You and Your Group Need to Take the Following Steps

Period 7

Situation A

Due to your expertise in United States history, you and your group have been chosen to lead the newest cabinet level department: the Department of History. The job of this new department is to advise the president on an array of issues utilizing your understanding of United States History. President Trump has asked for your help on the following questions. Your briefing to the president on these issues will help guide United States policy in these areas. You will choose ONE of these questions to examine during the duration of your tenure.

·  What foreign policy should the United States take? [isolationism, interventionism, some combination of the two]

OR

·  What economic policy should the United States take? [laissez faire, more involved role by the federal government, some combination of the two]

Situation B

Due to your expertise in United States history, you and your group have been chosen to advise numerous organizations attempting to gain social, political, and economic rights for populations who have been disadvantaged and/or experienced discrimination (e.g. immigrants, people of color, LGBTQ, etc.). You have been asked to synthesize your knowledge of United States social history to answer the following question:

·  What tactic(s) is/are the most effective in gaining rights for people who are disadvantaged? [protest, political action, etc.].

You and your group need to take the following steps:

·  Step 1: Choose ONE of the questions above on which you will focus your research and argumentation (foreign policy, economic policy, social movements).

·  Step 2: Synthesize your knowledge of the time period from 1900-1945 [the Progressive Era, WWI, Roaring 20s, Great Depression to the end of WWII]. You should think about the following [see attached to help you organize your thoughts] and blog about the lesson(s) that you have learned:

o  What specific factual information from the time period can you use to help you answer the essential question?

o  How does this specific factual information help you answer the essential question?

o  After gathering all information from the time period, what is the lesson that you have learned about American foreign policy, economic policy, or social movements? This lesson should be framed in the form of a claim/thesis and your thesis should be supported with specific evidence.

·  Step 3: Throughout the course of the project, your group needs to post a link to One news article. The news article need to be from a reliable news source and connect to your specific essential question that you are researching. Your post needs to give an explanation of the following:

o  A summary of the news articles.

o  How the news article relates to the essential question that you are researching.

o  How might the lessons of history guide you in solving the conflict associated with the article?

·  Step 4: Each individual should comment on two separate blogs that are exploring essential questions different than theirs. The comments might consist of the following:

o  Critiques of their analysis of history (e.g. specific factual information that is counter to their thesis)

o  Additional historical information not mentioned in their blog post that might support their claim/thesis.

o  Links to news articles that might be of interest. These news articles might be about current events that relate to their essential question and/or thesis.

Setting Up Your Blog

Today you will be creating your own blog page to use as an ongoing e-journal throughout the duration of this course. You will be expected to use the next couple of days to develop your blog using creative yet appropriate images, design, fonts, colors, etc. to make it your own. You need to follow the steps as well as the restrictions that are listed below.

STEP 1:Please go tohttps://www.blogger.com/startand follow the steps to create your blog. Begin by clicking on “Create a blog.” If it asks to text you a verification code, you can do that without fear of google spamming you. Don’t feel pressured for a good title – this is changeable. You cannot use your CPS e-mail. You will need to use your own g-mail account (or create a new g-mail account if you do not already have one). As you fill out the info,PLEASE BE SURE THAT YOU WRITE DOWN YOUR PASSWORD AND URL. Your password should be known by ALL members of your group so it should not be a password that you use on your own personal accounts.

NOTE:Do not use last names on the bloganddo not use specific identifiers such as your address or the name of our school. Instead, you canconsider using your first and middle names or other nicknames and for the school, simply say an urban high school high school or something like that.

STEP 2:Once you have created a blog and are logged into your blog page (which should be at the blog address in Step 1) you can add gadgets or different apps to your page. You can add any links you use often by clicking “add a link.”You might think about adding links to newspapers, magazines, news organizations, and history websites that might be useful in completing your research. You can also add Facebook/Twitter accounts of historians and/or journalists.

This is not your Facebook account. You need to be aware that this site is public, thereforeDO NOT use your Full Name on the page, DO NOT use information that a “creeper” could use to identify you. DO keep your posts, pictures, and songs appropriate.