SEP Session 3, Day 1

Many teachers began the first day of class by playing get to know you games with the students to build a positive classroom community. After learning more about each other, teachers introduced students to the foundation of their course.

Students in "To Demolish, or Not to Demolish," began class by listing characteristics and values that are important to themselves, their family, community, and city. Later in class they looked at images of buildings around the world in a class discussion. For each building, students hypothesized the purpose, significance, and design principles evident. Click through the images below to see some of the building students analyzed.

Down the hall, in "Building A Better Board Game," students learned that board games can be strategy based, random, or a mix of both. They wrote down some of their favorite games on sticky notes and placed their game where they believed it fell on a Random- Strategy spectrum.

In "Inside Out: The Social Life of Emotions" students learned the difference between psychology and sociology, as well as the various types of sociology. Students tested their knowledge of US society through a partner competition. A question such as " What % of Americans put none of their paycheck in a savings account?" was shown on the board. Students wrote down their guess. Whichever partner was closer received the same number of points as their answer. Other questions included " What % of Americans come from a single parent family?" and " What % of students who received Bachelors degrees in 2013 were women?" The correct answers in order are: 47%, 33%, and 60%