Black History Month: another way to visit History
One of the days of the history class is dedicated to Black History Month. It is already a tradition in Saxon educational centers to celebrate the achievements of African-American people, and the memory of their immense contribution to the history of the United States. The activities are a good opportunity to talk about American history, Human Rights, and the fight for freedom at any time in History.
In our class, presented in a playful way, we made a short introduction on human and civil rights, and a review of the history of slavery. Some names related to Black History Month were discussed, which led to a small debate in 3rd ESO A, very interesting, about initial or preconceived ideas on each topic.
The central activities of the day were three and they were carried out in six groups of three or four people. The groups rotated through six different islands, with a different type of activity on each two islands. Time was an important factor, to add excitement to the tasks, and it was rotated from one island to another up to three times, every 12 minutes. The background music was “The saber dance”, which adds more tension to the activities, like in a TV game show.
The proposed challenges were a Challenge Quiz, with curious questions about important people and dates; a timeline of pivotal moments in civil rights history; and a letter soup where you can search for keywords, proper names or phrases related to the topic.
The activity was exciting and the groups showed interest in the discussions and in carrying out the activities. During the week we had studied the Age of Discoveries of the 15th and 16th centuries, following the syllabus, in this class we verified how you can jump through the ages without getting lost, with another way of approaching History.
Horacio Diez
Secondary History Teacher
