Tuesday, April 8, 2008

Objectives:
After this class, students will be able to:
a. consider the media's portrayal of teachers and education.
b. define terms related to education.
c. read and analyze an education study.

Agenda:
1. Warm-up: Students will answer the following question in their notebooks: How are teachers portrayed in the movies and on TV? What kinds of things do they do? How do they interact with their students?

2. Today's Vocabulary:
a. Private School - an alternative to public education, tuition-based, requires the student to apply for admission, selective, not open to all.
b. Parochial School - one type of private school, usually religious-based
c. Homeschooling - students are schooled at home, usually by their parents, based on the choice to opt-out of public education, occasional oversight by the government but mostly unregulated

3. Article for reading and discussion:
"Gifted Black Pupils Found Pressured to Underperform"

Pre-Reading Questions:
a. What does it mean to "act black"?
b. What does it mean to "act white"?
c. Is there a middle ground - can a person act both black and white or are they mutually exclusive (one or the other)?

Post-Reading Questions:
a. What does it mean to underperform?
b. Do you agree with the article's definition of acting black? Why or why not?
c. If 60% of the students in the survey felt that acting black was negative, how many students is that?
d. Of the suggestions made in the final paragraph, which one do you think will help students most and why?

Homework: There is no homework assigned for this class tonight.