Day 70: Why Japan and China are not "practically the same"

Students will be able to analyze political cartoons for persuasive techniques and purpose.

First off, the Library of Congress site is incredible.  I pretty much ripped off the entirety of today's lesson from them.  Fantastic site.  We looked at numerous current and historical political cartoons and examined them for symbolism, exaggeration, labeling, analogy, and irony.  We also had several mini history and culture lessons along the ways, explaining nuggets of wisdom such as:

• the entirety of the Arab Spring and current events in Egypt - in 5 minutes
• why "Asians" "Japanese" and "Chinese" cannot be used interchangeably.  I guess it's good they learn this at 16, right?  
• who Kate Middleton is and why her pregnancy made the news (I was surprised they didn't know this)
• why California's 25% high school drop out rate is bad - "'cus like, the majority of them graduate, so what's the big deal?"  

We also looked at a few cartoons from the election, and only once today did I hear the phrase, "It's 'cus he's black" uttered.  I think we are making progress.

Anyway, it was an entertaining followup to yesterday's lesson on procedural texts.  They wrote they own how-tos, and I got all sorts of responses, from the basic "How to make a paper airplane" or "How to make a peanut butter and jelly sandwich", to "How to rob a bank", "How to take a pee", and "How to hug a live polar bear."  I'll try to share some with you tomorrow.

One period tried to convince me the blank was a cactus or a sun.  "Yes Virginia, those who don't graduate grow up to be cacti."  That was my smart-aleck end-of-day response, and I feel a little guilty - but he was being a clown.

This inspired the nationality debate...a WWII comic drawn by none other than Dr. Suess.

Finally, at 6:47 AM this morning on my rural town's AM station they played a country song with the lyrics, "And if they don't arrest us, we'll be there for Christmas in Texas."  Now don't that get you in the spirit of the season.