Day 2 – Promoters of Change or the Status Quo

Yesterday we started a history unit where I “put the standard out there for the kids to OWN,” as Michelle commented on yesterday’s blog post. Here is the standard:

Understand the role of individuals and groups within a society as promoters of change or the status quo.

  • Understand that specific individuals and the values those individuals held had an impact on history.
  • Understand significant events and people, including women and minorities, in the major eras of history.

I was impressed with the work the students have done since yesterday. Some of the students are doing more predictable subjects in history–those who have promoted change and those who have promoted the status quo:

  1. Rosa Parks
  2. Ku Klux Klan
  3. Martin Luther King, Jr.
  4. The North and South in the Civil War

Some students have found lesser-known people in history who have done great things:

  1. Augusta M. Hunt – Relative of Helen Hunt who was a leader in women’s rights in early 20th century Maine
  2. Benjamin O. Davis, Jr. – 1932 West Point grad and Tuskegee Airman
  3. Lucy Terry Prince – Former slave, amateur lawyer and poet
  4. Kenneth James Weishuhn – a 14-year-old aggressively bullied to death by promoters of the status quo
  5. Elias Clayton, Elmer Jackson, and Isaac McGhie – three black circus workers who were lynched in the northern city of Duluth, Minnesota
  6. Pearl Harbor and the United States’ neutrality in early WW II. They are asking an interesting question. Is there really such a thing as neutrality or was the U.S. promoting the status quo by trying to stay out of the war?

The last two days we have had rigorous and relevant historical conversations.

Update – Here’s my report after we finished.

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