Professional Development opportunities that is! The application process is open for such awesome summer Seminars such as National Endowment for Humanities or Gilder Lehrman.   Both of these seminars provide a small stipend to help with travel expenses.  I have  been fortunate enough to attend programs sponsored by both groups.  I have blogged about them in the past.  Check it out here,  here or here.  There are other opportunities out there for teachers as well.  Some you have to pay for out of your pocket and some with small stipends like these.  Keep your eyes out and take the time to apply.  It is well worth it.

It's not often you get the opportunity to spend a week with other Social Studies Teachers, learning content and touring historical places you may not have had the chance to visit before.  Who knows, you may run into me!

 thenWhether you celebrate, Kwanza, Hanukkah, Christmas, Festivus or even nothing at all teaching in the Middle of December is tough.  The days are shorter and darker.  They kids are excited and anxious for break and the teachers are stressed.  On a side note, did you know that stressed is desserts spelled backwards?  So go ahead and enjoy the endless supply of peppermint bark in the teachers' lounge.

The question becomes, how do I keep my students engaged for these last few days before the Vacation?  By the way, as I am typing this on my prep I am avoiding the giant pigsty of a desk that needs to be cleaned and the book shelves that need to be organized.  Across the hall is the music room where I have been listening to "Frosty the Snowman" and a variety of other Christmas Carols being sung loudly and enthusiastically with the eighth graders that just left my class.

Way off topic already.  So...what do I do to keep them engaged?  Why prove that Santa is real of course.  I found an old copy of the letter written by Virginia O'Hanlan in 1897 archived by me many, many years ago in my file cabinet.  

Me:  "Who here believes in Santa?"
Eighth Graders:  Eye rolls and groans
Me: " What if I told you that I had a primary source document that proves Santa is real?"
Eighth Graders: Less eye rolls and groans this time, surprisingly a few perk up to listen.
Me: "It all started when..."

I built a little background information for them by talking about the letter that Virginia wrote to the editor of The Sun in New York way way back in 1897.  We chatted for a few minutes and then analyzed the primary source using the document analysis sheet I created a few years ago.  You can find it here at my TpT store.  After analyzing the document, we watched the cartoon " Yes Virginia, There is a Santa Claus."

I found two cartoon versions on youtube, each about 22 minutes long.  The first one was the one I remembered from the 1970s and the second one was a much newer version.  Interestingly enough, I offered the choice of which one they wanted to watch.  The first group watched the newer version and the second group went for the cheesy cartoon from the 70s!
  

For some reason, the newer video is posted in 3 parts.

The second  group seemed to enjoy the activity a little more than the first.  To each his own I guess.

Teaching the Declaration of Independence usually results in groans and eye rolls.  This year I wanted to engage my students right from the get go, so I did what I do best when planning to teach concepts in a new and exciting way, troll the internet.  I stumbled across an idea to introduce the Declaration of Independence in a unique way. It is called "The Break-Up Letter."

Here is what I did...

After I greeted the kiddos as they walked in the door, I instructed them to review the Content Objective on the board and complete their warm-up activity.  I asked them to list what they know ( or think they know) about the Declaration of Independence as the warm-up.  After a few minutes I had them draw a line under the last thing they wrote, asked them to get up and talk to at least 5 different people and record the new ideas below the line. (More on this activity another time).  While they were happily flitting from person to person I pretended to find a note on the floor.  I made a big production about paper on the floor and asked all of the kiddos to return to their desks.  I told the class that I was very annoyed and tired of picking up their stuff off the floor, after all I am not their mothers.  As I was saying this, I unfolded the paper and read what was on it to myself.  Insert dramatic acting here.  Some how the kids "convinced" me to read the letter aloud.

As I read this letter, there were lots of gasps, giggles and groans.  Well groans is not quite the right word but it fit alliteratively with what I was going for.  In all reality the groans were more like "Oooooh".  Once I finished reading the letter, I refused to say who it was from at first.  After some begging and groveling from the eighth graders, I relented and said " The American Colonies."  At first there were many looks of confusion until one bright little chippy student said, "She's talking about the Declaration of Independence."  Love, love, love that the connection was made!

Boy it sure is easy to pull of a practical joke with eighth graders.  And it is not even April Fool's Day, although that would have made the joke that much better.    I deserve an Academy Award for best performance of an annoyed middle school teacher.  Well maybe not an Academy Award, but I thought my performance was pretty convincing!  

So class continued as we built some background information by reading and annotating an article on the Declaration of Independence and answering some comprehension questions.  We discussed how the Declaration of Independence is the first document of its kind, but many other people have modeled their declarations after ours.  We talked about how Thomas Jefferson was part of a committee of five men selected to draft the document.    We even learned that Jefferson made about 80 revisions and looked at the original draft, complete with cross outs and mistakes.  You can see that document here.  Through out the discussion there was the occasional ,"Wow she got us good," comment! 

So where do we go from here?  Next we will read the actual document and break it down into its different parts.  After that I want to have the students read  and analyze the deleted passage on slavery.  

You can view a brave soul, far braver than I with his video of the break up letter to his class here.

You can see another blogpost about this lesson here.  Ok, I just realized I did not include a copy of the letter.  Oops, sorry about that.  You can find the letter I modeled mine after on the blog post above listed above.