Student Blogs 2010

FACING HISTORY AND OURSELVES CLASS OF 2010

This is the third year I will have the privilege of teaching Facing History and Ourselves course at Westborough High School. Because it is a semester course - I have been able to learn from my students each semester and put needed changes into effect before the next semester’s classes began.

Thus, the class I taught the very first semester is not the class I just finished teaching in the spring of 2010. Let me be totally honest - the first year I taught the course - I wasn't exactly sure the best way to convey the material to the students. I admit it freely given the student responses you're about to read. During that first year, I gave quizzes and tests and made seniors, who had one foot out the door, do projects and a killer research paper.

In essence, that first year, I drove the students crazy and they did not get the real “Facing History” experience. More importantly, they never achieved “civic agency.” More about that in a minute. In the second half of this year, I dropped the quizzes, tests, added a research project and discovered objective participation as a criterion for grading. With these changes I observed students discussing the content of the course with each other unlike any other class I have ever taught since becoming a teacher. In addition, I found that I could have the most amazing conversations about the content of the course with the students by conducting the class in this manner.

Because Facing History and Ourselves is an unleveled elective, there are Advance Placement students mixed in with the most academically challenged students in the high school. In most class discussions, you could not tell the difference and the students mention this dynamic in their blogs. The last semester of this year, I changed the course yet again – given my observations and student feedback – and made blog postings and the creation of a “reflective essay” blog project the centerpiece of the course.

This semester the students finally achieved “civic agency.” This term applies when a student has made an intellectual, moral and emotional connection to the content of the course. Bottom line, as the kids would say, "I got it!"

With “civic agency”, I am able to put the students on the streets of Berlin in 1939 and they understand exactly how and why most of the people living in Nazi Germany are able to treat Jewish people and other “undesirables” of the Third Reich as they would vermin. The students learn that when someone asks, “How was someone like Hitler able to come to power and do what he did?” it is one of the most dangerous questions in the world, because it means there is no memory of how and why the holocaust was allowed to happen.

What am I teaching to the students who are taking Facing History and Ourselves? The students themselves best answer that question and they have done so in the “blogs” they created at the end of the course. In these blogs, you will find that every student mentions the same words repeatedly. Words like, “bully”, “victim”, “bystander”, “rescuer” and “respect.” They talk a lot about respect. These words are the lexicon of Facing History and Ourselves.

If you ever get the opportunity to take the week long Facing History and Ourselves seminar during the summer you will better understand the power of the course and the reason many students end up saying, “This course changed my life.” There is not a doubt in my mind, after reading what the students have to say in the following blogs, that Facing History and Ourselves should be a required course in every high school in the United States.

Mr. Gallagher
Social Studies Department
Westborough High School


Facing History and Ourselves Student Blogs of 2010

http://mikelisblog.blogspot.com/2010/05/what-facing-history-and-ourselves-meant.html

http://jillcafarobs.blogspot.com/2010/05/what-facing-history-and-ourselves-means.html

http://orfaofaceshistory.blogspot.com/

http://allisonswhatfacinghistorymeanttome.blogspot.com/

http://ryansantomsblog.blogspot.com/

http://jarheadblogs.blogspot.com/2010/05/what-facing-history-and-ourselves-meant.html

http://osmanalnaal.blogspot.com/2010/05/osmans-blog.html

http://myfacinghistory.blogspot.com/

http://allisonbernice.blogspot.com/

http://facinghistoryandourselves.blogspot.com/

http://stephkwon.blogspot.com/

http://mollyfacinghistory.blogspot.com/

http://rgdiv.blogspot.com/

http://brian-leslie.blogspot.com/2010/05/what-facing-history-and-ourselves-meant.html

http://aferraro2671.blogspot.com/2010/05/what-facing-history-and-ourselves-meant.html

http://whatfacinghistoryandourselvesmeantome.blogspot.com/

http://jakesharkey.blogspot.com/2010/05/what-facing-history-and-ourselves-meant.html

http://sarahstoddardsblog.blogspot.com/

http://juliansullivan.blogspot.com/

http://fhaoimpact.blogspot.com/

http://pappazisisblog.blogspot.com/

http://wwwfacinghistorysanj.blogspot.com/2010/05/how-facing-history-and-ourselves.html

http://vaughnsewellsblog.blogspot.com/2010/05/sample-blog.html

http://elblogodefoy.blogspot.com/

http://andrewlabelle.blogspot.com/

http://tfranksblogspot.blogspot.com/

http://marianeleite.blogspot.com/

http://rachelreflects.blogspot.com/

http://erniepile.blogspot.com/

http://lookingbackonfacinghistory.blogspot.com/

http://elariasblog.blogspot.com/

http://rachelfacinghistory.blogspot.com/

http://whatfacinghistoryandourselvesmeanttom.blogspot.com/

http://haeminburke.blogspot.com/2010/05/what-facing-history-meant-for-me.html

http://tomoconnorsblog.blogspot.com/

http://pauldriscollblog.blogspot.com/

http://ethanhoellfacinghsitory.blogspot.com/

http://blogsaregreat12.blogspot.com/

http://saraortizc.blogspot.com/2010/05/what-facing-history-and-ourselves-ment.html

PERIOD 2 - "THE PIANIST"

The motion picture, The Pianist is the true story of Wladyslaw Szpilman who was the most accomplished piano player in Poland, if not all of Europe, in the 1930s. This film does an excellent job of explaining why it became impossible for the Jewish people living in Europe to escape the Nazis and the plight of tens of thousands of Jews living in Warsaw. Post a reflective comment about the film and respond to at least one other student’s comment.

PERIOD 7 - "THE PIANIST"

The motion picture, The Pianist is the true story of Wladyslaw Szpilman who was the most accomplished piano player in Poland, if not all of Europe, in the 1930s. This film does an excellent job of explaining why it became impossible for the Jewish people living in Europe to escape the Nazis and the plight of tens of thousands of Jews living in Warsaw. Post a reflective comment about the film and respond to at least one other student’s comment.