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= Welcome 8th Grade Advanced History Students! = So what is history? Why is it important? What does it teach me? How is it revelant to my life? Sound familiar? well it should, it is what I hear every year from incoming students. If I am being honest, it also comes from students who leave my class every year. Now I love history and I love the study of it. It is exciting to read about the exploits of Thomas Jefferson, the tribulations of Lewis and Clark, the contradictions of Aaron Burr and the passionate people that have created this amazing country that we call home. Now if you have ever read a textbook, especially ours, you will find one thing that rings very true.....it is BORING! Every section, every chapter is filled with information that you can easily google and find. I know, I know you must be thinking you are the teacher! How can I say these things, well I fell in love with the stories of strong people and the events that formed their lives and the life of our country. WE are now the strong people who are creating and guiding our country. A little scary? YEAH! There is good news, there are millions of people who have come before us who have screwed up, made mistakes, lied, cheated and created MAJOR issues (Hitler...yeah!) so there are places where we can learn what not to do! For example don't send a group of soldiers up a hill again and again if you see the first time it did not work for you (General Robert E Lee). Gheesh, come on you are supposed to know your stuff! Now to find these amazing and creative people you need that boring book I mentioned before, your textbook! What you should really be doing is reading the textbook looking for the mistakes, the amazing people, blundered events, the scandals etc that pull you in, that make it interesting. Then go an google them, read about them, find out what it was that made them tick. This is where it gets interesting, and not only interesting but, dare I say it, FUN! The point is that there is so much we can learn from these amazing people to help us create this world we live in. It is my greatest hope is that you will be the next changer, creator, molder, or designer of your/our future! WHAT WILL YOU CHANGE?

Visited: Good start Ashok

Whenever you are going to evaluate anything in this class keep in mind the acronym P.E.R.S.I.A. Remember the following movie and use the information from it to make better evaluations for your various podcasts or blog postings.

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