The Acropolis in Our Lesson Plan

On Monday and Tuesday my students will be looking at Greek Architecture in part using the History Channel movie above.  Here is the entire assignment. 

Alexander the Great: Horrible Histories

Pythagoras and the Golden Ratio

Studying Greece? Do your students know the Golden Mean? That's the ratio of 1.618. It is Ф. The Greek letter Phi. It is better known as the Golden Ratio, Golden Mean, Divine Number, or Golden Section. Pythagoras first discovered the ratio while playing a monochord (a simple, single stringed instrument).

Fakebook & Greek Gods

I have used Fakebook for a few years with my WHI kids to have them make comments between the gods.  Fakebook lets students create comments and posts, upload pictures (or have them chosen from the Internet) and even add in video.  If you watch my video above, it explains how to do all of this.   For what it is worth  there is also a FakeTweet and a FakeText.

The whole idea behind using Fakebook is having the kids summarize and synthesize what people might say to each other.  So here is my assignment (which you could copy and tailor to your own needs).  The kids really enjoy the assignment and the best part is that the Fakebook site creates a unique url and lets the kids add in their own password so they can work on the site on multiple occasions. 

School on a Snow Day

I will admit that I can't get away with this with all of my classes, but my AP Comparative (which is AP US Government and AP Comparative in one year) is a motivated bunch. So while today is our second snow day (actually a "cold day" since it is 5 degrees right now) we have managed to work around the day off and not miss any time.  How you ask?

1. For my online kids I use Blackboard Collaborate so I created a class and gave my brick and mortar kids the link back in late October and we all agreed that at 10 am on a snow day we would have class.  24 of my 30 kids made the class and the others watched the session which was recorded.  
2. If you don't have something like Blackboard Collaborate you could you a Google Plus Hangout live stream where you could send a link to your students and they could watch a live lecture (here's how).    You could then use Today's Meet to send a link to students and you could see their live questions.   You would be able to do this by splitting your screen. 
3. Today based on what we are doing I decided not to how an online session and instead made the video above as both an introduction and a continuation of our material.  Then my kids will watch this video and look up these court cases.  
4. I communicated with the kids by using Remind101, Blackboard and even using my gradebook which has all of the kids' emails.  For the Remind101 message I used a shortened tinyurl (tinyurl.com/fcpscoldday) which linked to my normal homework e-sheet. so I didn't have to text the kids multiple times with the assignments.  
5. We will start our class on Thursday with questions (several have already emailed me with some) and then take a quiz where the kids can use their notes.  Then we will move on and still be able to have our test next week without a hitch. 
6. So if you have a motivated bunch and you can afford to miss a day of school you might want to try some of the techniques. 

Take My Course

I will be teaching the sixth version of my technology integration course with Fairfax County Public Schools this spring.  We will learn about such items as webquests, pacing your students individually using technology, flipping the classroom, using electronic textbooks, collaborating online, how to use Google Drive and lots more in a ten week course.  You can get more details here on page 42.  To sign up go to MyPLT (if you need help go to page 72) and put either the title or just a few words from the title or even e-mail me and I can add you to the class.  The deadline for signing up is January 17th.

The class will be on Thursdays from 4:30 to 7ish at Woodson.  It is free to FCPS employees, but if you live in the areas and are not in FCPS you can take it, but you have to pay for it (page 9).  The class fills up quickly, so if you are interested I would sign up sooner rather than later.  If you have questions, please e-mail me at ken.halla@fcps.edu. 

Historians Debate Origins of WWI on Twitter

Who started World War I?  Three respected historians, Simon Schama, Tom Holland, and Gary Sheffield tweet their views.

It all started earlier this month when British Education Secretary, Michel Gove, argued that the war was started by Germany and that it was a just and noble war for England.  Gove also attacked liberals, specifically the movie, "Oh! What a Lovely War," and "The Monocled Mutineer and Blackadder" as "a series of catastrophic mistakes perpetrated by an out-of-touch elite."

Russell Tarr, a history teacher who developed the site, Active History, sent out a tweet which started a discussion about the origins of World War I with  the three  historians. 

Tarr developed an awesome worksheet for his students  using the tweets from the historians. The worksheet contains all the tweets along with links to a BBC 4 Radio appearance by the three historians as well links to Secretary Gove's original remarks.

Students read the tweets and the articles and then discuss and debate the different views.

Great Prezi: Sunni Shia Split

Here's a great Prezi about the Sunni Shia split. It's excellent and worth showing when teaching the rise and spread of Islam. I posted it on my World Religions blog a few weeks ago. I post a lot of material about all the religions, some of which might work for World History.

British Education Secretary: WWI was Noble and Just Cause

   
Understanding diverse interpretations of history is what makes the subject interesting. Often there are no clear answers.  But Michael Gove, Secretary of Education in Britain and pictured above, believes that World war 1 is an exception.

Gove seems to think that there is only one way to look at World War I.  He believes that the Germans caused the war and that liberal historians distort that view and that movies like "Oh! What a Lovely War," and "The Monocled Mutineer and Blackadder" are "a series of catastrophic mistakes perpetrated by an out-of-touch elite."

Gove argues further that the war was " a noble cause" and a "just cause." He adds,  "the ruthless social Darwinism of the German elites, the pitiless approach they took to occupation, their aggressively expansionist war aims and their scorn for the international order all made resistance more than justified."

Historian, Sir Richard Evans, responded to Gove by saying, "How can you possibly claim that Britain was fighting for democracy and liberal values when the main ally was Tsarist Russia? That was a despotism that put Germany in the shade and sponsored pogroms in 1903-6.”

Who says that history is boring?