Monday, February 9, 2015

I Teach in Fake Life!!!


This is the million dollar question that I struggle with on a daily basis. Teaching an AP class makes you feel like you teach in augmented reality, thanks CB.  My kiddos are asked to do so much in so little time. 50 prompt driven Multiple Choice questions, 4 short answer questions, 1 document based question, 1 long essay question all  have to be done in little over 3 hours. In my opinion it is not really fair but what I do know is that I am just a little minion to the CB.

I do not have time to cover all the little things in US History, this year the CB had a redesign for APUSH and I have to say I like the changes for the most part. It is the lack of resources and scoring guidelines I hate.  Should I spend time going over the little parts of US History or should I spend time going over the big ideas and hope the little things stick?  This year I have done the least amount of "flipping"I have ever done. I am spending most of time going over process and skill vs content. I honestly feel I am cheating my kids because we are not covering all parts of US History. There are days where it seems like my kids understand the process or skill then tomorrow comes and I feel like I am 4 steps behind.

Is this what I am supposed to be blogging about?

The following Historical Thinking Skills are the most important for my kids to understand where everything falls in line for US History.

 Historical Causation, Intended Audience, Point of View, Purpose are the areas I have spent the most time in this year. However, there are many more they have to know like Continuity and Change over Time, Periodization, and synthesis. It never stops in APUSH.

Well I have to get back to the #flipclass chat. Let me know if you read this.