Death Penalty Resources

Arguably pretty objective:

Pew Forum. This website does a nice job of showing both sides of the issue, with an emphasis on some of the recent Supreme Court cases that have involved the death penalty.
http://www.pewforum.org/topics/issues/Death-Penalty/

Has bias, but still reliable sources:

Supports the death penalty:
This is a website that is organized by the lead prosecutor for Clark County, Indiana. This site is very well known and respected for containing a large amount of verifiable data related to the arguments in support of the death penalty.  (there is also a link off of his site that has a list of many additional pro-death penalty sites)
http://www.clarkprosecutor.org/html/death/death.htm

Opposes to the death penalty:
American Civil Liberties Union: Clealy opposes the death penalty and has a lot of information to support their point of view.
http://www.aclu.org/capital-punishment

Constitutionality
http://www.thisnation.com/question/018.html
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2013/02/27/colorado-death-penalty-ca_n_2773237.html
http://www.aclu.org/capital-punishment/case-against-death-penalty

Just cool...
Very cool website for both sides of the argument. This is how others have debated this topic, included the major reasons pro/con and the sources used to support their point of view:
http://idebate.org/debatabase/debates/capital-punishment/house-supports-death-penalty

And, again our grounding website for objective analysis of the issues:  Today, we're going to be looking solely at one website, ProCon.org. This is a pretty fabulous website that focusses on looking at controversial issues by providing both sides as objectively as possible.

• Overall reasons why people are either for or against the Death Penalty

http://deathpenalty.procon.org/view.resource.php?resourceID=002000

• The background on exactly what the Death Penalty is, what qualifies as a crime worthy of the death penalty, where the death penalty is legal, etc.

http://deathpenalty.procon.org/view.subissues.php?issueID=000132

• Some of the specific reasons why people are either for or against the Death Penalty. 

1. Moral and Ethical Issues

2. Legal Considerations

3. Deterrence and Retribution

4. Social Issues

5. Death Penalty vs. Life in Prison

Learning about what interests you

Document you will be completing during class

You have 3 choices to learn about today:

1. Ebola

Link #1:  A background on Ebola, to get started.


Link #2:  Violence in Guinea against medical workers as fear of disease rises

Link #3: What Sierra Leone is doing this weekend to attempt to slow down the spread.

2.  Scotland votes to stay a part of Great Britain in landmark voting

Link #1: What was the issue really about, anyway?  The basics
Link #2: Scotland says no
Link #3: The day after the vote

Link #3:  Interesting map showing the world as it has been controlled at some point in history by Great Britain.

3. The 2014 Massachusetts Governor's Race

Link #1: From a few weeks ago, but still a good reader background on the race.

Link #2: Here's is how WBUR, the local NPR station is talking about the race. Specifically about the role gender might play.

Link #3: If you like looking at poll numbers and want to see lots of varying opinions about who has the lead, take a look here.

Learning about ISIS (Islamic State of Iraq and Syria)

Tomorrow, President Obama is going to be delivering a pretty big speech on what the US is going to do to try to take on ISIS (Islamic State of Iraq and Syria).  This is the same group that has killed 2 American journalists over the past month and has killed thousands of people in Iraq and Syria in their quest to create a new Islamic country.

There's so much to learn about this topic, I thought we would start with a video that will probably raise more questions than answers, but that's ok!

Then, together in small groups, we're going to learn a bit more through a very cool website called vox.com

http://www.vox.com/cards/things-about-isis-you-need-to-know/what-is-isis

As a way to track questions and/or reactions, we're going to try something called a back channel. This is when you comment as you learn/read about the topic.  The website that we will be using is called, Today's Meet.

https://todaysmeet.com/wmscurrentevents2

The idea is to use this space to:   1) ask questions, 2) react to what you are reading, 3)add details about what you know on the topic 4) react to others comments and ideas

Raising the Minimum Wage -- What should the US do?

Our first discussion is going to be about a hot domestic issue: The minimum wage.  There are some pretty fierce debates going on whether the minimum wage is woefully low for people to live on or is simply the rate that it needs to be for business to be successful.

Some people see it like this:

While others see it as: 

YESTERDAY, 430 protestors around the country were arrested while protesting the low wages at fast food companies. 

Let's do a little background reading and then discuss the pros and cons of this very current issue!

Political Cartoons...what do they tell us about what's going on in the world?

 Website for political cartoons: http://www.cagle.com

Link to political cartoon analysis sheet:  http://www.archives.gov/education/lessons/worksheets/cartoon_analysis_worksheet.pdf

Your task:

Step 1: With your partner, go through the political cartoon website, Cagle Political Cartoons and just look at a variety of cartoons. (about 10-15 minutes)

Step 2: Select a political cartoon to analyze. Be thoughtful about your choice.  Make it something that is relevant, current, interesting, thought-provoking AND one that you think you understand what the cartoonist is trying to say (there is always some kind of takeaway -- message that you as the viewer are supposed to think about after seeing a particular political cartoon. You might not agree with it, but it's still the message!)


Step 3: Try to complete as many parts of the Political Cartoon Analysis Sheet that is linked above.  It might be possible that you can't answer every question, but try your best. BE CURIOUS. BE SPECIFIC. BE DETAILED. Don't be afraid to take some risks in trying to explain what the meaning is behind the cartoon.  (Please also note the exact title of the cartoon and write it on the analysis sheet. This way we can find it later)

Step 4: You will print out your completed sheet (make 2 copies, so each of you has a copy).