GT/A. P. & A. P. WORLD HISTORY: GENERAL INFORMATION:
1. This is a college level course being taken by high school sophomores. And THAT is a challenge!
And I am aware of the challenges, both of the difficulty of the content of our course and the MANY, MANY commitments that sophomore students struggle with. Band practice, athletic practice, games, UIL events, STARR, 3-D days, all sorts of things that take our time. So I have learned that SOME flexibility on my part makes everybody happier and less stressed.
2. Our test date is set for the second week of May and we have no flexibility about that appointment.
Therefore, EVERYTHING we do in class is geared toward the A. P. Exam.
There are MANY things I would love to teach at length, lavish time and attention on, but we are always "on the move" (sort of like the Mongols), and due to the factors named above, we're always "lucky" to have everybody in class for five days at a go.
3. We DO use some movie & video clips, and a VERY few full-length movies in class.
Movies & video clips are used to give visual reference to historical periods and events. These are NOT "free days" and there are notes to take and the information from these become part of our multiple choice quizzes & tests, and also may be regarded as "documents" for essay questions. This is one reason that students may need a classroom "buddy" to take notes, and then may also want to come by on my conference period (7th period this year) to see what they have missed.
GENERAL DEADLINES:
PERSIAN Charts are generally due on Mondays and Thursdays, but this may be subject to change, depending on chapter length, test days, student activities, etc.
On the day that a PERSIAN Chart is due, there will either be a short multiple choice quiz or a ONE paragraph essay quiz. I will be teaching how to take these quizzes before we begin the first one. They are directly correlated to the content of the chapter and the A.P. Exam, and therefore the grade weight for these is appropriately triple the value of PERSIAN Chart in the Daily Grade category (30% of the student's average).
Full Unit Tests will be Mastery Grades. (Mastery Grades count 70% of the student's average, as per SISD grading policy).
It's a wild ride, but we laugh a lot even as we work a lot. And at the end, the day after Exam, we take a well-deserved rest.
