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Joseph Kepler - 'Looking Backward', 1893


My classes are in the middle of their Immigration unit and I'm looking ahead to their final project.

The essential question for the unit is, "Who Deserves to Be an American?"

Yes, I know it's a provocative way to ask the question, but that's the idea; aside from learning about an important theme from American history, I want my students to be able to look at a controversial topic from several different angles, listen to a variety of opinions, and then form their own opinions. It's not important to me what their opinions are - just that they are based on something other than gut feeling.

We do some really interesting activities in this unit, which I'll post about soon, but their final assessment for the unit is to write a research paper.