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Using U.S. History to Teach English

Using U.S. History to Teach English. By Gabriel Friedman. Why use U.S. History in an English class?. History makes language come alive U.S. History reveals our national consciousness T. Paine: In America the law is king John F. Kennedy on duty and service.

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Using U.S. History to Teach English

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  1. Using U.S. History to Teach English By Gabriel Friedman

  2. Why use U.S. History in an English class? • History makes language come alive • U.S. History reveals our national consciousness • T. Paine: In America the law is king • John F. Kennedy on duty and service

  3. Breaking Free: The Declaration of Independence • Compare the American Revolution to Brazil’s independence from Portugal • Seek to understand the United States’ founding document • Acquire new vocabulary • Learn how to use the present perfect tense

  4. Breaking Free: The Declaration of Independence • Contextualize • What does it mean to be free and independent? Is freedom as important as equality? More important? Less important? • What is the best way for a people to express their desire for freedom?

  5. Breaking Free: The Declaration of Independence • Why did the U.S. declare independence? • Did the U.S. have good reasons for fighting against Britain? • Compare Brazil’s independence movement with the United States’

  6. Breaking Free: The Declaration of Independence • Vocabulary: dissolve, impel, endow, derive, abolish, prudence, transient, usurpation, wholesome, relinquish, fatigue, compliance, inestimable, obstruct • Activity: In pairs, find positive and negative words in the Declaration of Independence

  7. Breaking Free: The Declaration of Independence • Grammar lesson: Introduce present perfect tense • Using the present perfect, students create Declarations of Independence from their parents. Ex. “They have forced me to study every day!” • Each student lists four complaints, as The Founding Fathers did • Then students can share their Declarations of Independence with the class

  8. Breaking Free: The Declaration of Independence • He has refused his Assent to Laws, the most wholesome and necessary for the public good • He has dissolved Representative Houses repeatedly, for opposing with manly firmness his invasions on the rights of the people • He has kept among us, in times of peace, Standing Armies without the Consent of our legislatures

  9. All Men are Created Equal: Race Relations in the U.S. • Identify significant moments in the United States’ racial history • Compare race relations in United States to race relations in Brazil • Examine beautiful metaphors (optional) • Grammar lessons

  10. All Men are Created Equal: Race Relations in the U.S. • The Constitution of the United States • Dred Scott v. Sandford • The Emancipation Proclamation • Martin Luther King, Jr.’s “I Have a Dream” • Barack Obama’s “A More Perfect Union”

  11. All Men are Created Equal: Race Relations in the U.S. • Contextualize • What do we already know about the United States’ racial history? Is it similar to Brazil’s? • What are civil rights? • What do you think about affirmative action? • Activity: Jigsaw reading

  12. The Constitution • Representatives and direct Taxes shall be apportioned among the several States...according to their respective Numbers, which shall be determined by adding to the whole Number of free Persons...three fifths of all other Persons

  13. Dred Scott v. Sandford • Beings of an inferior order, and altogether unfit to associate with the white race, either in social or political relations, and so far inferior that they had no rights which the white man was bound to respect

  14. The Emancipation Proclamation • On the first day of January in the year of our Lord, one thousand eight hundred and sixty-three, all persons held as slaves within any State...shall be then, thenceforward, and forever free

  15. “I Have a Dream” • I have a dream that one day this nation will rise up and live out the true meaning of its creed: "We hold these truths to be self-evident: that all men are created equal”

  16. “A More Perfect Union” • But I have asserted a firm conviction – a conviction rooted in my faith in God and my faith in the American people – that working together we can move beyond some of our old racial wounds, and that in fact we have no choice if we are to continue on the path of a more perfect union.

  17. All Men are Created Equal: Race Relations in the U.S. • Closing Discussion • What are race relations like in Brazil today? Have they always been that way? • Having explored these texts, how do race relations in Brazil compare to those in the U.S.? • How can we confront and eliminate racism in our own country and abroad?

  18. Final Questions • How can teachers explore grammar using these classic texts and speeches? • What challenges face the English teacher who wants to use history in his or her class? • What steps can the English teacher take to overcome those challenges?

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