Sarah Ploog

Status:

Standard:  Culture: G. Reshaping the Nation and the Emergence of Modern America, 1877-1916

Performance Expectation: Compare and to analyze societal patterns for preserving and transmitting culture while adapting to environmental or social change.

Outcome: The students will have a better understanding of the significance of culture as it is forced to adapt and change to new environments. They will also understand how culture is preserved and the importance it has.

Evaluation: Before the first day, we would assign the students to bring in the top three nationalities their families were. The discussion about the nationalities census would include:

1.)  What did you notice from the census? Are they all mostly the same or are they  different?

2.)    Why do you think that is?

3.)    What do you think it would be like if it were opposite?

4.)    Do you think this census is the same all over the US?

5.)    What does this census tell us about the US and why do you think that it?

On the second day, we would have the students write a reflection paper. The questions they would write about could be:

1.)    Was the activity easy to do or difficult? Why or why not?

2.)    Do you think it was easy or difficult for the new immigrants coming to New York to talk with one another? Why or why not?

3.)    What problems do you think the immigrants experienced when they came to America and had to communicate in a language other than their native one?

4.)    If you were an American living in New York and noticed the problems the immigrants were having what would you do to create a solution?

These discussion questions would be used in the all class discussion as well.

Curriculum: A eleventh or twelfth grade American History course.

Instruction: On day one we would take a census of the entire class' top three nationalities. We would discuss the similarities and differences and why there are so many. We would discuss how this census shows preservation of a culture and its importance. Then, we would discuss the history of American immigration in the late 1800's and the early 1900's. We would use a clip showing immigrants coming to Ellis Island from www.wikipedia.com.  On day two we would start by reviewing the basic points of the history of immigration. We would then show a clip or two from the movie gangs of New York. Then have miniature discussions about the significance of what the clip portrayed and how it can apply to the history we discussed. Then break the class into four groups. Each group will be assigned 6-8 different letters. Their job is to create a conversation using only words that start with one of the letters they received. They will work with another group and attempt to have a conversation. The sentences don't have to be complete sentences. They will write down their sentences to each other and whoever can create the most sentences in 3 minutes wins. The groups can switch to join other groups and attempt to speak to each other again. After the activity, the class will write a 1-2 page reflection paper on the activity and how it applies to the history we discussed. After they wrote the reflection paper, we would have a class discussion about what they wrote about.

Discussion Questions: See above in Evaluation