Course title: Freshmen Seminar (History)

Teacher: Biko Eisen-Martin

General Course Description:

We will start out looking at your own personal identity and heritage. Who are you? Where do you come from? How do you fit into the world around us? We will then expand our lens to look at various structures of identity such as culture and race. In these units, we will look at case studies of different peoples and their experiences in the United States depending on their own personal or group identities (including youth identity and American identity).

Second semester, we will be focused on issues directly facing youth today: Healthy decision making, substance awareness, sexuality, and gender identity to name a few. This semester's work will also be grounded in academic case studies that look at the evolution of these issues over time. Second semester, we will also devote significant time and energy to a culminating project that explores various movements for social change in the world.

Goals/Objectives:

Students will engage in critical thought as they explore multiple forms of text (oral, written, visual, etc.). They will learn to analyze, question, and react to multiple points of view. They will be expected to understand bias and its role in human thought and action.

Students will interact with others in their learning community in a positive and cohesive manner. They will learn to give and take within a diverse environment. They will be expected to be self-reflective, thoughtful, and explorative. Most importantly, they will learn to respect themselves and those around them.

Course content:

Essential Question: Who am I and how do I fit into our diverse society?

Units

1. Culture, Community, and Human Nature
   How do we define culture?

   What are our sub-cultures?
   Focused look at ethnic and teenage culture
   
   What are our common cultures?
   Focused look at American, CAS, and classroom cultures
   
   What is Cultural Relativism?
   Focused look at point of view and perspective

2. Race, Power, Discourse
   What are the definitions and origins of Race? Does Race Matter?

   Privilege, Power, and racism

   Emphasis on stereotyping: case study of Arab-Americans

   What is Alliance?
   The classroom community as a live model

3. Adolescence - Social Issues
   What messages do teens receive from the media?

   Focus on music, film, and advertising industries

   How can we learn to make healthy decisions?

   Focus on Values, Sex-Education, Substance Use/Abuse, Nutritional Choices

   Theory in Practice

   Focus on the Global HIV/AIDS crisis and Eating Disorders

4. Identity - Teen Culture
5. Why is Gender Identification important?

   Female and Male Societal Development

   What is sexuality?

   Homophobia and the link to sexism

Grades/Credits:

Students will be assessed throughout the year in a variety of ways. Semester grades typically break down as follows:

Journal: 30%
Projects: 20%
Essays/Writing Assignments: 20 %
Tests/Quizzes: 10%
Current Events: 10%
Respectful Participation: 10%

-Journals are collected once every 4 1/2 to 5 weeks.

-Students can expect one major writing assignment per quarter

-Students can expect one major project per quarter

-Current events credit can be fulfilled in a number of ways. Students will be expected to do one per semester.

-Respectful participation is earned through on-time, daily attendance, and positive classroom conduct.

Instructional Materials:

Students will need:

- A 2-inch binder with 6 dividers (note: the same 2-inch binder is good for all CAS 9^th grade classes, however each class will need its own dividers)

-A Mead or Alco Composition book, with lined paper. This will serve as your journal.

-A collection of pencils, pens, and highlighters

-loose leaf paper in your binder

Texts we will use:

• Students will be given unit readers, in which all reading materials for that unit are available. They will be expected to bring this to class each day.
• Readings are pulled from a variety of sources, including "Facing History and Ourselves" curriculum guides, Reel Bad Arabs, 75 Readings, Ophelia Speaks, Ask Me If I Care, "The San Francisco Chronicle", "The New York Times", just to name a few.

Suggestions for Independent work:

-Students should always be scanning the newspaper for current events which relate to topics we discuss in class

-Other outside readings that are relevant to class discussions