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AnonymousAfter our discussion of the Execution of Mayor Yin and reading some of the links Clay posted I started to think of the story on Nixon's visit. How the local grocery store had these beautiful fish, not for sale, but for show for the President's visit. How can I connect this in my classroom?
My students had the privilege of going to a political rally that Vice President Biden spoke at in Bakersfield. During the rally, it was noticeable that no expense was spared to make the city and location of the rally immaculate. The "pomp and circumstance" was very apparent to anyone who was used to the area.
As an assignment, I would have my students read about Nixon's visited and compare and contrast that with the one they experienced with the Vice President. This would give them a look into China's culture and a close comparison to ours.
AnonymousSince we did not share out, I figured I would post my idea for the unit lessons that I plan to teach. My weakness in knowledge of China and East Asia is in the 19th century. I did not know too much about the Qing Dynasty, so I decided to teach about that. Our first discussion in the class were about the 19th century and Imperialism, and it is a concept that still affects us today. My topic will focus on the effects of British incursions into China during the 18th and 19th centuries. I plan to have a Socratic Seminar with my students based on 4 or 5 of the primary sources from that time: Emperor Qianlong's letter to King George III, the treaty of Nanjing, An Argument for Legaization of Opium by Xu Naiji, An argument against by Yuan Yulin, and an 1836 Letter to Queen Victoria by Lin Zexu.i will use Close reading strategies to read the documents with the students. They will also be given guiding questions to direct their analysis in defining the issues in the Opium War, characterizing it, interpreting the Treaty of Nanjing, and also exploring the Chinese views of the British. The students will also have a written component after they have the Socratic discussion.
AnonymousSometimes there is so much information that one hears about China during the Mao era that it is hard to discern what is believable. Both our government and theirs put out what they want us to know or think about Mao and communist China. I actually thought that I was learning a lot from the photos and experiences from Professor Dube. Firsthand knowledge seems more real to me. Then I can make my own judgements about the people and government. Some of what we know is supported by the primary knowledge. The photos showing the forced abortions of Chinese women were very disturbing, but also shed light on the lengths that the Chinese government went through to enforce their policy. A huge human rights violation in the eyes of the world.
AnonymousI'm sorry I missed the last session. I have laryngitis and have been without a voice for 8 days now and really did not want to pass this on to anyone. I'm looking forward to developing a unit plan on autobiographies for my Creative Writing class. I plan on having them look at some of the journals that were shared with us in class and will then have them explore the Library of Congress website (loc.gov) to see if they can find any journal/diary entries from Americans during WWII. At the end of this, they will develop a three-five page autobiography of one person based on the journal entries. Essentially, rewriting what they have read and also using some of the historical information of the war which we have used in this seminar. Hopefully they will walk away with a new appreciation of history, the real people it affected, and how to view it from many different angles.
AnonymousAs a third grade teacher, I think my students would enjoy a unit on Chinese Characters. First, I would start off by introducing students to a bit of the history of Chinese Writing. I would talk about how the symbols started as pictures that depicted the actual thing it referred to and how that developed over time. I could show them a couple of examples to illustrate this. One website with examples is http://www.china-family-adventure.com. For my next lesson I would like to teach students how to write numbers
1-10. I would teach them how to do this one stroke at a time. For my last lesson I would like to have my students make banners for good luck for Chinese New Year.
AnonymousI will probably do my lesson on the 47 Ronin, which Professor Yamashita talked about in one of his sessions. In past years, my students have always enjoyed learning about samurai, and I think this is a story that will resonate with them. At their age (13-14 years old), loyalty and fairness are very important to them.
I would like to use pictures of the graves, some Japanese wood block prints, and perhaps some excerpts from the different plays. I also heard that there is a manga about the 47 Ronin. I'm going to pick it up from the library and if it's appropriate, might use that.
AnonymousSunday was the anniversary of the attack on Pearl Harbor by the Empire of Japan. I did not realize it until it was mentioned on the news. Then I realized that not much was mentioned about it. The evening news gave it two sentences and then moved on. I began to wonder why? Why was so little done about it? Was it because it was so long ago? Was it because the U.S./Japanese relations are good so we don't want to upset that? Does it not matter anymore s nice that generation is now almost gone? I just wonder why. Or was a lot done and I am just unaware of it?
AnonymousI plan on creating a unit for my kindergarten class on the topic of the Chinese Harvest Moon Festival. I will incorporate books, pictures, slide shows and music into my lesson to teach them the significance of the festival. The students will also do a comparison on the Chinese Harvest Festival with the western holiday of Thanksgiving.
AnonymousI found fascinating the notion of Mao's little red book and the vast amount that was distributed and was considered a must-have item for the Chinese. It is known that within 10 years (1966-1967), 5 million copies were sold world wide. Back then, the total world population was 3 million. There were more copies made than there were people on Earth.
AnonymousI'm going to focus a few days on the Opium trade and the wars that resulted. I will look at the treaty and compare it with other Euro-Asian treaties.
AnonymousWhat an excellent idea! I really like what you are going to do with your classroom. Comparing President Nixon's visit to China to Vice President Biden's visit to Bakersfield will really hit home for these students because they witnessed it first hand. In addition, you're showing how we're not so different after all. Great idea!
AnonymousThe FBI has formally accused North Korea of hacking into Sony over the release of "The Interview".
http://www.npr.org/blogs/thetwo-way/2014/12/19/371894427/fbi-formally-accuses-north-korea-in-sony-hacking
A lot has been made of the events that have occurred because of the making and planned release of the comedy. North Korea hacked into Sony and released new movies and embarrassing emails from their executives about other actors. Apparently, the attack against Sony has some similar hallmarks of cyber-attacks made by North Korea in the past. Now the attacks and threats of violence against showing it have caused movie theaters and the Studio to cancel airing the film.
AnonymousI am trying to create a unit for my Creative Writing class on writing historical fiction. I plan to use some of the journal entries that we have seen and talked about in class and some of the historical documents about World War II in Japan. The idea is to have my students begin to learn how to do historical research using primary documents and translate that information into a short story using the journal entries as a basis for creating characters and scenes.
AnonymousNow tech insiders are doubting the FBI's stance that North Korea was behind the hack, even as the US places new economic sanctions on North Korea.
AnonymousI know the incident is old news, but I found the incident very interesting. When I first read about the incident, the headlines used the phrase 'cyberterrorism' which was days later changed to 'cybervandalism' in some headlines. The tone clearly being different in the latter headlines, I thought it very interesting to huge change in word choices. My friend theorized there was no hack after all, and that it was a publicity stunt by certain companies. It turns out this was more interesting than all the articles I had read online about the incident!