The Integration of Video :: American History :: Holocaust

As a middle school student, I distinctly remember watching Schindler's List.

Bold, based upon truth, and heart-wrenching, this 1993 film strongly moved me. That humanity could be so cruel was truly unbeknownst to me beforehand. With that in mind, I must thank my social studies teacher again and again for the early exposure. It revealed to me not only truth of humanity past but a passion to learn more.

The catch? The teacher hooked us with a real-life topic, introduced it via content, continued it via the video, and maintained the interest by looking deeper into the Holocaust topic and doing assignments based off of it.

Too often in the classroom teachers lose student interest by talking about same-old-same-old. But as a future teacher myself, I have an opportunity to make important engaging topics that are about life and the reality of it an essential thing. That said it will be my hope to do so.

If your students are struggling to get engaged - to have passion for their learning - lead them down a path where that may change. For me, it was an exciting and real-life type movie. Consider integrating reasonable and intentional films, today!

A Trip to the Holocaust Museum is another idea, a wonderful place I have visited 3x!

Here is a link to Schindler's List: Amazon:: Schindler's List (feat. Liam Neeson)

Image Citation: Wheelock, Andrew. washingtondc037.jpg. November 2005. Pics4Learning. 28 Mar 2014 <http://pics.tech4learning.com>

The Integration of Drama :: American Civil War :: Technology?

The most distinct memory as a 4th-grader that I have was when we studied, acted-out, and tested upon the American Civil War. The beauty of this teacher's creativity was that it stuck in my poorly-remembering-of-a-mind far better than I ever could imagine. Furthermore, it translated to an interest in the American Civil War that remains today.

All Rights To :: http://openclipart.org/people/j4p4n/civilwarbattle.svg ::

The trick? The teacher instigated a multidimensional lesson:

1. She began with her learning goal, which aimed in the general direction that her students would be able to understand and analyze the American Civil War. 
2. She instructed first through lecture, involved each of us in class readings, and found interesting primary sources.
3. She sparked our minds-interest further by building up this great "acting-out" of the Civil War that we were going to do once instruction on the topic diminished. Encouraging each of us to research the war, find outfits, and patiently wait to get selected to a certain side, we all eagerly looked forward to it. 

Subtly, we were taking cue after cue she through at us and REMEMBERED what we heard. In full, it worked beautifully. Test scores were undoubtedly above-par for each one of us.

How does such a tail of my history potentially impact future studies on US History in the educator's realm via technology?

Building up students interest through involved hands-on webquests, recorded dramas, or presentations of sorts really can work. In the same way as my 4th-grade teacher's plan, we as teachers today can use our technological understanding to better our students, too!

For further ideas, click here: CivilWar.Org Teacher Resources