I’m so excited for our class to begin! We’ll see how the semester unfolds — and all of this is subject to change — but here’s the plan.
*Three major projects, including:
- Quality of Life. What makes a country “good” for its people? Students will be creating their own “made-up” country and then researching Central American countries to determine what factors contribute to “quality of life.” They’ll be using this information to create both positive and attack video ads for their country of choice.
- Ancient Civilizations. Students will be studying an ancient civilization of their choosing (Western Hemisphere) and creating a newscast to better understand the GRAPES of that Civilization. (G=Geography, R=Religion, A=Achievements, P=Politics, E=Economics, and S=Social Structure.)
- Fast Food Nation. Students will be researching their own food identities and then choosing one food-related issue to research the historical, economic, environmental, social, and personal components of that topic. They will be presenting their findings (and their food) at our POL (Presentation of Learning) afternoons on December 5th and 6th. I’m hoping this will be in IGNITE style — but still working on details. We hope you can join us for your student’s presentation.
*Supplemental work, including:
- Students will be participating in a stock market simulation game through howthemarketworks.com. — this will give us an opportunity to learn how the stock market works in addition to exploring some basic economic principles.
- We’ll be reading excerpts from the young reader’s edition of Michael Pollan’s The Omnivore’s Dilemma. It’s got some wonderful explanations of the origins of our food and our food choices.
- Geographic Mapping. Our focus this year is on the Western Hemisphere and we’ll be playing games to learn basics about this half of the globe.
- And hopefully lots of other fascinating ideas too (Banana economics, The Story of Stuff, The Huexotzinco Codex, etc…)
*Three ADIs (All Day Integrated) field trips
- Denver Art Museum on September 15th to see a special exhibit entitled “La Tierra.”
- Museo De Las Americas to tour the museum, learn about the history of the Tortilla (and make them too), and to learn about the art of protest on November 17th.
- And as yet an undetermined field trip on October 27th to explore the “food-industrial” complex. (If you have ideas for this, please let me know. I’m still researching possibilities.)
Students should plan on bringing a writing utensil to class daily. At this point, there is nothing “due” — but this will change as we start both the stock market simulation and the create a country project to launch the course.
Have a wonderful week! -JF