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Subject - Teaching World History in the 21st Century - chapter 17 From - Jeremy Greene <worldhistoryteacher@hotmail.com> Date - Saturday, September 25, 2010 10:30 pm What follows are three more post on the topic of research papers -stemming from the discussion on chapter 17. In this case whether a document-based question is or is not similar to a research paper. Best, Jeremy Greene World History Teacher International Relations and Key Club Advisor Chelmsford High School Chelmsford, MA 01863 Melissa Nowotarski AP World teacher melissamauntel@gmail.com I do agree with David's [Dave Clarke] comments about realizing that each school and district is different. My English department does a fairly good job at teaching the research paper, but they don't really emphasize that until the junior year. Because I'm teaching freshman, it's just not something that I want to tackle. Besides, the skills that students practice in the DBQ are essentially skills that they practice in research paper. It is like a mini-research paper. I do peer editing on the first set of essays that we turn in. This allows students time to rewrite their paper, if they are completely off base. I have a relatively low number of students this year so I can grade each essay, but certainly David's comments about peer grading are doable as well. I do reading quizzes at the end of each chapter. This year I'm experimenting with putting them on my Moodle course and having students take them on their own time. There are constraints placed on the time and the questions are scrambled so cheating will be reduced (but I realize not eliminated). So far, this has saved me time so that I can concentrate on other things. I also make students take notes every night on a note sheet that I've created. I collect these, along with classroom materials, at the end of the unit (or period as they're calling it now in the AP description :). The notes count as a homework grades (like the quizzes) and the classroom material counts as a participation grade (showing me that they've participated in class). Those are my ideas. Hope they help someone. Melissa -------------------- Renee Tantala Milwaukee rtantala@wi.rr.com A DBQ develops deductive skills (often merely speculating on a fragment of text, taken out of context, with little or no background information). A research paper should develop inductive skills, based on as broad a range of sources that one can assemble or sample (given the time allowed for research, availability of sources, etc.). The research process should begin without a preconceived "thesis" to avoid cherry-picking. ------------------------------------------------- Melissa Nowotarski melissamauntel@gmail.com Date: Fri, 17 Sep 2010 07:17:28 -0400 X-Message-Number: 28 The process of a DBQ is the same as composing a research paper (which I taught for several years as an English teacher). You have evidence, and you have to figure out how to piece it together. In addition, if you teach to put the document # in parentheses after the use of the document you're basically teaching parenthetical citation. If I can get those ideas across to freshman, they are going to be fine writing research papers later on. In fact, one of the theories about how to teach a research paper to younger students is exactly like a DBQ. Get them a set of sources to choose from so they get the process down, and then as they get older have them do their own research. While it might be necessary for some to do a research paper in their courses, I don't find it necessary in mine. On another note, I would highly recommend Google docs to anyone who's looking to scale back their paper load. Students can now just share a folder with you once, which is a huge benefit to those of us who have difficult to spell last names. You can read over the writing, write in comments where you want, and it just seems that I write more and can do it faster than on paper. I found it hugely beneficial last year when I started it. I will tell you, though, I only use this first semester. Second semester, I have the students write their essays out (timed now according to the AP exam) so they can get use to that process. Melissa
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