Race, Class, and Punishment

Strategies

Graphic organizers

Many of my students are exceptional education and have IEP or 504 education plans.  They have difficulty organizing their words and thought.  Graphic Organizers are necessary tools to engage the student for several reasons.  First, less than 20% of my students score on grade level on STAR reading assessments.  Second, my students have never done active research.  Third, my students struggle with processing and developing critical thinking skills and graphic organizers that help them scaffold their thoughts to develop a theory or point.  Lastly, 75% of the students have been identified as requiring exceptional education services.  Research based best educational practices suggests the importance of graphic organizers in increasing student retention.  All activities and graphic organizers will lead to several student output projects. 

Gallery Walk

The gallery walk is an active learning exercise that allows students to use their own inquiry skills to formulate theories about images.  Students today are 21^st century learners meaning they have great visual skills.  The students will be given three different color sticky notes.  The first note will have students write a specific detail about one of the pictures around the room and place that note on the picture.  The second note will have students develop a hypothesis about what is happening in the picture and they will place it on the picture.  The third note will have students formulate a question about one of the pictures and place that sticky note on that pictures.  In the end, I will discuss each picture with the students and attempt to answer their questions and help them further develop their hypotheses about the picture.

Journaling

Students will write a journal every day after each completed lesson.  The journal will allow them to reflect on their experiences with the juvenile prison system.  They will compare and contrast the historical issues that have typically led young black men to prison while examining their actions.  The students will develop their journals into letters of warning to other young people to help them avoid the prison pipeline.