Mr. Brilla's Musings

Welcome:  Here we are, our last full week before parent-teacher conferences and Thanksgiving break. In the spirit of Thanksgiving, I did want to be sure to take some time to thank you all. I have been having an absolute blast this school year with my students because they truly are a fun bunch of kids. I appreciate the opportunity I get to teach this group of students.   I showed a great video from Goalcast this week about choosing how you show up and trying to be the best and happiest version of yourself on a consistent basis. The talk, given by Ryan Estis, is about a quick interaction he had with an impactful barista while traveling for the holidays. I hope you watch the video and enjoy it.  This Past Week: Monday:  We started the week by taking a look at a painting called "American Progress" to introduce the idea of Manifest Destiny to the students. The students also watched an EdPuzzle video about Manifest Destiny before playing a Blooket version of the Trai...

 Welcome:  The first week of the second quarter has come and gone and this year is cruising along! I'm looking forward to getting to talk to many of you during conferences in a few weeks. This week we watched a great video on not judging others on superficial things like appearances & the importance of standing with the people that often get ignored in life. I hope you take the time to watch the video--it's a great one.  This Past Week:  This past week was another week where both the Honor's American History & American History classes did most of the same types of learning activities so the updates are combined here.  Monday:  Today was all about introducing our next unit of study--"Manifest Destiny: Surviving & Thriving in the American West." We started by doing a Pear Deck flashcard factory to help introduce some key terms to the unit and then the students watched part of America the Story of Us: Westward.   Tuesday:  No School ...

  Welcome:  American History (Periods 1, 4, and 5):  This Past Week:  Monday:  This week started with the students working on their study guides for the civics exam. The students were given time to complete as much as they could on their own and then work with their desk groups and get help from me to make sure they had the correct information. We also took some time today to play some Blooket review games for the Civics Exam.  Tuesday:  I was out today and the students worked on a Pear Deck meant to help them use the CRAAP test to locate & evaluate sources of information on the internet. I will be completely honest here--I used Pear Deck because I felt like it would be a logical step-by-step way to introduce the topic to the students and it didn't seem to work as well as I hoped it would. I think it ended up overwhelming some of the students.  Wednesday:   We spent some time today discussing the assignment the students worked on yesterda...