Civil War Report Card

Students created a report card evaluating Union President Lincoln, Union Generals Grant and McClellan, Confederate President Davis and Confederate General Lee. I use this report card activity often throughout the year because it's a really effective way for students to analyze and synthesize material. It also helps students see "the big picture". Students must give a grade for each topic/person and justify the grade. Students need to argue, for example, why someone earned a B but also why that person did not earn an A. It's a higher-level activity and it generates terrific discussions.

The consensus was that, two years into the war, Lincoln, Grant and Lee earned Bs or As but McClellan had grades that ranged from Bs to Es because of his inability to consistently engage Union troops in battles and the students haven't forgiven him for not finishing off the Confederates after Antietam. President Davis earned a B, on average, but students want to learn more about him and see how he handles the later years of the Civil War.

Comments

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

Name That Executive Role!

Image
Students today learned about the many roles of the head of the Executive Branch, the President of the United States. I found several images of former Presidents in these roles--can you guess which is which? Post your answers below or email them to me. Choices: Commander-In-Chief Chief Executive Political Party Head Chief Diplomat 1.  President Eisenhower 2. President George HW Bush (on the right side of the picture) 3. President Franklin Delano Roosevelt  4. President Reagan meeting with British Prime Minister Margaret Thatcher (this one's a bit of a giveaway!)
Read more

Historical Perspective and Peel the Fruit Thinking Routine

Image
Practicing historical perspective is an essential social studies skill. Historical perspective is being able to step into a historic situation and examine the motivations, biases, and beliefs of a person or group of people. Students have to revert to the beliefs of a group of people even if those beliefs completely contradict the views we have today. They must weigh decisions based on the situation of the time, not necessarily how situations are viewed today. The C3 Framework for Social Studies states that "Historical understanding requires recognizing this multiplicity of points of view in the past, which makes it important to seek out a range of sources on any historical question rather than simply use those that are easiest to find. It also requires recognizing that perspectives change over time, so that historical understanding requires developing a sense of empathy with people in the past whose perspectives might be very different from those of today." http://www.so...
Read more

Industrial Revolution Haiku

Students have been learning about the Industrial Revolution in the mid1800s and how it changed life in New England. Today students processed their learning by creating haiku poems on the subject. They were challenged to think about and evaluate this topic within the structure of a haiku, a 3 line poem with 17 total syllables--5 in the 1st and 3rd lines and 7 in the second line. The poems have been impressive and some will be posted here soon.
Read more