Aim How to write an Enduring Issues essay

Aim: How to write an Enduring Issues essay? Do Now: What is an enduring issue?

An Enduring Issue: is a challenge or problem that a society has faced and debated or discussed across time. An enduring issue is one that many societies have attempted to address with varying degrees of success.

Nested Issues Enduring Issues are often nested, e. g. , conflict (war, competition, armed struggle, resistance, invasions, threats to balance of power) and human rights violations (injustice, inequality, discrimination, unfair treatment, persecution for beliefs, threats to cultural identity, restrictions to movement). These sets of issues show a range of possible issues a student could identify when writing the Enduring Issues Essay. Issues can be expressed negatively as well as positively.

How to choose The concept of “Nested Issues” is one way to think about Enduring Issues. When choosing the Enduring Issue to write about, a student may choose one of the Enduring Issues identified in this chart, a nested issue, or one of their own issues. What presents itself as a “Nested Issue” in one set of documents could be the Enduring Issue in another set of documents depending on the documents provided and the student’s perspective.

How students determine the enduring issue To identify an Enduring Issue a student must analyze each of the documents, determine the issues in each document, and then group those issues under a common category that encompasses all of these other issues. This common category is the student’s Enduring Issue. .

Example An example of an Enduring Issue Essay might be human rights violations or injustice: Doc. 1 discrimination, Doc. 2 destruction of a group, Doc. 3 genocide, Doc. 4 apartheid, Doc. 5 religious discrimination. The issues from these documents fit under the category of human rights violations or injustice

Affected/Been affected by people The identified Enduring Issue must be an issue that has affected people or has been affected by people and has continued to be an issue across time or has changed over time.

Defining the issue Defining the Enduring Issue will require information from the documents and the application of social studies knowledge.

How is issue defined The identification of the Enduring Issue will be dependent on the documents provided, the context of those documents, and the perspective or lens the student uses to interpret those documents. This set of circumstances will affect how the Enduring Issue is defined.

Enduring Issues charts Enduring isssues- Word format. docx Enduring issues - on Publisher format. pub

What I do I gave my 8 th grade students a copy of the chart (colored paper). They can use this on tests. Recommend: keep it digital and handy for students Put on schoology/website/Google classroom etc. Posters on wall. Have students make them. End a lesson with summary question: What enduring issues were discussed today? What enduring issues can be applied to today’s lesson? To today’s documents?

And… Work with your colleagues (in your school and in the district) to create Enduring Issues Essays PRIOR to teaching the unit. WHY? So you can include those documents in your lessons- or similar documents So you can include a discussion of those issues in your lessons So you can tailor discussions of current events to those issues (that’s what makes it enduring)

When grading the essays Determine how much your students already know about how to write this essay Are they 7 th graders just being introduced to the issue? Have they ever heard about Enduring issues? Have you been using Enduring Issues on all your tests this year? I did not require students to “ARGUE” how the issue has affected people. I introduced this in WWII unit and will now include that on the next test.

Rubric Enduring Issues Rubric- adapted. docx Enduring Issues Rubric. docx

Suggestions for this year Give your 7, 8, 9 th and maybe 10 th grade students an enduring issues essay this year. Teach a lesson(s) introducing enduring issues to students NOW Use the term frequently Summarize lessons with a discussion of these enduring issues Get to know what the teachers are doing in the lower grades so you know where to begin in September.

How to create an enduring issues essay Decide on your possible enduring issues for the unit (Ideally, you would do this before you teach the unit. ) Look for a variety of documents that exemplify that issue (chart, graph, reading passage, photo/painting, map etc. ) Remember: 3 documents must have the same enduring issue (can have different nested issues). The Regents will have 5 documents but I sometimes have 6 or 7. I usually give students a preview of documents (docs not the whole essay) on schoology so they can prepare. This is more important when there is a longer reading passage.

Next I cut and paste documents into a template I ask another teacher to look at it At this point it usually takes about one hour to create an essay. The more you create, the faster it goes. Working with colleagues is best, especially in the beginning. Tips: Use an old DBQ and modify; search online for Enduring Issues essays others have created; share with your colleagues across this district.

Activity Use this template to create an Enduring Issues essay for your upcoming unit. Adapt as needed. NOW—Quickly divide yourselves into groups by grade level. Decide on a unit to focus on, then enduring issue(s).

sample WII essay Enduring Issues- WWII. docx

Other resources 2 -Enduring Issues intro worksheet. docx Enduring issues intro writing hints. pptx template for essays. docx