Before you get started with your assignment, you need to figure out the following:
- Your country name now, and any other names it may have had in the past
- Where in the world your country is located (a continent helps, but neighbors are important too)
- Was your country ever controlled by another country?
- Is your country currently in crisis?
- Does your country rock? Does it suck? I get that these are ridiculous oversimplifications, but sometimes you need to get the big picture
To do this, I suggest:
Kiosko.net World news services organized geographically.
Live Twitter feeds from various countries
for above (you can enter a URL and it will translate the whole site, use BabelFish to translate).
We are archiving our research in a Paper.li
To use Twitter, I recommend a few things:
1. Open a TweetDeck, Seesmic, or HootSuite account to manage your streams - it is a whole lot easier to follow our class and reTweet (personally, I love TweetDeck).
2. You must include links in your Tweets, which means that your research has to come from Tweets with links (see graphic below). You can't base your research on 140 character messages.
3. To find links to Facebook pages about unrest, keep an eye out for URLs that include fb like http://fb.me/UfDYEq3G BEWARE! This is the real world and there may be inappropriate content including violent images. Be responsible. Use Babelfish to translate.Twitter: Use Kiosko.net above to find out the major news publications for your country, then follow those on Twitter (i.e.Al-Jazeera is @AJELive on Twitter).
4. Be critical. Review your resources carefully (rubric coming). Think about what you are looking at:
- Do not reTweet Wikileaks, unless you talk to a teacher about it first.
- Is your source a blog? (i.e. Facebook, Wordpress, Blogger/Blogspot)
- Is it a news source? (i.e. Reuters, NYT, BBC, Associated Press)
- Is it a reference source (CIA World Factbook, etc...)
Link to spreadsheet with contact information (sign in with @ncps-k12.org to access)
Twitter:
Hashtag: #ncramsss
@ncramsss - Mr. Webb
@nchslmc - NCHS Library
@swanc - Ms. Swan
@mluhtala - Ms. Luhtala
Link to spreadsheet with contact information (sign in with @ncps-k12.org to access)
eBooks:You can cross search all of these at one time by using the Gale Virtual Reference Library (awesome iPhone and iPad apps - Access My Library - School Edition)
- Countries and Their Cultures
- Encyclopedia of Modern China
- Encyclopedia of Population
- Encyclopedia of World Cultures
- Africa: An Encyclopedia for Students
- Encyclopedia of India
- Encyclopedia of Latin American History and Culture , 2nd ed., 6v, 2008
- Encyclopedia of Modern Asia , 6v, 2003
- Encyclopedia of Modern China , 4v, 2009
- Encyclopedia of the Modern Middle East and North Africa , 2nd ed., 4v, 2004
- Encyclopedia of Western Colonialism since 1450 , 3v, 2007
- Europe 1789-1914: Encyclopedia of the Age of Industry and Empire , 5v, 2006
- History of World Trade Since 1450 , 2v, 2006
- Korean War Reference Library , 2v, 2002
- World War II Reference Library , 5v, 2000
