions about founding fathers. I added pictures to the questions with the lesser known Founding Fathers. The point of this Gimkit was to introduce more names to the students. The class averages were super low – 40% to 50% range. Students were confused by all the John’s, James’s, and George’s.

The last step involved the students choosing a Founding Father from a list of links I provided. I wanted them to design a slide about sa Founding Father with the following:

1. Five acomplishments
2. A picture
3. Basic information – year born, year died, etc.
4. One surprising fact
5. Apply an archetype to that Founding Father – explain why with evidence.

The students had 22 minutes to finish their slide. I ran a timer for 15 minutes, paused, and went over the archetypes because this was a first for the students. I resumed the timer for another 7-8 minutes as they chose an archetype for their chosen Founding Father. Here are some examples:

With the last 3 minutes of class, I had students share their slide through a Google Form. I converted the Google Form data and links into a spreadsheet. Then I added that spreadsheet to the assignment. See how to quickly change share settings so students can see each other’s work.

Thursday and Friday

Thursday rolled around and I worried that the students didn’t have enough background information for the final part of the Founding Fathers mini-unit. As it turned out, I was worried about nothing. The students made great slides and had good information. To begin class, I ran the same Gimkit again. This time class averages rose up to the 60% to 70% range.

While the Gimkit was running, I passed out paper Frayer models. When we share learning artifacts through Google Forms, I like it when students use paper and pencil to write notes from peer work. I think the students secretly like the paper and pencil too. Students had 15 minutes to write down 2 accomplishments, basic facts, a surprising fact, and the archetype for four different Founding fathers.

I gave them all a quick speech about writing down things they KNOW and UNDERSTAND. For example, I would have students write down, “He was foreign minister.” I will ask them, “What is that?” They always respond, “I don’t know??” I have really been striving to coach them to write down basic things they understand, Write down things in your own words.

Once students had their information, it was time to reflect on their learning. This is where I was inspired by the student who put together the presidential basketball team. On EMC2Learning, they have an NFL Draft template. I asked the students to think about who would be drafted in the first round based on their accomplishments. Who would be drafted in the second round and so on?

I cannot share the template, but here are some student samples:

Friday ended up being a wasted day because we had some special events going on. Some students finished up the NFL Draft templates. Some did not.

This week was a shortened week with no school on Monday. I was in class for one day on Tuesday. Then I flew to Boston for MassCUE Wednesday through Friday.

We continued this week with a focus on the American Revolutionary War. Last week, one thing became clear – the students did not understand the Declaration of Independence (DOI). I simply could not do the same thing I did last year.

Last year, we did an in-depth exploration of the DOI where we ended with a blackout poetry lesson. With me being, gone, doing a blackout poetry lesson was out of the question. Plus, the fumes from our blackout poetry last year filled the school. It was an interesting day.

With my one day back, on Tuesday, I did a quick lesson on the DOI. I created a nearpod lesson, and we did Parafly with some excerpts. We also made some connections between grievances and past events we learned about. By the end of the lesson, students had a better understanding of the Declaration.

When I ended the class, I left it as the Declaration was the point of no return. The American Revolution was in full swing and the students would be learning more about the war.

Monday – No school

Tuesday – Nearpod Parafly

Wednesday and Thursday – American Revolution (Mr. Meehan History)

Friday – American Revolutionary War Soldiers (Mr. Meehan History) with a Sketch and Tell.

Tuesday

When I arrived today, I realized the students were confused about the Declaration of Independence. The message is fairly simple, but the configuration of words can be complex. As a result, I began class by showing a series of breakup clips from Seinfeld, Friends, and the Office. This provided an instant connection. Following the clips, I asked the students, “Why do you think I showed breakup clips?” Students began to think………..”Ummm because the colonies didn’t want to belong to Britain anymore. They were tired of the King. The colonists were tired of Parliament and taxation without representation.” The students figured it out. I framed the DOI as a breakup letter. This seemed to help them better understand the message written by Thomas Jefferson.

After our breakup videos, we used Parafly to help translate important sections of the DOI. With two of my classes, this strategy worked well. With three of my classes, I wish I would have Frayered some words such as: political bands, unalienable, endowed, self-evident, consent. This would have helped students develop better synonyms for these words when paraphrasing.

At the conclusion of the paraphrased sections, I had students identify which Enlightenment idea inspired those words: natural rights or social contract. I also had students make connections to previous content we learned. For example, with the grievances listed out against King George, we made connections back to the Boston Massacre, Intolerable Acts, and the Quartering Act.

The last slide in the nearpod had 4 statements on it with blanks. Here are these statements:

1. All __________ are created equal.
2. All people have basic __________________ that cannot be taken away.
3. The government gets its power to make decisions and protect rights
   from the _____________________ .
4. When the government does not protect the _____________ of the people, the _______________ have the right to _______________ or __________________ the government.

If students could fill in the blanks, then they understood the DOI. In the end, 95% of students could identify the enlightenment influence on the DOI and could fill in these four statements.

Wednesday and Thursday

For Wednesday and Thursday, I used a lesson I got from Mr. Meehan on Twitter. This lesson is similar to a hyperdoc, hyperslide, with several assignments about the American Revolutionary War. I made a few changes to the slides:

1. Drag and drop arrows to the sentences that answers questions about Lexington and Concord.
2. Weaknesses and Strengths of the British and Colonial Armies.
3. True False statements paired with an infographic.
4. Reading about different groups of people and how they contributed to the war. Then writing a letter from that group’s perspective. (Last year the slide was write a letter from General Washington’s perspective. Someone brought up a good point – why write from Washington’s perspective? Give other people a voice. So, I changed it and it worked out much better.
5. Choose a battle and make a Number Mania.
6. A slide with a song from Hamilton and some questions.
7. A drag and drop slide that shows students how General Washington led the Americans to victory in the Battle of Yorktown.

For Wednesday, my expectation was to finish the first four options listed above. For Thursday, my expectation was to finish options five through seven listed above. I also set up a Quizizz to be taken twice. The students were shown the answer during the quiz and shown only the questions after the quiz. From these two days, I had 60% students engagement and 40% not engaged. It was interesting to see that 60% of students who were engaged scored a 70% or higher on the Quizizz and the other 40% scored a 69% or lower. I sent many, many emails of blank work screenshots to parents.

Here are some Number Mania’s and Letters:

Friday

Friday was a day to finish any missing assignments or learn about the experience of a soldier in the Revolutionary War. This lesson was another activity I got from Mr. Meehan on Twitter. It’s similar to a choose your own adventure as students click different options as they learn about colonial soldiers or minutemen. For example, they can choose to be a minuteman or colonial soldier. They pick a tool necessary for survival. Students learn about how much they were paid and what they ate.

Last year, I left nan empathy map for students to complete after this activity. This year, I wanted to keep stuff simple and left a Sketch and Tell. I simply asked, “What is one thing you learned?” Here are some examples:

What a whirlwind of a week! I’m currently sitting in Columbus, OH working on this blog post. I was at school for Monday and Tuesday, and I’ve been in Columbus since Wednesday morning.

On Wednesday, I received the Ohio District 5 Teacher of the Year award. I had a professional development meeting on Thursday with OH-NNSTOY and met some amazing educators. I’m also in town to attend the Ohio Council for Social Studies Conference to promote EduProtocols Field: Social Studies Edition.

Back in 505 – we used Monday as a way to end the American Revolution mini-unit. I gave students a choice board and established success criteria. Students could choose between Virtual Story Cubes, Hexagonal Learning, or a creating a Netflix series with the Revolution.

This week we also focused on the Enlightenment thinkers and ideas and the influence those ideas had on the Declaration of Independence. Knowing that I would be out, I want to frontload some vocabulary to help set up the students for success. I also wanted to use some familiar lessons in class.

Monday – Choice Board

Tuesday – Fast and Curious, Parafly, Sketch and Tell

Wednesday – Nearpod over the Enlightenment

Thursday – Frayer, Thick Slide

Friday – Declaration of Independence Analysis

Monday

I wanted to start off the week by ending the American revolution mini-unit and move onto something else. I put together a choice board for students that included three choices for them to show me what they know:

1. Virtual Story Cubes from EMC2Learning
2. Netflix Template (I honestly have no clue where I found this).
3. Hexagonal Learning (Stephanie Howell template)

Throughout the year I introduced different creative templates and lessons to students so I can offer the items as choices throughout the school year. The students were familiar with the Netflix template and Hexagonal learning. The Story Dice template was brand new. I thought most students chose the Netflix template, but I was wrong. Most students chose the Hexagonal Learning.

The Hexagonal Learning already had the concepts on the hexagons so it was a bit easier for students to show what they learned. Whereas, the Netflix and Story Cubes required a different set of creative thinking skills since the information wasn’t explicitly in front of them.

With any assignment, I always try to have clear expectations and success criteria to help guide the students through their creativity and learning. Here was my success criteria:

1. You correctly identified and described 3 examples of taxes or acts that angered the people of Boston.
2. You correctly described 2 examples of protest.
3. You correctly described how and why the relationship changed between Britain and its citizens in the 13 colonies.

Here are some student samples:

Tuesday

Lately, I have been noticing a lot of copy and pasting and I wanted to address that issue. The perfect was to address this is through a Parafly EduProtocol. Introducing Enlightenment terms such a Republicanism, Social Contract, and Natural Rights was a perfect fit with Parafly.

When students came into 505 on Tuesday, I had my Quizizz up on the board. I have been using Gimkit and Blooket ALOT, and wanted to switch it up back to a Quizizz. The Quizizz contained vocabulary questions and questions directly related to a reading from ICivics. The first round of class averages with the Quizizz were: 54%, 52%, 54%, 36%, and 60%.

Following this Quizizz, I had students log into PearDeck. This was the first time I used PearDeck all year. I like to use Peardeck with Parafly because I can watch the kids typing in real time. I could also tap responses, make them glow, no name were shown, and give honest feedback.

After students logged into PearDeck, I had to explain what paraphrasing means, and how it compared to summarizing. Then, I introduced paraphrasing with a small paragraph on the Land, Sea, and Air Burger which a secret menu item from McDonalds. I used McDonalds because it’s a happening place in our small little town of New Richmond. After some honest feedback and practice, I used short paragraphs directly from the ICivics reading related to Natural Rights, Social Contract, and Republicanism. I introduced the terms in that order because they built off of each other and made sense.

Students weren’t thrilled about the Parafly. I heard some groans, I’m bored comments, and one kid said, “Oh my God, this isn’t ELA.” I replied, “I’m a secret ELA teacher.” After students paraphrased definitions for the Enlightenment terms, I had them copy and paste their paraphrases onto a Sketch and Tell. Then students created images for each term and paraphrased definitions.

With 10 minutes to go in class, we circled back the same Quizizz as before. This time around, class averages were as follows: 86%, 82%, 92%, 75%, 96%. Despite the moans and groans, the students realized that Parafly worked and they learned something. They saw meaning in what we were doing. They built some confidence within themselves. It was awesome.

Wednesday

Wednesday, I was using a student paced Nearpod to help students learn about the Enlightenment and its influence on government and the Declaration of Independence. The Nearpod was created as a collaboration with ICivics.

I chose this lesson because it went along with our Parafly lesson from Tuesday, and it was simple for students to advance through the slides. This was meant to build some background knowledge and help the students understand how natural rights and social contract influenced the writing of the Declaration of Independence. When I checked in on students work, students engagement was at 90%.

Thursday

Thursday I needed another familiar EduProtocol for students to introduce them to the Declaration of Independence. Last year I used a Number Mania with an article I typed up that included a lot of numbers related to the Declaration. After reading the article, I retyped some of the paragraphs to make it better. However, I decided not to do a Number mania. Instead, students created a Thick Slide.

On the Thick Slide, I had students collect 5 important facts about the creation of the Declaration of Independence. They also included an interesting number with a fact (mini-Number Mania), 2 images with captions, and a place to include examples of social contract and natural rights.

Through the years, I have noticed that students have a lack of background knowledge about basic social studies stuff. For example, some of my students have never heard of Thomas Jefferson. This shows that we shouldn’t assume that students know basic information. As a result, I had students Frayer a Historical Person – that person being Thomas Jefferson. Here are some student samples:

Friday

I wanted to keep things simple and light for today. I used a lesson I got from Peacefield History on the Declaration of Independence. I don’t normally give digital worksheets, but it had to happen.

On the slides I shared, I included videos I made where I read sections of the Declaration of Independence as I explained some of the sentences and vocabulary. The slides also contained grievances where students used icons or GIFs to represent each grievance. Finally, I included a small section for students to copy and paste examples of natural rights and social contract.