Jimmy to “Dubya”

Jimmy to "Dubya"

How did they do?

A Web Quest for secondary U.S. History students.

By David Farrar

Introduction The Task Resources Process Evaluation Conclusion

Introduction

We all have our opinions as to which of our Presidents was the greatest. Was it Lincoln because of the Civil War, Washington because he was the first, FDR because of the Depression and WW II? History students never seem to think of more recent events and people as being important. In this project you will be asked to research one or more of the five most recent Presidents and what went on during their administrations.

The Task

A group of historians has been asked to evaluate the most recent Presidents and their terms in office to in order to determine which did more for the country and during whose term the country was better off. You will assigned to one of six groups of historians. Five groups will be preparing presentations supporting one of the five and showing why their President should be ranked higher that the others. The other group will be a panel making the final evaluation based on the presentations and the criteria.

Research all five Presidents and important events during their administrations.

Learn the basic history of the United States since 1970.

Specifically be able to present important information on the following: politics and domestic policy, science and technology, the arts, and world events and foreign policy.

Rank the Presidents based on the following criteria:

Leadership qualities
Character and integrity
Political skills
Domestic policy
Foreign policy

Be sure to include a variety of items in your presentation.

Pictures

Songs

Legislation

Humor (editorial cartoons etc.)

Films

Politics

Media

Primary documents

Diaries

Artifacts

Etc.

The five groups will make their presentations using a variety of methods. Power point, video, posters, dramatic presentation or any thing else you can think of.
Each group member will be expected to contribute to the project. A self-evaluation and a group evaluation will be turned in.

Resources

Although this is a Web Quest a variety of other sources should be used as well. History books, biographies, magazines, newspapers are a few examples.

Internet sources

http://www.portraitofamerica.com/html/section_1.html -this site rates our current President.

http://www.infoplease.com/spot/presrankings1.html-explains-how to rate Presidents.

http://www.squirrelnet.com/search/ratings.htm -listing of top search engines

http://www.allsearchengines.com/-same -same as above

http://www.brown.edu/Administration/George_Street_Journal/v22/v22n18/helen.htmlhttp://www.brown.edu/Administration/George_Street_Journal/v22/v22n18/helen.html -brief ratings of recent Presidents

http://www.presidential-facts.com/ -facts about G.W. Bush plus links.

http://www-libraries.colorado.edu/ps/gov/us/election.htm -information on recent Presidential elections.

http://www.thepresidency.org/research.htm -more detailed information on all Presidents.

http://www.netcolony.com/news/presidents/ -comprehensive source of Presidential information.

http://www.ibiblio.org/lia/president/ -very comprehensive site with many links.

http://www.cnn.com/ELECTION/2000/transcripts/121300/bush.html

-George W. Bush speech.

http://members.aol.com/IceCold966/index1.html - Biographies and pictures

More information is available by simply typing in the name of the person you wish to find out about.

Process

This lesson will require work in class and out of class. While most of the work will be done on the Internet there are other sources of information that should be used by group members.

There will be six groups consisting of from three to five people. Since this is a group project with a group grade it is important that every member of the group contribute.

Each group member should be responsible for a particular area. The work can be divided by the criteria, or you may choose to have part of the group build the support for your argument while the others try to refute the others.

Groups should consider how to best present their position. PowerPoint, video. Audio, a newspaper, graphs and charts, posters and collages are only some of the possibilities. Please feel free to use original materials and tasteful humor.

Internet information should be gathered and saved on discs. Backup is recommended.

The assembled information should be examined and the best selected for use.

Each group should organize their presentation to the committee and the rest of the class. It should be kept in mind that you are not only learning about recent history but are teaching others.

The presentations will be given in class.

Each person should turn in a summary of what their contributions and what they learned from the lesson. A self and group evaluation should be included here. This should include your opinion as to how each member of your group contributed to the final product.

All materials used in the project should be documented using Turabian citation style. This includes pictures. Remember plagiarism is stealing and lying.

Evaluation

There will be several methods of evaluation used group and individual, teacher and student. The research process, group cooperation, knowledge of the topic, ability to defend a position and debate, and the presentation will all be considered as well as your summarizing essay and evaluations.

Excellent Good Adequate Poor

Research	Effective use of time. Universal involvement.	Busy most of the time. Some seemed more so.	Fairly busy and effective.	Lack of concentration
Knowledge and debate	All obviously well informed.	Quite knowledgeable.	Somewhat informed.	Barely a clue.
The presentation	Effective, original and accurate.	Did the job.	A bit short of effective.	Went through the motions.
Essay/Evaluation	Shows effort, well written and processed.	Processed and fairly well written.	An acceptable piece of work.	Better than nothing.

Conclusion

Hopefully you have accomplished what few high school history students have ever done and learned United States History right up to the present. You have honed your skills as a researcher and reinforced your writing abilities while becoming knowledgeable of recent history and current events. One of the goals of this project is to get you interested in current events and create an awareness of how the actions of politicians and governments can affect our lives.