Teaching Controversial Issues: Bringing The ‘Fight’ to the Classroom

Presentation given at the 1st annual WSUNER Conference, April 20, 2013

by Kevin Lydy and Arch GrieveThe Dayton Regional STEM School

Why teach controversies?

• Some of these topics are required• Important to teach kids to argue the way

adults should be arguing• Makes students defend their arguments, not

repeat what they’ve heard their parents say• Goal is not to change their views, goal is to

help them articulate and defend their views more fully

How we’re different at STEM

• Teach units thematically, not strictly chronologically– Benefit #1: Students cover one topic multiple

times over the course of a year (e.g., WWII)– Benefit #2: Ability to cover contemporary issues

instead of “pushing for the present day”

Sample units: Struggle for Equality

• Present U.S. history from the perspective of marginalized groups; recognizing that there truly is no unified, collective voice but a common thread runs through each narrative

• Begin with the experience of women in U.S. history, then to African Americans, Native Americans, Latin Americans, Asian Americans, Arab Americans, People with Disabilities and Gays/Lesbians.

• Utilize a wide variety of resources, predominantly primary source documents and video documentaries.

• Lessons utilized come from a variety of resources, including PBS, Teaching Tolerance, Teachers Curriculum Institute, Anti-Defamation League, Ithaca College and many others.

Sample Units: Conflict and Genocide

• Don’t cover major wars that Kevin covered already• Look at Armenian Genocide, Holocaust, Cambodian

Genocide, Rwandan Genocide, Darfur, Kashmir, and the Conflict in Northern Ireland

• Israeli-Palestinian conflict is culminating project• Utilize Choices curriculum heavily (from Brown

University) for the content readings, as well as other online sources, like Frontline documentaries, the US Holocaust Memorial Museum website, etc.

• Many resources and sites are included on the handout

Content Requirements: EqualityAll within American History course title from June 2012 “Model Curricula” from ODE

Topic: Social Transformations in the United States (1945-1994) Content Statements:28. Following World War II, the United States experienced a struggle for racial and gender equality and the extension of civil rights.29. The postwar economic boom, greatly affected by advances in science, produced epic changes in American life.30. The continuing population flow from cities to suburbs, the internal migrations from the Rust Belt to the Sun Belt, and the increase in immigration resulting from passage of the 1965 Immigration Act have had social and political effects.

Content Requirements: AI ConflictAll within Modern World History course suggestions from June 2012 “Model Curricula” from ODE

Topic: Cold WarContent Statements:20: Religious diversity, the end of colonial rule and rising nationalism have led to regional conflicts in the Middle East. 21: Postwar global politics led to the rise of nationalist movements in Africa and Southeast Asia.

Topic: GlobalizationContent Statements24: Regional and ethnic conflicts in the post-Cold War era have resulted in acts of terrorism, genocide and ethnic cleansing. 25: Political and cultural groups have struggled to achieve self-governance and self-determination.

Inspiration: Equality

• Thematic curriculum from Mary Connor • Curriculum did not include gays/lesbians or

people with disabilities• Topic is more prevalent in the news• Students who identify need to understand

that they have a history

Inspiration: AI Conflict

• Ohio state standards• My own personal interest in the conflict • My own personal disgust at the partisanship

that exists on the national level for multiple issues

Integration

• Both units are integrated heavily with Language Arts classes

• Students write letters to their members of congress, so assessment is authentic

• LDC grant from Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation

Essential Questions: Equality

• What is the experience of gays and lesbians in U.S. history?

• How have societal changes in the U.S. affected gays and lesbians?

• What are contemporary issues surrounding gays and lesbians?

• What are the different opinions on those issues?

Essential Questions: AI Conflict

• How has this conflict come about? (history)• What are the primary issues in the conflict?

(history)• What do both sides believe about the other?

(empathy)• What is (or should be) the US role in the

conflict?

Implementation: Equality

• Excerpt from Ellison, Ralph. Invisible Man• Anti-Defamation League’s “A Note About

Language”• Timeline lesson plan adapted and updated

from Out of the Past: 400 Years of Lesbian and Gay History in America (PBS Online)

• Before Stonewall documentary• Stonewall Riots

Implementation: Equality (cont.)

• After Stonewall documentary• Students are then presented with their project, to write

their state senator concerning Ohio House Bill 176 which would add “sexual orientation and gender identity or expression to the existing list of protected classes (ie: race, religion, sex, disability, veteran's status, age, etc.)”

• Students need to explain the steps necessary for HB 176 to become a law

• Students are then given a demonstration of how to utilize evidence and research to support an opinion

Implementation: Equality (cont.)

• Dr. John Feldmeier, professor of Political Science at Wright State University and civil rights lawyer talks to the students

• Students then engage in a series of peer critiques as they write their letters

• Students are graded on how well their argument utilizes claim-evidence-reasoning and not on which side of the argument they choose

RubricUsing a Likert Scale of 1-5

Implementation: AI Conflict

• Intro: Israeli Rabbi Ovadia Yosef calling for the destruction of the Palestinians and the Hamas Farfour cartoon

• Begin with timeline of major events, geography, and terms primarily through lecture format utilizing powerpoint and worksheets, which lasts roughly a week

• End of first week students are given a formative assessment to determine where they are at with the material and help differentiate for their primary document assignment

• Found that students had a better understanding of the material after going through the letter-writing process

Pre and Post tests

Implementation: AI Conflict (cont.)

• Documentary entitled Promises, looking at the children of the conflict

• Begin researching primary documents using differentiation techniques and open source

• Google Docs collaboration • Guest speakers from Israeli and Palestinian

perspectives, and WSU Professors Drs. Shannon and Schlagheck

Implementation: AI Conflict (cont.)

• Students begin letter-writing process, focusing on content in history and format/structure in language arts

• Requirements are very structured and rubric very specific• Prompt: “After researching primary and secondary

documents on The Arab-Israeli conflict, write a letter to your Member of Congress that argues your positionon whether the US should support or not support the Palestinian bid for statehood in the UN. Support your position with evidence from your research. Be sure to acknowledge competing views. Give examples from past or current events or issues to illustrate and clarify your position.”

Rubric

Reflection: Equality

• Improvement:Need to ensure that students' opinions are supported by evidence that has legal standing.

• Ensure that all students' opinions are valued, but that they must be supported by evidence.

• Positive: Dr. Feldmeier’s presentation was everything that I could have hoped for.

Reflection: AI Conflict

• Improvement: Next year for I/P Conflict I want to spend more time utilizing the seminars to help go deeper into the primary documents.

• Also need a better way to share the documents peer to peer, as we didn’t come up with a standardized way to name documents in the Google folder.

• Positive: Was able to differentiate primary documents well based on student reading levels so that they could meaningfully contribute to the discussion whether they were summarizing the Oslo Accords or a three sentence UN Security Council resolution.

Doubts we have (controversial educational issues)

• The bill Kevin talks about might not go anywhere• Editing a video, ‘becoming the censor’= good idea or not?• Using Wikipedia for primary document analysis• Limiting our own biases, how do we check ourselves? (Let

them know if you take a stand or keep your views to yourself: Kevin’s HRC sticker and Arch discussing his own thesis comparing S. Africa and Israel)

• Having a unit on Gay Americans automatically puts Kevin in a position to defend

• Students providing other sources