Unit 2: Lesson 1: Activity 4

Giving Voice to the Unheard Stories

^[1]

The more stories we explore, the better understanding we develop.

Benchmark:

11.5.9.9 - Analyze seventeenth-, eighteenth-, and nineteenth-century foundational U.S. documents of historical and literary significance (including The Declaration of Independence, the Preamble to the Constitution, the Bill of Rights, and Lincoln’s Second Inaugural Address) for their themes, purposes, and rhetorical features

ISTE Standard

Digital Citizenship 5.a - Students understand human, cultural, and societal issues related to technology and practice legal and ethical behavior.

Learning Targets:

I can analyze the themes, purposes, and rhetorical features of foundational U.S. documents.

I can understand the human, cultural, and societal issues that relate to technology and use technology in ethical ways.

Essential Questions:

Whose voices are missing from the early governing U.S. documents and why are these voices important to understanding the colonial U.S.?

What must I do in order to effectively present digital information to an audience with a wide variety of cultures, races, beliefs and values?

Summary:

In this activity, you will explore the “absent narratives” as the country was established and create a space for these narratives to be recognized and discussed.

You Will Need:

Approximately two or three 50-minute class periods

Internet access

A digital presentation tool

Activity Instructions:

Step 1.

Look back at the documents you’ve read in activities 1, 2 and 3 of this lesson. Whose voices and perspectives are missing? Whose stories are not told? On a classroom Google Doc, create a collaborative list of missing perspectives. Save this for list for later use.

Optional activity: The Minnesota Humanities Center has established a collaborative of people^[2] focused on bringing absent narratives to the public. Explore their resources to further your understanding of whose voices might be missing from our collective stories.

Step 2.

For each document studied in this lesson (The Federalist Papers^[3], various examples of Colonial literature, Preamble^[4], Lincoln’s Second Inaugural Address^[5], Great Speeches Collection: George Washington Speech^[6], and Washington’s First Inaugural Speech (1789)^[7]), write a paragraph description of how you think the document would change if it was written from one of the absent voices.

Step 3. 

Post your best paragraph to your classroom discussion forum. Comment on the posts of at least 2 other members.

Step 4.

Using a digital presentation tool of your choice (for example, Storify or Prezi), create a collection of images, words, phrases, journal excerpts, photos, videos, audio recordings, etc. that focuses on one community of people whose voice has been mostly left out in the study of colonial U.S. (rubric). Your collection should include:

• at least 20 elements in a variety of formats, and
• it should answer this question: how would someone from this community of people explain his or her experience during the colonial period in the U.S.?

Step 5.

 Submit your presentation for review.

Step 5. 

Based on teacher feedback, revise your presentation and submit this collection to your e-Portfolio. Include a 2-3 paragraph reflection with your artifact.