Harwood Open House
Creating Sustainable Communities Mr. Matt Henchen
CSC – Civics mhenchen@wwsu.org
How to view student assignments – Visit My Blog http://newschoolhistory.com/
Each week, I will attempt to post the following information:
- What we are currently learning about with links to resources, readings, and handouts
- What we will be studying next week with resources for pre-teaching
- A list of required tasks/assignments for each week
- Special updates and/or other announcements
***All new posts will automatically be sent out via email each week.
What is the purpose of the course? – The purpose of CSC is to help students develop the knowledge, skills, and attitudes required to become active and engaged citizens capable of making positive change in their communities.
Grades – Grades will be updated on Powerschool every two weeks. Your student’s grade will be based on their overall performance in the class assessed in relation to the following learning targets (proficiencies).
Skill-Based Proficiencies
- Self-Direction: Students are self-directed and have passionate opinions about their lives and their role in the community. They demonstrate grit, self-advocacy, and a willingness to persevere and work hard. They are able to self-critique and are willing accept criticism from others. Students can revise explanations as necessary based on personal reflection, peer critique, and/or expert opinion.
- Critical Literacy: Students can form a strong argument by locating, analyzing, evaluating, and synthesizing a variety of resources and media formats with diverse perspectives on a given issue.
- Creative Problem Solving: Students use their educated opinion to come up with an effective plan for creating positive and productive change in their community?
- Collaboration: Students can work together with others to achieve a common goal?
- Communication: Students can persuasively communicate their educated opinion through logical, well-organized, accurate and valid arguments and counter-arguments. Students can explain and defend their personal point of view on issues that affects them as well as society; use information gained from reputable sources; explain, critically evaluate, and defend views that are not my own.
- Civic Discourse and Dialogue: Students can help build collective knowledge on an issue using the techniques of democratic dialogue. Students communicate in ways that foster the exchange of ideas in a democratic society.
- **Citizenship: Students use all of the skills above to make positive change in their community. (This is the ultimate goal – the desired proficiency)
Content-Based Proficiencies
- Learning Communities: Students can explain the variables that lead to a positive and productive learning community.
- Environmental Sustainability: Students can demonstrate an understanding of the major environmental issues facing society.
- Economic Issues: Students can explain the problems and possible solutions to some of our nation’s economic problems.
- Social Justice: Students can explain the problems and possible solutions to some of our nation’s most pressing social problems, such as discrimination, prejudice, and intolerance.
- Political Literacy: Students can explain the problems and possible solutions to some of our nation’s most pressing political problems.
Assessment – How to maximize the growth of every student?
This is a work in progress as we make the shift toward proficiency based grading. However the ultimate goal of my grading and assessment system is to encourage and reward maximum growth of every student. Your student’s grade will be comprised of actual performance, growth over time, and habits of work (self-direction and effort).
Where to go for what?
Powerschool – see your student’s official ‘grade’
Shared Google Document – see your student’s progression on each of the competencies, see teacher and student comments and be able to add your own.
Class Blog – See what we are doing and view student assignments.
What will students learn?
- Students will learn how to form an educated opinion, set meaningful goals, create effective plans, and take action!
- Students will learn to how be less cynical, and more hopeful and engaged.
- Building the classroom community – students will learn how to create a healthy and productive community that maximizes learning for all students?
- Appreciating our Natural World – American youth can identify over 1000 logos but fewer than 10 plants. This lesson attempts to shift the balance of this ratio and help students reconnect to the natural world.
- What is Good, What is Better? – This lesson helps students understand the importance of considering multiple viewpoints when forming educated opinions about social and political policy.
- Gotta Get Political – This lesson helps students understand the basic political beliefs that color our political debates. Students are asked to explore a political issue from at least 4 different political perspectives and then share their research with their classmates. We will also examine the role of the media in society.
- Community Asset Mapping – This lesson helps students understand the strengths and deficits of their local community by using Google maps to create a map of important community assets. We will be working in partnership with the Central Vermont Regional Planning Board on this project.
- VOX POP Journalism – In this lesson students will interview members of the community to identify possible social problems that we will explore this year.
The rest of the year will be spent on whole class social action research projects and student-led service learning projects.
- Whole Class Community Action Research – We will look into various issues facing society from all three spheres of the sustainability spectrum: economic issues, social issues, and environmental issues. We will research, created an educated opinion and then take some form of civic action.
- Student-Led Service Learning Projects – Students will be asked to develop their own projects that tackle an issue in the community. They will be asked to conduct research, analyze various diverse viewpoints, form an educated opinion and then take action.
Below are some project ideas already under development:
- Build a greenhouse on site to provide the cafeteria with nutritious, organic produce.
- Solar panels to provide a renewable and cost effective means of providing electricity to the school.
- WNALT – “We’re Not All Like That” – Breaking Stereotypes
- Raising awareness about animal cruelty
- Building an outdoor classroom with Yestermorrow
- The Forgotten Ones – Interviews and installation art of people that our community has forgotten
- Creating a wilderness educational experience designed to bring students closer to the natural world
- Building a Sugar Shack on campus
- Rebuilding the ropes course
- Building a new series of mountain bike trails on campus
Check out some student work from last year:
http://newschoolhistory.com/2013/06/25/student-work/
Modern U.S. History Mr. Matt Henchen
mhenchen@wwsu.org
How to view student assignments – Visit My Blog http://newschoolhistory.com
Each week, I will attempt to post the following information:
- What we are currently learning about with links to resources, readings, and handouts
- What we will be studying next week with resources for pre-teaching
- A list of required tasks/assignments for each week
- Special updates and/or other announcements
What is the purpose of the course? – The purpose of this Modern U.S. History course is to help students develop the knowledge and skills required to become active and engaged citizens capable of making positive change in their communities.
Grades – Grades will be updated on Powerschool every two weeks. Your student’s grade will be based three things:
- Actual performance on test, quizzes, projects
- Growth over time
- Self-Direction and Effort
The Essential Questions of the Course
- If nations were people, what sort of person has the U.S. been? What sort of person should we be?
- How far have we come at ensuring that every American has ample opportunity to achieve the American Dream? How much further do we have to go?
