Goal for the day: To understand the context for today's immigration reform debate
Before moving on to immigration reform, I felt obliged to share just a bit more about the climate deal struck last week between President Obama and the Chinese leader. I showed this clip from PBS News Hour as our opener.
I then asked where the students families are from. We learned that Keagan's family arrived from Europe via Argentina, that one side of Riley's family emigrated from Russia and came through Ellis Island, and that Rachel's grandmother was born in the U.S. but her parents were from Mexico. When discussing immigration reform it's important to realize that unless your ancestors are Native American or were brought to the U.S. in chains, your family's history is one of immigration.
To understand this history a bit better, we divided into six groups with each group taking one part of this timeline of important moments in immigration. Groups studied their time period and then reported out to the group. I filled in a couple of additional results, which resulted in this summary timeline of important events in our history.
I then showed this clip about the connections between U.S. foreign policy, gang violence, and the current refugee crisis. Our own foreign policy and international trade are all part of the immigration puzzle. It's important to think broadly about the issue.
I then passed out separate articles to each of our six groups. Each group got started reading their article, filling in notes into packet 2, and preparing to report out important points to the whole class. All these articles and additional radio and video clips for this group activity are on my Student Resources page.
We'll pick this group work up on Monday.
Homework due Monday, November 17th
Reading Getting to Maybe about the negotiations of the Gang of Eight that forged a compromise bill in 2013 on immigration reform. No other piece of homework will better prepare you for your Senate role than this article. Answer the questions on this article in packet 2.
Before moving on to immigration reform, I felt obliged to share just a bit more about the climate deal struck last week between President Obama and the Chinese leader. I showed this clip from PBS News Hour as our opener.
I then asked where the students families are from. We learned that Keagan's family arrived from Europe via Argentina, that one side of Riley's family emigrated from Russia and came through Ellis Island, and that Rachel's grandmother was born in the U.S. but her parents were from Mexico. When discussing immigration reform it's important to realize that unless your ancestors are Native American or were brought to the U.S. in chains, your family's history is one of immigration.
To understand this history a bit better, we divided into six groups with each group taking one part of this timeline of important moments in immigration. Groups studied their time period and then reported out to the group. I filled in a couple of additional results, which resulted in this summary timeline of important events in our history.
I then showed this clip about the connections between U.S. foreign policy, gang violence, and the current refugee crisis. Our own foreign policy and international trade are all part of the immigration puzzle. It's important to think broadly about the issue.
I then passed out separate articles to each of our six groups. Each group got started reading their article, filling in notes into packet 2, and preparing to report out important points to the whole class. All these articles and additional radio and video clips for this group activity are on my Student Resources page.
We'll pick this group work up on Monday.
Homework due Monday, November 17th
Reading Getting to Maybe about the negotiations of the Gang of Eight that forged a compromise bill in 2013 on immigration reform. No other piece of homework will better prepare you for your Senate role than this article. Answer the questions on this article in packet 2.