Teaching International Relations Program

Dear Chris,

Thank you for participating in TIRP outreach! This folder is for your four session reports. This is a public forum and we encourage your professors and teachers to review your journal entries for feedback. Make sure your report of classroom activity is appropriate for public viewing.

Remember:
1. Each entry must be submitted within a week or before the next session, whichever comes first.
2. Entries need to be at least 500 words. It is your responsibility to save a copy of your report.
3. Your reports should focus on the content of the TIRP session. Spend no more than one paragraph discussing logistics. Include the key IR concepts and specific student responses.
4. Select "Post Reply" not "New Topic" when submitting each entry. This will ensure that all your
reports are posted in a way that will be easy for CALIS staff, professors and teachers to read.


A CALIS staff member will review your entry each week and leave a posted message approving it toward your extra credit. Thank you for your participation in TIRP!
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Report 1 - NOT SUBMITTED as of 10-30-09 - Kate
Hey Chris! Please submit your report as soon as possible. You will be marked late but will still receive credit. Thanks!

Report 1 - LATE/CONTENT APPROVED - 11-16-09 - Kate

Report 2 - APPROVED - 11-16-09 - Kate
Sorry you couldn't make it to the session, but thank you for submitting your report.

Report 3 - APPROVED - 11-16-09 - Kate
Congratulations on the success!

Report 4 - APPROVED - 11-23-09 - Kate
Thanks for all your hard work. We would love to have you as a TIRPer in the future.

Our first session was a difficult at first, but the students began to open up once they got to know us a little better. We traveled to Venice Beach High School. It took us much longer than expected. We planned to leave earlier for future sessions. The group was primarily sophomores, and there was a mix interest and enthusiasm among the students. After introducing ourselves, we jumped right into our first activity, a Why War questionnaire. The activity consisted of each student receiving a piece a paper with roughly fifteen different reasons for going to war, ranging from economic interests to saving American lives. The students were asked to rank each justification on a one to five scale, with five being a highly important reason to go to war. While the students were doing this, Won, Aaron and I walked around the classroom talking with the students about their reasons and explaining any questions they had. For the most part, many of the students were eager to ask questions about IR vocabulary such as Facsim, genocide, and national interests. I was very impressed by the level of maturity in which the students were showing when answering these questions. After giving them about ten minutes to answer the questions on their own, my partners and I stood at the front of the classroom and went through the most asked topics and discussed them as a group. We re-answered many of their questions about certain vocabulary and historical references such as WWII, Nazism, and Facism. We then allowed the students to discuss and debate these topics as a group. Protecting against genocide seemed to be the number one most important reason the group believed that the United States should go to war. One girl in the back of the room was all about peace for the entire session, but even she put a five on protecting against genocide.

After wrapping up the first activity with a vocabulary overview, we began the Theories of War activity. Our original plan was to go over all three theories. However, we decided that it would be more beneficial for the students to not be overwhelmed with too much information in the first session, which could possibly result in them not remembering any of it. Therefore, we meticulously focused on the first theory, Human behavior. The Human behavior theory focused on the reasons for going to war the stem from the individual, including aggression, greed, and tendency to react in an uncertain environment. After seeing the students have trouble connecting human behavior to countries going to war, I came up with idea of comparing a school bully to an overly aggressive state. To my surprise the students were very responsive and understanding of this random spontaneous idea of mine. This metaphor helped us explain other human behavioral war theories for the rest of the session.

One thing that I think we learned from last Friday is that, we need to focus on building a strong International Relations knowledge foundation. We went in with a plan to do 2-3 activities. I believe that rather than doing more with shallow explanation we should focus on covering less material in a higher quality manner.

TIRP Session 2
First, I would like to thank the Calis office for understanding about my situation. Unfortunately, I was unable to be present at the second session due to a last minute change of my ROTCs training schedule. The TIRP office told me to still write a report on what I would have like to see happen for the second session.

After learning on our first session that time management was our only issue, I would have attempted to heavily focus and nail down one or two activities rather than trying to blaze through multiple activities. I think it is super important to remember that these kids are still in high school. Being International Relations Majors, I feel that sometimes we forget that not everyone is entirely familiar with vocabulary terms, examples, and historical references that we all have learned in our classes.

We planned on doing a case analysis for Week 2, using the three causes of war that we were to teach about during Week 1. However, we were unable to get through all three causes during the Week 1. Therefore, I would have briefly gone over the cause that we did talk about, Human Behavior, before meticulously going over the next two causes, National Attributes and Systematic Conditions. I believe that it is imperative that we carefully go over these three topics because they are essentially the foundation of our entire TIRP plan. Additionally, Ms. Hayashibara requested that these sessions focus on the causes of war. If the students can gain a thorough understanding of the three causes and some of the relevant vocabulary, then they will be well prepared and capable to discuss and analyze a few historical war cases.

I would have liked to have broken the class up into three different groups, having Aaron, Won, and myself lead a group in discussion over each cause of war. After leading a thorough discussion with each group, I think it would have been a fun idea for the groups’ members to stand at the front of the class and present their work to the other students. This would have been a fun way to teach in a smaller more atmosphere and for the students to engage and interact by teaching their peers. We plan to do an activity similar to this design for Week 3. I think it is important to practice public speaking skills at a young age in order to foster a familiarity for it as you grow older. I believe that this could be a great dual learning experience for the students.

As we are discussing these causes of war, I would like for the students to begin creating a vocabulary list/ word bank they can refer to throughout the sessions, with their lists growing after each week. Instilling vocabulary at this level is highly important. If they don’t remember anything else from our sessions but the vocabulary, then I will still be greatly proud and pleased because that knowledge will allow them to understand international news reports and stories they hear and read on the news.

Hi Kate,

I was having trouble working the Webboard the first two weeks, but I emailed both of them to Tirp on time. Just wanted to let you know. Thanks so much!

Ms. Hayashibara was really pleased that we arrived very early to our third session. I believed we even pulled into the parking lot before she did. After not being able to see them the week before because of my Rotc training, I was excited to get to see their faces again. We conducted a case study on the American Revolution. I think it was a great case to pick because many of the students were not too familiar with the background and history of the American Revolution. It's important because I think after this session they had a much more thorough understanding of how the United States developed out of the original colonies. We used the knowledge, vocabulary words, and concepts that we taught them in the first two Tirp sessions and applied them to this case study. The three theories of war that we discussed were human behavior, national attributes, and systemic conditions. Our plan for this week was to briefly review the ideas of the theories of war, followed by breaking the class up into three equal discussion groups that would each be led by Aaron, Won, or myself. I led the National Attributes Group. I began again with introductions in order to get to ensure that the students remember my name and vice versa. At this time, I was unsure of my group's previous exposure to the American Revolution. After asking them, I discovered that some were familiar with the topic and some were highly unfamiliar with the topic. Therefore, I gave a brief but thorough lesson on an overview of the American Revolution so that all the students would be on the same page and not feel left out. We then went through each of the four subcategories of the theory we were discussing (Description, Explanation, Prediction, and Prescription). While discussing each subcategory, I would challenge the group to think and analyze ways in which the theory could be applied to our particular case study. It was a slow start at first, but it progressively grew into a more fluid process. If they couldn't make certain connections, I would help them out by explaining the rationale and historical context of the situation. We went over each subcategory multiple times, and by about the third time most of the group felt comfortable with the topics and the relationship to the national attributes theory of war. I was very excited to hear the speak of George the Third and relate his dictatorship to the Explanation subcategory. We then had each group select a representative to present on what their group learned and discussed throughout the class. I was confident that any member of my group would have felt that they knew enough to present. Our presenter did a great job, and Ms. Hayashibara even gave him extra credit points for representing his group. Overall, it was a great session. Ms. Hayashibara gave our group all five's on the evaluation sheet. We did a wonderful job with time management, and I feel that the students are beginning to retain the information and understand different reasons why war occurs.

Our last session was awesome. For the past three weeks we spoke about War, specifically the causes of war. We even did an analysis of the Revolutionary War. When we began our fourth and final session, we wanted to briefly do a back report and review of the overarching concepts. The students were slow to respond at first, but then they began sharing the ideas we discussed in the previous sessions. We were pleased that our lessons had made an impact on the students.
For our final session, we decided to change up the war theme and teach the students about peace. We thought that this would be an appropriate change of gears to show the students that’s not all about countries fighting each other all the time. Similar to our plan last week, we split the class into three different groups. This seemed to be the best way to ensure that every student had the best opportunity to be engaged and active in the discussion. We guided them through the possible terms of peace worksheet. Again, the most important aspect of the worksheet was vocabulary. There were numerous terms that the students were unfamiliar with or that they understood them in a different context. Once the students were familiar with the definitions and examples of the peaceful vocabulary, they were able to quickly string the peaceful concepts and theories together from their previous knowledge of war terms and conditions. The worksheet consisted of a matching like quiz. In my group, we did the quiz together to ensure that everyone understood the concepts thoroughly. After completing the quiz as a group, we would go around our group and explain each question and answer combination. At times, I had to remind the student/group of the why certain answers matched up with certain question, but after reviewing the whole set about three to four times, the group became quite familiar with the terms and ideas. Our original plan was to have the group members present what they had learned to the other groups, but we adjusted this plan in order to provide for a deeper discussion of the material with multiple explanations and historical examples. I was very impressed with many of the students in my group. When explaining their perceptions of the questions, they remembered and used terminology and historical examples from previous TIRP sessions. After covering the topics, I spoke with my group about college life and what my classes are like. They were very pleased to hear that you are allowed to make your own schedule. I initiated this discussion because I think it is important to emphasize college and continued education to these students. I wanted to make sure that they understood that each of them had an opportunity to go to college and study a major of their choice.
I thought that we had a great four sessions. Aaron, Won, and quickly learned how to work as a group in order to make for the best sessions possible.