And Now for Some History (Click for Project Description)
Teacher Reflection: When I was a freshman in high school, I still felt so far away from what people were calling the "real world". However, the reality is, I was 15 years old and I was only 3 years away from my right to vote. When I turned 18, I felt a little lost in college as my roommates and friends passionately argued about which propositions they would be voting for and which candidate they thought would make our country better. I eagerly devoured pamphlet upon pamphlet. I wish I had done this sooner so that I would have had time to look at the biases in the things that I was reading. Fast forward a few years, and I was excited about politics. I was reading the news constantly and having provocative debates with my peers, many of whom walked into college able to do so. I sometimes wonder if I had encountered these passions earlier, if I would have pursued a different field. Students in this project were extremely receptive to the different court cases that we encountered. They debated big ideas with passion and with empathy. I constantly quote Aristotle in my classroom: "It is the mark of an educated mind to be able to entertain a thought without accepting it." Students were able to discuss the ethics of pro-choice and pro-life as they explored the nuances of the Roe v. Wade case. Students discussed affirmative action. They debated about privacy and about rights. I was really impressed with students' abilities to hear thoughts that were different and contradictory to their own. I enjoyed the final product immensely because while students worked on the art piece together and agreed on the summary of the case, their separate thoughts (which were often contradictory) both allowed to exist on the page together. If I were to do this project again, I would find another place to publicly share our knowledge. I would also love to do a live debate on some of the topics that were discussed in class, as I think students and community members would be engaged in something like that. Overall, I was really excited for the end product! It was lovely to see all of the thoughts on the page and students respectfully discussing topics that adults often struggle to wrestle with.
Student Reflections:
This project we worked in pairs, my partner was David. For this project we each got a supreme court case, my case was about Affirmative Action. My partner and I worked well together in terms of turning our work in, but we both have very different political views, so we had a hard time agreeing on our case, and spent most of our work time in academic debate. We had conversations that showed me empathy to two sides of an argument, and I realized I was growing a lot as a person from this conversation. If I could go back In time I would thank Miss Carol for this project because it really pushed my thinking and grew my empathy. I think this project I grew a lot in oral communication/collaboration in my academic discussions, but I learned a lot more in content. Before this project I didn't know what the supreme court was, or how interesting it is to interpret law. Now, I am very interested in law and I know that the supreme court is the highest judicial court. As I mentioned earlier, I think I learned a lot about empathy in this project, when my partner and I were having academic arguments I started to realize that there are two sides to every story, and that it is good to hear different opinions from yours. For example, when I heard my partner talking about how he thinks affirmative action Is unfair, he made a fair point that It is racist because race plays a role in acceptance. My partner couldn't make it to exhibition, but I did a great job with my oral communication skills talking to guests, I even got one lady to engage in a full on argument with me about my case(I won.) To be honest, I did most of the work in this project, which means I need to do a better job of including my partners and giving them clear instructions on what to do. Overall, I am super proud of my growth in this project.
~Gus K.
Student Reflections:
This project we worked in pairs, my partner was David. For this project we each got a supreme court case, my case was about Affirmative Action. My partner and I worked well together in terms of turning our work in, but we both have very different political views, so we had a hard time agreeing on our case, and spent most of our work time in academic debate. We had conversations that showed me empathy to two sides of an argument, and I realized I was growing a lot as a person from this conversation. If I could go back In time I would thank Miss Carol for this project because it really pushed my thinking and grew my empathy. I think this project I grew a lot in oral communication/collaboration in my academic discussions, but I learned a lot more in content. Before this project I didn't know what the supreme court was, or how interesting it is to interpret law. Now, I am very interested in law and I know that the supreme court is the highest judicial court. As I mentioned earlier, I think I learned a lot about empathy in this project, when my partner and I were having academic arguments I started to realize that there are two sides to every story, and that it is good to hear different opinions from yours. For example, when I heard my partner talking about how he thinks affirmative action Is unfair, he made a fair point that It is racist because race plays a role in acceptance. My partner couldn't make it to exhibition, but I did a great job with my oral communication skills talking to guests, I even got one lady to engage in a full on argument with me about my case(I won.) To be honest, I did most of the work in this project, which means I need to do a better job of including my partners and giving them clear instructions on what to do. Overall, I am super proud of my growth in this project.
~Gus K.
During this project, I collaborated with one of my classmates. We split the work between the two of us. She drew a picture to represent our case while I wrote a summary of the case. We finished it with writing about our thoughts on the case. I think splitting the work helped the project go a lot easier. I think an area we could grow in was working together and not working with us both on different sides of the classroom. I was able to use work ethic, collaboration, oral communication, written communication, and content. I used work ethic when putting together my thoughts for the case because it was hard to summarize up such a big case. But I was able to figure out how to make a paragraph of a summary I wrote to be simple and to the point. Collaboration is one of the main things I used because we were both able to give each other critique which is something our school focuses on a lot. Those were the two main things I used during this project. I learned about the court case Terry v. Ohio which put a law in place that an officer may search the public as long as the officer truly believes that person is suspicious of something. I used respect in this project because when you’re working with someone else you have to respect the other person and make sure whatever you do is also benefiting them. The final product turned out really well. I was able to summarize the court case really well to explain everything that happened but make it short and simple. The drawing also really stands out and pulls the whole court case together to look awesome! I used oral communication after the project was over for our team’s mini-exhibition on our court cases. This is an event open to the public so I had other people outside of my classroom coming up to my table and asking about my court case. I think I did a good job at explaining my court case to others and hopefully they learned from what I had to offer as the summary and drawing.
~Grace J.
~Grace J.
For this project, we were tasked to explore some of the most important Supreme Court cases with a partner. We would have to do a summary of the case, our thoughts on the case, and an art piece to represent the case. First, we did initial research on the case that our partner and I drew randomly. Next, we brainstormed on how we would like to create an art piece to represent our case and how we connected to the case so we could give our response to it. We then did a rough draft of our art piece, summary, and our thoughts.We got critique from our peers, then went on to make our final draft. When our work was done, and we were proud of it, it was time to present it in front of an audience. We had a mini exhibition to present our work to the public and get their feedback on the work that we did. Overall, this project opened our eyes to how one case can build its way up to the Supreme Court, and change the way we live our lives today. My group for this project was made up of just me and my partner Ethan. we worked extremely well together to get all of our work done in a timely fashion and make it something we were proud of. In terms of collaboration, we made sure to communicate with one another of what work we were going to do, and when we should be done with it so we could move on to the next thing. Also, if one of us did not understand something that the other person did we would make sure to explain it to each other so we both had an understanding of what we were doing. Without doing those things, we wouldn't have had as good of an understanding of our case, and we would not have been able to challenge ourselves to create a piece of work that was more than we needed to do. Some areas I could grow as a group member are to step down a little bit more and listen to what my partner or group has to say. I need to learn how to really listen to their ideas, and even if we have different ideas work on merging them into one greater idea. Overall, my partner and I for this project worked extremely well together and if we had not worked that well together we wouldn't have been able to come up with the products that we did and been as proud of it as we were. In terms of our classes learning outcomes, I feel like I met them all, if not exceeded them all. for work ethic, every time we had the opportunity to have open work time in class to work on our case, I always spend every second of that time putting 100% of my effort into my work to get it done. Also, after I receive critique from my peers, I use all the critique to create a better product and did not stop until I felt like it exceeded the expectations. in terms of collaboration, my partner and I for this project work extremely well together to get our work done, I gave other groups good critique so they could improve theirs as well, communicated to my teachers and my partner of what materials we needed to make our art piece, and when we could stay in to get extra time to work on our piece. For oral communication, once again I communicated with my teachers and my partner that we had all of the materials to get what we needed done, and so my partner and I both knew what we needed to do, what time it needed to be done by, and if we both felt that it exceeded the expectations. With written communication, I gave good critique to other groups when we had Gallery walks, and when making our summary of our court case and our own personal thoughts, I made sure to be specific with dates and everything said by the court and the opposing party. I also made sure to put my personal thoughts into it, without just putting my emotion on the paper, but also how this case affects my everyday life and if how this case did not turn out the way it did, how my life could be different. With content, my partner and I both made sure that every piece of work that we presented and turned in was not just meeting the expectations, but exceeding them. For our art piece, instead of just drawing a picture, we created a 3D pop-up that represented our case. We were extremely specific with the summary of our case to make sure that the reader could get an accurate representation of when and how this case happened. Without doing all of these things, I would not have been as proud of the work that I created. With our class values, I made sure to be aware that I was doing them, because if not most of the learning outcomes would have been harder to make sure I was doing. With empathy, I made sure to understand why we couldn't do something a certain way, or why we had to hold off on doing something. With Grit, my partner and I didn't stop until especially art piece look the way we wanted to. Since we took a challenge option and did a pop up it was more difficult and took more time to finish. As we saw other groups already having finished their art pieces, it made us want to hurry with ours but instead we stayed in at lunch and took our time on it so it ended up the way that we wanted to. We made sure to be responsible and not lose any of our work for materials, we made sure to respect each other and what we had to say about our case. We also stuck to our word with what work we were going to do and that we were both going to put 100% effort into that work. Doing these things kept my partner and I from being mad at each other or just not understanding why we felt a certain way. Overall, I felt as if this project let my partner and I demonstrate our creativity and ability to find ways to connect two things that maybe we normally wouldn't. I feel like I added a lot of creative ideas and Grit to the group, as well as some ideas that will probably too big for this project. If I had to grade myself on our learning outcome in class values I would give myself an A plus, because I feel like the whole project I was aware of everything that needed to be done, how we could get it done on time, and make sure it exceeded all the expectations. Doing these things, made me extremely proud of the work that my partner and I produced.
~Allie L.
~Allie L.
