Welcome to a new school year!

Welcome to my class blog, 7th & 8th grade students and families! First, I want to apologize for the lack of indentation and spacing in this post; there seems to be a glitch in the system because in my draft the spaces appear, but when I publish the post they go away! I am trying to get help to rectify this annoyance! I am hoping to upgrade to a class website as soon as possible, but until that is finalized, I will continue with this blog. I had a great summer, but it went fast because it was so full! I spent a week at the MAGE Summer Institute at Macalester College in St. Paul (which happens to be where I did my undergrad), played a show with my band, and spent the rest of break traveling with friends and family. I traveled to Boston, Maine, New Hampshire, Connecticut, New York, St. Bart's, Detroit Lakes, and Vancouver! So definitely a whirlwind, but very, very fun. I hope you all had an enjoyable summer, too. I really believe that Social Studies as a discipline empowers individuals to be engaged, conscientious citizens in our democracy and aware, informed, empathetic members of the global community. To me, Social Studies is fundamentally about people and their stories; Social Studies is a place where we take time to analyze how human institutions act upon and are shaped by people; it is a place where we weigh our options and develop our worldview. We have such an archive of stories and examples to help guide us in making the world a more equitable, peaceful, happy place for everyone! Here's an overview of Social Studies this year: 7th Grade: Throughout the school year we will study the time period roughly between the 1890s to the end of WW2 in 1945; a large percentage of that time is spent covering U.S. history, but we do a fair amount of world history, as well. We rely heavily on Upfront magazine to keep us up to speed on current events, and the kids just love this publication every year (so do I!); we will regularly work in geography skills and content (map quizzes are a regular feature), and briefly touch upon some basics of government and economics as needed to contextualize the history content. I love to use literature in my Social Studies classes (I used to teach a course that combined Language Arts and Social Studies skills into a two hour block), so memoirs and novels will be a big part of our class; I really believe that literature brings the content to life and helps students to connect and empathize with the characters as representations of historic perspectives. I still remember characters and stories from elementary, middle school, and high school! Reading is powerful. We will begin the year briefly reviewing the Gilded Age and European colonialism to give context to our focus unit, "American Imperialism/Expansionism"; under the umbrella of this unit are sub-units such as Cuban Independence and the Spanish-American War. To support this unit we will read the novel The Surrender Tree by Margarita Engle, a work of historic fiction written entirely in free verse poetry from the perspectives of six different but related/tangentially related characters; this will support Mrs. Kempf's opening unit in Language Arts about poetry. Later this quarter we will study WW1; as the year progresses we will begin work on a long-term research project; there will also be some opportunities for extra credit reading projects both during the quarter and over breaks. 8th Grade: 8th grade Social Studies continues, more or less, from the point where 7th grade Social Studies leaves off-- with the end of WW2 in 1945. We will spend the first part of this quarter learning about systems of government and economics so that students can meaningfully understand what we will study for almost the remainder of the year-- the Cold War. By the end of the school year we will have learned about the latter half of the 20th century, some units focusing on U.S. history, others on world history. Geography skills will be worked in as often as possible, with an attempt to align the geography content with the history content whenever possible; students will take map quizzes, but not as regularly as in 7th grade. As in my 7th grade Social Studies classes we will read lots of great literature in 8th grade Social Studies! Extra credit reading opportunities will be available again, although this year I've decided to allow students to complete extra credit reading and related projects throughout the quarter, as well as during breaks. We won't start reading our first novel in Social Studies until about midterm, but students will read the book Code Talker with Mrs. Kempf in Language Arts; I'm really excited about this because Code Talker is about the Navajo "code talkers" in WW2, which is the unit this year's 8th graders ended on just a few weeks ago at the end of 7th grade Social Studies; we placed the novel here deliberately to maintain the flow of content. After Mrs. Kempf's classes finish reading Code Talker, then we'll begin reading the novel Year of Impossible Goodbyes, by Sook Nyul Choi; this will again flow seamlessly from where Code Talker leaves off! Year of Impossible Goodbyes is a work of historic fiction from a Korean perspective during WW2; the novel begins in Korea under Japanese occupation nearing the end of WW2 and ends with the beginning of the Cold War as it manifested itself in the newly divided Korea-- Soviets in the north, Americans in the South. Later in the quarter we will study the decline of the European colonial system and learn about Indian Independence (i.e. Gandhi), as well as the end of the Apartheid system in South Africa (i.e. Nelson Mandela). Later in the year we'll begin work on a new long-term research project. Mock Congress Elective: Some 7th and 8th graders are scheduled to take Mock Congress with me this year! This is a new course offering at Paideia and will meet once per week, all year. We'll start the year by learning about the legislative process. Once we have a handle on that we'll simulate the Minnesota State Congress, debating and "voting" on bills that are on the floor of the MN House and Senate; then we'll repeat the exercise as though we are the U.S. Congress. Later in the year we'll create our own bills-- all of which are aimed at community service projects-- and pass some into law. (Hopefully we won't have too much gridlock! ;) ). Depending on how much time we have left at the end of the year, we may or may not enter into some comparative politics, where we would look at other legislative systems throughout the world and compare them to our own. I will continue this year to post announcements, reminders, homework due dates, and upcoming quiz dates on my class Twitter account: @MsHoodsHoodlums@twitter.com This is merely one quick, easy tool of communication; it is by no means required of students or their parents/guardians and is not the only (or even the primary) method of communicating. It's just easy and lots of people are already on Twitter, so it's an option. Data Driven Instruction (DDI) quizzes will continue this year; DDI quizzes happen near the end of each quarter and are graded for middle school students. I'm excited to start the year with returning students and families, as well as to meet and get to know new students and families! Please never hesitate to contact me with questions, concerns, and constructive feedback, and thank you in advance for your support! Sincerely, Ms. Leah Hood