Tuesday, November 29, 2011

Student Reactions on King George III and The Stamp Act

During our American Revolution unit, students had an opportunity to see how the colonists felt about laws King George III would impose on them when we role played in class today. First, I told them Mrs. Huggins sent us a video message that was left out of our morning announcements and it was extremely important that we take time out of our day to view it before lunch. I secretly asked Mrs. Huggins to help me out with the lesson without telling a sole. I asked her to tell them in the video message that a "NEW" school rule would begin today. No students would be allowed to bring a lunch from home, or choose an alternate lunch item. The only way to get lunch from now on was to get a hot lunch. In fact, the hot lunch was actually going to be a peanut butter and jelly sandwich. The good news was they could choose their jelly. You can only imagine the students reactions to this message. It worked!! I got the questions rolling. Most students were not happy about this new rule. Many students asked questions like, "what if we get tired of eating the same thing everyday?" or "what if we don't like peanut butter?". After much discussion, I told them this wasn't really a rule that was going to happen. My goal was for them to experience how the colonists felt when King George III imposed laws that they had to follow. We all had a good laugh and it really sparked their interest in our lessons on The Proclamation of 1763 and The Stamp Act. In the next part of our lesson, we divided the class into the British and the Colonists. We brainstormed a list of things that could be taxed in the classroom. After many ideas and a lot of student conversations taking place, we all voted as a class to have the British (one half the class) tax the Colonists (the other half of the class) everytime they had to use the restroom and everytime they spoke to someone other than a teacher. Wow! They are tough on eachother. I am so glad the British could tax only for the afternoon. By 2:30 pm, I believe we were all glad the Stamp Act was repealed!