Toto, We're Not in Kansas Anymore...

 

This week we did a lesson on Populism, a social and political movement of western farmers and laborers in the late 1800s.  One way to hook the students into the ideas and concepts surrounding this topic is to explain the popular theory that Frank L. Baum wrote The Wizard of Oz as a parable on Populism. Supposedly, many of the characters in the story represent ideas and concepts of this movement.  This connection to The Wizard of Oz was first introduced by an American high school teacher named Henry Littlefield in the 1960s.  You can read his original essay here.

I put up pictures of various characters from the book/film on our bulletin board as visuals. I love this lesson because as the students make connections between our discussion of the Populist movement and various characters in the film, I can see little 'light bulbs' going off in their minds via the expressions on their faces.  It's really fun and engaging!

Monopoly & Lemonade

This week we did one of my favorite lessons of the year...one that I actually first created and used during my student teaching at Orono High School 8 years ago.  I always try to think of creative ways to engage my students in the topic we are discussing. Currently, we are learning about inventions, industrialization, and the rise of big business during the Gilded Age.  Some key concepts and vocab for this lesson involve...

-social Darwinism/ survival of the fittest
-laissez-faire capitalism
-monopoly
-trusts & corporations
-vertical & horizontal integration


The students were asked to do a background reading on these concepts and fill in a worksheet before coming to class.  To reinforce and engage the students in this topic we played this:

Yup...it's the classic game of real-estate adventures...Monopoly!  What better way to discuss the topic of monopolies then to play Monopoly?

The students get SOOO excited when they walk into the room and see these four board games set up at each group of desks!  Little do they know, there is a twist waiting for them...

At each group, I have placed 4 or 5 envelopes.  In each envelope there is a predetermined amount of money and property, representing different social classes in society.  The envelopes are placed face down before the students come to class and they say "Do Not Touch" so they  won't know what is in their envelope when choosing a seat.  When told to do so, they open their envelopes and find out whether they are a 'captain of industry', part of the middle class, or on the low end of the totem pole...

I have them play the game for about 15 minutes, just long enough to either amass more wealth or lose so much that they either forfeit or have to take out a personal loan from another player.  Playing the game in this fashion acts as a spring board for a great discussion about social class, survival of the fittest, luck and pluck, what it takes to be successful in business, and, of course, monopolies. Here are a few of the discussion questions after the game (click on the picture to enlarge):

Here are a few more pictures of the students playing the game:

To finish the lesson I also have the class create a fictitious lemonade stand...

We discuss various strategies that one would need to use to make their business profitable.  This leads into my explanation of how Andrew Carnegie used the strategy of vertical integration to dominate the steel industry and how John Rockefeller used horizontal integration to dominate (and create a monopoly of) the oil industry.  This is a fun and practical way to explain these somewhat complicated ideas in a friendly and relatable manner.  

As a side note, here is a really tasty and simple lemonade recipe!  My Period H class had fun making it... they were my last class before February vacation and thus they got to actually make the lemonade so that the lemons didn't go to waste!

Chat Time!

As part of our new unit on the Gilded Age and Progressive Eras, we just started watching the film Gangs of New York.  Instead of pausing the film every time I want to point something out or every time a student has a question, I create a private chatroom at TodaysMeet.com.

TodaysMeet is a really cool (and free) resource for teachers and presenters who want to encourage a backchannel chat amongst their students or audience.  Backchanneling allows conversations to go on while something is being presented.  In this case, we watch the film while having an online conversation.  I can also print out a transcript of our conversation to give to the students as notes.  How cool is that?  Most students seem to really like this activity because it takes something they love to do (chat online) and allows them to do it with a purpose!  This type of 21st Century activity would not be possible if it weren't for the 1-to-1 laptop initiative, so I am very thankful for that!  Check it out in action:

I'd also like to give a shout out to Mr. Richard Byrnes, whose blog I follow to get lots of cool ideas on how to integrate technology in my classroom.