Embedded Files
Since many of my 7th-grade students had no previous knowledge of what the term "advocacy" meant, I began this project by opening a discussion about what advocacy means. The discussion involved group brainstorming where students were asked to come up with real-world issues they felt passionate about advocating for. In an effort to keep the project predominantly student-centered, I engaged students with resources (videos, scenarios, and real-life examples) that I believed would ignite their thinking of advocacy and why it is important.
Once I felt students had explored real-world advocacy together, we transitioned to an exploration of articles on the troubled history of three important Hawaiian landmarks to see if we could identify any issues we felt passionate about. Students worked together in groups as they annotated the texts, being sure to highlight statistics and other pieces of important evidence that helped inform their thinking of issues and advocacy. Each group constructed an informed opinion after the article exploration - in the form of a Google Slide - and presented their opinion (spoke in the front of the room) to the class.
Planning
Planning
The slides present students with an introduction lesson about advocacy. The slides contain all activities, media, and discussion questions we worked with during the conversation-related segment of the advocacy project. Students followed along to the slides as they were presented on the television.
Student Engagement
Student Engagement
We started our whole-class direct instruction by reading a definition of "advocacy" and discussing as a class what this definition means. Breaking apart the key words from the definition was good practice as it allowed us to simplify advocacy and make it easier to comprehend. After reviewing the defintion, students were asked to consider several different examples of world issues or injustices that they have seen or heard about in their lives. Students raised their hand and shared with the class as I wrote them down on the whiteboard to the right of the definition we analyzed prior.
Next, students separated into groups for a group activity. Their task was to talk with each other and brainstorm five real-world injustices they believed would be worth advocating for. Since students were with their groups, it was my hope that they would feel more comfortable discussing injustices - an unfamiliar concept to many in our math class - with the class. Each group wrote their five injustices on posters and presented them in front of the class! Here are the posters:
After students proved they were able to identify real-world injustices in their group presentations, it was time to transition their thinking to injustices that exist in our local community. With the help of the quote below, I emphasized to them that big change is difficult; effective change starts at home and extends outward into the world.
Sharing this quote with students helped transition their thinking about injustices close to home. In order to help guide their thinking, I asked the class a question:
"What are some injustices that we can identify here in Hawaii? Can you think of any examples?"
Students contributed thoughtful responses such as "Waikiki has homeless people" or "people leave trash on the beach", but their responses lacked significant depth. It became clear to me that the class needed access to more resources (texts) educating them on the history of Hawaii. From there, students would be better able to identify present-day injustices that exist with their new knowledge of Hawaiian history. As a result, they could construct strong opinions and take informed action in the next segment of our advocacy project.
Lesson Texts
Lesson Texts
In order to gain knowledge on the history of Hawaii, we agreed as a class it would make sense to learn about some famous developments on the island. When I asked students to share well-known places they know on the island, students responded with "Waikiki", "Pearl Harbor", "Popeyes", "Dole", and "Waimea Valley" to name a few. Much to my students' disappointment, Popeyes didn't make the cut and we had already visited Waimea Valley.
Therefore, we started our local injustice exploration by reading three articles that provide students with information on the historical significance of three notable landmarks in Hawaii: Pearl Harbor, Dole Plantation, and Waikiki Beach.
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Before reading the articles, students watched this video as a helpful reminder about annotating skills they have previously learned in Science class. After, students annotated the articles in groups, paying close attention to any injustices or issues discussed in the articles.
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Shown below are each of the three articles assigned to my groups in class. The articles contain text to the left and visuals of the three different landmarks to the right.
Article #1: Pearl Harbor
Article #2: The Dole Plantation
Article #3: Waikiki Beach
Student Work
Student Work
Students worked with their groups on annotating their assigned article. Students were encouraged to use their annotation skills from Science class (and that they learned from watching the video) to highlight at least three key pieces of information, writing at least three comments in the margin, and circling key numbers or statistics mentioned in the article. Students were reminded to think, speak, and write about injustices they identified as they read the article with their groups.
Group #1 Annotated Article
In this article, students identified the problem of pollution in Waikiki due to tourism. Students did a nice job highlighting poverty and unemployment rates to use as evidence in their group presentation to follow.
Group #2 Annotated Article
In this annotated article, students did a nice job asking why locals aren't better protected from the colonizers and tourists that have come to Hawaii. I am impressed they came up with this question as a group.
These Google Slides show students' informed opinions that they created. Students used these as presentation aids when they spoke about their opinions in front of the class. I was overall fairly impressed by students' ability to craft an opinion based on the information they read about in the articles, but an area of improvement was definitely citing the evidence properly and giving credit to the authors/source of the article.
This student gathered key information from the articles and identified several issues but could have done a better job suggesting what change he is suggesting takes place as a result of the issues.
This student's slide is very well organized and well written but could be stronger and more persuasive if 1) the author of the article was mentioned and 2) the student what new implementations we should advocate for.
This student used a statistic from the article, which is great, but failed to construct a thorough opinion.
This is a well-rounded opinion that could have been stronger if they just mentioned the author of the article when citing the information they learned.
Student Discussion
Student Discussion
video 2.MP4This group shared their informed opinion with the class. They did a nice job citing evidence from the article to support their opinion that Native Hawaiians are not treated fairly and need more protection from the state.
Conclusion
Conclusion
Beginning this project by opening a discussion about what advocacy means was a crucial first step. The group discussions and activities we engaged in strengthened our knowledge of advocacy and how it exists in the real world. It prepared us well to advocate ourselves! The conversations students engaged in formed a strong foundation which prepared the students well to take action for the local injustices they identified together in the class texts on Waikiki, Dole Plantation, and Pearl Harbor.
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