Tuesday, June 29, 2010

Current Events Assignment

Background:
Significant issues and events will always affect how Americans will live in the future. In order to understand these events, people can make connections to previous events and issues that have plagued our nation’s history.

Your assignment:
Every 2 weeks (on a Friday) you will bring in one current event for discussion in class. You must also bring in a connection sheet filled out.

Some general guidelines:• Each student must bring in one current event and his/her connection sheet. Each current event must be from a reliable source, such as NY Times, Washington Post, Boston Globe, etc.
•The current event must somehow have a connection to a previous historic event or theme that we have discussed in class

Example: Recently, several states have deemed President Barack Obama's health care bill because they believe that it goes against states rights. This can be connected to the nullification crisis during Andrew Jackson's presidency when several states argued that the Tariffs of 1828 and 1832 were unconstitutional for the same reason


Grades will be determined by:
•Did the student hand in both the current event and the connection sheet?
•Did the student follow the directions (getting a current event from a reliable source, emailing it to the teacher on time, filling out all the questions from the connection sheet)?
•Are the connection, stance, and summary sufficient based on knowledge from class?
•Did the student participate in the group discussion or assignment on discussion day?

If you have any questions or are unsure about your article or connection, please feel free to ask via email or after class.