Thursday, December 20, 2012

12/19-12/20

Yesterday in history we took notes on the Civil War through 1862. We talked about the First Battle of Bull Run and what each side was expecting out of the battle and how they were prepared for it. We also talked about the battle along the Antietam Creek and how it was the bloodiest day in American History. Then Lincoln made issued his Emancipation Proclamation and read a paper about that.Today was the last day of history before break! In two groups we answered questions about either Gettysburg or Vicksburg and then made large billboards about the battles.

Tuesday, December 18, 2012

11/17-11/18

Yesterday in history we did a QR code scavenger hunt on the Civil War. We got to choose our groups this time and my group consisted of me, Jess, Sarah, and Cara. We had trouble getting all of the right answers and figuring out which ones were wrong but it was still really fun. Today in history we talked about habeas corpus and Lincoln's right to suspend it. Habeas corpus says that people can not be held in prison with out just cause. During the Civil War, Lincoln suspended that right and imprisoned those who spoke or acted against the Union and in favor of the Confederacy.

Friday, December 14, 2012

11/13-11/14

Yesterday in history we talked about Lincoln's view of the Union. He thought that the Union was everlasting because the Constitution contains no way to destory itself. He described secession as anarchy and refused to look at the South as seceeding and just saw them as states in rebellion. Today in history we went to the computer lab and worked on a slideshow presentation on the North vs. the South. There were three different sections to the presentation and we broke up into three groups to fill in the corresponding slides.

Tuesday, December 11, 2012

12/10-12/11

Yesterday in history we learned more about Lincoln an what happened after his election. Of course we did this with a whole slew of papers we had to read and answer questions about.
Today in history we learned about South Carolina and their reasons for seceding. Many papers were involved.

Sunday, December 9, 2012

12/6-12/7

Yesterday in history we took a test on the 1850s and today was a half day so we did not have class.

Wednesday, December 5, 2012

12/4-12/5

Yesterday in history we looked at a political comic about the election of 1860 where all of the candidates were ripping a map of the U.S apart except for John Bell who was trying to glue the whole thing back together. Then we watched a video about the south succeeding.
Today in history we had an Ed Cafe and had to argue that our VoiceThread person was the most important to the 1850s. Also, today is the last day of my thirty day challenge! Finally! To celebrate the end of of it, I sent a letter to myself. All in all I did not like having to this at all.

Sunday, December 2, 2012

11/29-11/30

Yesterday in history we learned about john Brown's raid of Harper's Ferry. We read a paper about what happened and then we read different accounts of the event told by people on different sides. For my thirty day challenge I wrote another letter to Jess. Today we did not have history because during E period we had to get ready to take the PLAN test.

Wednesday, November 28, 2012

11/27-11/28

Yesterday in history we learned about Dred Scott's lawsuit against his masters to free himself and his family. We also took notes on how slaves were not considered people, they were property and therefore could be taken anywhere free or not. For my thirty-day challenge I started a letter to my friend Sara who goes to Waring. Today in history we talked about and watched a video about the election for U.S senate in Illinois between Stephen Douglass and Abraham Lincoln. Then we got a couple of papers. One had parts of speeches they gave while running and the other had questions for us to answer about them. For my thirty-day challenge I finished the letter from yesterday.

Monday, November 26, 2012

11/19-11/26

Last class was last Monday and it was so long ago I have no idea what we did. I'm pretty sure we got a lot of papers though and had a discussion about them.
For my thirty- day challenge I have written a couple of letters to my sister at college, a letter to my friend Emily, a couple of letters to post secret, and letters to various family members. I am finding it very difficult to write a letter a day an often only remember right before I'm a noir to go to bed. But the people I've been sending them to have mostly written me back and said that they really liked receiving them.
Today in history we learned about how Kansas and Nebraska became states and the chaos it caused. Stephen Douglass wanted to organize the unorganized territory and so he made them states and decided that they would solve the issue of slavery with popular sovereignty. A bunch of chaos inside and 200 people were killed in only a couple of years.

Tuesday, November 20, 2012

11/16-11/19

On Friday in history we read a chapter from Harriet Breecher Stowe's Uncle Tom's Cabin this chapter was about a woman named Eliza that ran away from her master with her two children. He master is trying to hunt her down and hires two men and their dogs to do the job. For my thirty- day challenge I sent in an application letter to e a CIT at a summer camp. Over the weekend for my thirty-day challenge I wrote letters to My granparents. Today in history we talked a little bit about the chapter of Uncle Tom's Cabin we read and then we talked about the fugitive slave law. Te fugitive slave law said that anyone caught helping slaves whether directly or indirectly would be fined a sent to jail. This helped the slave owners, because many people started to comply to this law and turn in slaves just out of fear. For my thirty-day hallenge I wrote another letter to my friend Priya who wrote me back from the first letter.

Friday, November 16, 2012

11/14-11/15

Yesterday in history we read textbook excerpts on the mexican war and compared what each of them said. Then we watched a video on the Mexican War and its effects. At the end of the video we took a short quiz on what we had seen. For my thirty day challenge I wrote a letter to my sister at college. Today in history we learned about what happened after the Mexican War and chose what we would do or what decisions we would make if in the postitions that the U.S. leaders had been in. For my thirty day challenge I wrote a letter to my friend Hannah who lives in Salem.

Tuesday, November 13, 2012

11/9-11/13

On Friday we took notes on the anti-slavery movement and on how slaves escaped to the north using the Underground Railroad. Then we got several excerpts from textbooks on the Underground Railroad and we looked at their similarities and differences. For my 30 day challenge I wrote a letter to my friend Sara who goes to Waring High School. This weekend for my 39 day challenge I wrote letters to family members in other states. Today in history we went to the computer lab and filled in two papers about a map of slavery in the U.S. and the Missouri Compromise. Today for my 30 day challenge I wrote a letter to Jess.

Wednesday, November 7, 2012

11/6-11/7

Yesterday in history we finished the papers we started on Monday and while we were doing that, we went up one at a time to vote on who we thought should be president, who should fill the spot in the senate and go should fill the seat in congress. Then looked at different parts of the Constitution and determined whether or not each part supported slavery. For my 30 day challenge I sent a letter to my friend Priya wo is going to a boarding school in Connecticut. Today in history we learned about slavery in the early U.S an the invention of the cotton gin. Then we read either the "Mudsill Theory" by James Henry Hammond or "Slavery's Opponents and Defenders" an answered questions about them. Today for my 30 day challenge I wrote a letter to Post Secret.

Monday, November 5, 2012

11/2-11/5

On Friday in history, in groups we read stories about slavery. Two of the stories were just different parts of the same story. The story I read was about a young slave girl who was treated so well as child that for a while she didn't even know she was a slave. When she was old enough to start doing slave activities, she had fun an was treated fairly by her mistress. After reading the story we had to summarize it, create a storyboard for it and make a question about it. Today in history we shared our information from the stories and filled in a venn diagram about them all. Then we got into new groups and read about different people and their thoughts on slavery. For my 30 day challenge I sent a letter to my cousin in Arizona.

Sunday, November 4, 2012

30 Day Challenge

For 30 days, I am going to write a letter everyday. I always wish that I would get a letter in the mail, but I never do. The only time I ever get a letter in the mail is when it is a thank-you note, which are all the same. So, I am going to write and send a letter a day for 30 days.

Tuesday, October 23, 2012

10/22-10/23

Yesterday in history we learned about and took notes on the Revolution at a time when the colonists felt defeated and like they had lost. We looked at another map on the projector. Mr. Boyle also moved the date of the memorization quiz back to Thursday. Today in history we did a partner scavenger hunt using QR codes.We had to search around the first floor for different QR codes to scan. Each code gave you a question about the American Revolution or described a battle and then we had to answer the question/give the battle name and give the date.

Thursday, October 18, 2012

Civic Values in the U.S

10/17-10/18

Yesterday in history we filled in our papers with summaries of the different parts of the Declaration of Independence. Then as a class we compared Brutus' trust of the other conspirators to stand with him through out the whole thing versus the signers of the Declaration adding their signatures and binding themselves to the document. Brutus trusted the people's word although if things had started going downhill for the conspirators they all could have just left and lied about their involvement. Today we had a sub and we read Thomas Paine's Common Sense. It was written to get the American colonists more pro-revolution and anti-Britain. In the southern colonies, most people were Tories and supported the crown. Thomas Paine wanted to change their opinions and make more than just 1/3 of the country support the revolutionary cause. After reading it, we had to write an essay either agreeing or disagreeing with the statement "these times (2012) are still the times that try men's souls."

Tuesday, October 16, 2012

10/15-10/16

Yesterday in history we presented our Revolutionary Replica "guests" to the class. We each gave a short presentation about our guest that included eight to ten important and interesting facts about them and how they were important to the revolution and share what was in their pocket and why. Everyone was really nervous and uncomfortable while they were presenting and so was I. It was really nerve wracking to talk in front of the whole class like that. Today we worked in groups of four to decipher what the Committee of Five was talking about in different parts of the Declaration of Independence. We then made a fake tweet from one of the committee about that part and went to a bitly site to shorten the link.Then everyone put their links on the projector so that in our respective groups we could make a website that had all of the other websites on it and we could read everyone else's tweets. This is the website that my group made: http://krunchd.com/055d

Friday, October 12, 2012

10/11-10/12

Yesterday in history we learned about the Battle of Concord and Lexington and the Battle of Bunker Hill. On the projector, Mr. Boyle had a map of the Battles that showed where the British and American troops were located and where they moved to. Using that, we were able to see how the battles played out and effected what the troops did next. Then we took a few notes on what we had just learned. Today we were handed a paper on the way into class and split up into groups based on that paper. In our groups we read papers about the Olive Branch Petition, the Common Sense Pamphlet or James Chalmers' Plain Truth. We had to figure out the purpose of each document and find quotes to prove it. We then got into another group with people who had all different documents and we shared the information we had with each other and then with the class.

Wednesday, October 10, 2012

Ed Cafe Presentation

https://docs.google.com/presentation/d/1XGb3SPG4pirbLuicwwDe_cbwmeKl8UpZXiS05InVoPc/edit

Tuesday, October 9, 2012

10/5-10/9

On Friday in history, we reviewed what we had learned during the EdCafe. We learned a lot during it, but the conversations we had weren't as good as the first Ed Cafe we did because none of us knew very much about the events we were discussing, so we had to learn about them before we could talk about them. After we talked about the Ed Cafe, we read a poem about Paul Revere's ride and then learned what really happened that night. Today we watched a short speech/lecture given by a man on witness accounts and whether you can trust them in court or not. Then,we worked in groups of three or four and read a short primary source about Lexington and Concord and who fired the first shots of the war. Then we gathered with people from different groups and learned about what their source said. Some people said that the British started the war and some said that it was the Americans and we had to decide whether or not the sources could be considered accurate or not.

Thursday, October 4, 2012

10/3-10/4

Yesterday in history we went to the computer lab with our Ed Cafe group and made a presentation on Googledocs about our topic for the Ed Cafe to be put on the wiki for people to use. My group was the Boston Tea Party with Andrew, Colin, and Jimmy. We made slides on the events leading up to the Boston Tea Party, what really happened during it and the reactions and repercussions of it. Today in history, we had the Ed Cafe. We got to listen to someone from each group talk about their event/topic and then discussed it with the other people sitting there. In some groups you would spend the whole time talking about it and arguing different view points on it and in other groups you would only talk for the first minute or so before running out of things to talk about. It all depended on who else was in the group.

Tuesday, October 2, 2012

10/1-10/2

Yesterday, we spent the class going over our homework from the weekend. The homework was on the three colonial sections of the early U.S: New England, the Middle, and the South. It focused on the differences and similarities between them. Then, once we had finished going over the homework, with a partner or two, we wrote down what we thought the average citizen from each section would look like and made a voice recording of that. Today, we learned about George Washington as a military leader with respect to the French and Indian War. The war started because the French had land west of the Appalachians that the British wanted. The British eventually won the war and then prohibited colonists from settling there so as not to disrupt the Native Americans living there. This made George Washington and other colonists who had helped win the war feel disrespected and like their efforts were for nothing.

Sunday, September 30, 2012

Comic Stips

Massachusetts police officers have to be very vigilant. They always have to be alert and watchful for crime and bad behavior Massachusetts students and teachers have to respect each other for class to run peacefully.

Thursday, September 27, 2012

9/26-27

Yesterday in history we had and Edcafe. We split up into different groups and taught each other about the different freedoms guaranteed to us by the 1st Amendment to the Constitution and then led a discussion about that freedom. We had each been assigned a freedom to teach everyone else about. We started with freedom of religion, then freedom of speech, then freedom of the press, then freedom to peacefully assemble, and ended with freedom to petition. I had freedom of assembly. Today we took a quest on the Constitution. There were five sections on it. A fill in the blank section, a section where you had to identify which branch of the government did what job, a defining terms and names section, a section where we had to memorize the Preamble, and a short answer section.

Tuesday, September 25, 2012

9/24-25

Yesterday in history we read a paper called "The Bill of Rock and Roll Rights" this was about a hypothetical situation in which Madonna goes to perform at a farm party on a Sunday. The cops show up and everyone is arrested and put on trial. The party goers had to spend one day in the stocks, Madonna was sentenced to death by hanging after her second trial, and the man who threw the party had to wait a year in jail before a trial and then another year before it was decided that he would be banished and have his farm sold to benefit his favorite charity. We then had to determine which of everyone's rights guaranteed by which amendment were taken away from them in the story. Today we talked about the first party system of the U.S., which included the Federalist party and the Democratic-Republican party. The Federalists were primarily made up of wealthy business men who wanted a physically and militarily strong nation and a strong central government. The Democratic-Republican party was mostly made up of farmers and landowners who thought that the people should have the power through the government at the state level and did not want there to be any adding to laws at the national level, only at the state level.

Friday, September 21, 2012

9/20-21

Yesterday in history we were handed either a federalist or anti-federalist paper and split into partners with someone else who had the same paper as us. Then, with our partner we filled out a paper that went with the one we were handed on our way in. Later we got a new partner and shared our information with them. We then used that information to create a fake pro-federalism or anti-federalism magazine cover Today was a half day and we did not have class. We only had C period and some of B before going to an activities assembly for the rest of the day.

Tuesday, September 18, 2012

Info-graph


Spreaker

9/17-18

      Yesterday on our way into class, we were handed a document on different "plans" for the executive branch of government called "One President or Three" . Then with the people that we happened to be sitting with, we read the document and filled out a paper about different aspects of each "plan"-the Virginia Plan, the New Jersey Plan, and the Hamilton Plan. At the end of the class we discussed our answers with everyone.
       Today we were handed papers on our way into class again. These were on the three branches of government. We then filled out the first page of the packet and on the back of that page we glued descriptions of the governments system of checks and balances into sensical places. Then we divided up into groups and made info-graphs on the three branches. We were supposed to do this on a technological device but a lot of people had trouble with the website and just drew an info-graph.

Friday, September 14, 2012

9/13-14

   Yesterday in history we split up into groups of three or four and shared the information we collected from the readings from Wednesday. In each group there was at least one person who had read about either unicameral Congress versus bicameral Congress, election by the people versus election by state legislatures, or proportional representation versus equal representation in Congress. We then took more notes as a class on those topics. Today we just discussed what has happened so far this year and Mr. Boyle cleared up any confusion that anyone had. We talked about the syllabus and how it has been hard to stick to it with the BYOD pilot. We also talked about upcoming due dates and Mr. Boyle explained some of the assignments to us again.

Wednesday, September 12, 2012

9/11-12

   Yesterday in history we learned about the Preamble. There were pages at different desks around the room and on each page was a phrase from the Preamble. In groups we went to each page and wrote down what that phrase meant to us and how it works currently and how it is not currently working. Today we split into groups of three and read about different people at the Constitutional Convention and their views on state representation. We then made fake Twitter conversations between those people defending their opinions.

Thursday, September 6, 2012

Actifacts To Describe Me


        I would also want a photograph of what I look like now to be found with me. That way, it would be easier for the scientists to figure out my age, gender, nationality, and anything else they would be able to determine from my physical appearance. Also, if they found a picture of me it would help my memory live on and people would be able to picture the face on my skeleton. I would want this so that when the scientists are working with and studying my skeleton it is a more personal experience not for me but for them. And they would remember me as who I am now, not as a skeleton.

        Another artifact I would want to be found with my body is a Vaccines CD. The Vaccines are my favorite band and perform some of my favorite songs. I would want one of their CD's to be found with me so that along with recognizing me from the picture, they would be able to recognize the music I like and maybe be able to tell what type of person I am based off of it. I want the scientists who find my body to know me on a more personal level than just by my decayed body.

         If my body was found 100 years  from now, I would want a tennis racket to be found with me. I spend a lot of my time playing tennis. My whole family plays, I take lessons, and I play on the Triton tennis team. This would also help the scientists know me better. Also having a tennis racket by me when I died could mean that I died in a tragic, athletic tennis accident. Which would be cool because I would have died doing something that I love.