It was with sad hearts that we here at the Florida Joint Center for Citizenship and especially our parent organization the Lou Frey Institute learned of the need for Justice Sandra Day O’Connor to step away from public life. Justice O’Connor, famous for being the first woman on the U.S. Supreme Court, continued to work hard well into her retirement, focusing on civic education.
And what did we get for her focus on civic education? iCivics, perhaps one of the most important and engaging civic education resources in the nation. But so much more as well, and for us in Florida, it is Justice O’Connor’s name that is on the law that mandates a comprehensive civic education program in Florida. The Justice Sandra Day O’Connor Civic Education Act, passed in part to the hard work of former Florida governor Bob Graham, former Representative Lou Frey, the wonderful Dr. Doug Dobson, and of course the justice herself, was a groundbreaking piece of legislation and helped pave the way for Florida to become a national model for implementing civic literacy and learning.
To this day, we at FJCC, LFI, UF’s Bob Graham Center, and the Florida Law Related Education Association continue the work inspired by Justice O’Connor. We, the staff of the Florida Joint Center for Citizenship at the Lou Frey Institute (and especially Dr. Dobson, who worked with her so closely) wish her and her family the best in a well-deserved break and full retirement.

Good afternoon friends! Another day, another chance to highlight some interesting sessions at FCSS this October. Be sure to register here, and join your colleagues for what will be an excellent weekend! Now, on to some highlights!

Well, of course we have the Friday night reception and the Saturday and Sunday keynotes, so you will definitely want to check those out! But what about some other interesting sessions?

Saturday Morning, October 20
8:00 AM Session
Mentor Session
Scott Kaplan, Pinellas County Schools

Are you a new or beginning social studies teacher? This session, sponsored by the FCSS Endowment and led by the excellent Scott Kaplan, will connect you with experienced educators and provide valuable insights into teaching social studies in a variety of classrooms.

Concurrent Session 1
Student Curriculum Relevance and Historical Relationships from Past to Present
Glen Wolff, Cypress Bay High School

How can we connect historical topics with present day events? How can we help our kids become critical thinkers and writers about past, present, and future? These sorts of questions will be addressed in this session! 

Civics and the Social Goals of Holocaust Education
Mitchell Bloomer, Holocaust Memorial Resource and Education Center of Florida

Looking for some good standards-based civics lessons featuring Holocaust education content? Then check this session out. See how they can be applied in the classroom, and get some ready to go resources!

Concurrent Session 3
Lessons in Character Education Found in Modern Media Formats
Kelsey Evans, Brian Furgione, and Allison Sheridan, University of Central Florida
This CUFA session considers how PBS programming, and media like it, contribute to the teaching of character education and the ways in which the messages in the media are perceived by families and kids. Certainly sounds like an interesting look at the ways we interpret the meanings behind what we watch and listen to and say.

Concurrent Session 5
The Imperative of Courage and Compassion in Combating the Holocaust
Bozena U. Zaremba, Jan Karski Educational Foundation

I am a huge fan of graphic novels, and this session will share with participants a graphic novel concerning courage and compassion, and the importance of engaging with, not running from, evil. Definitely one to check out. 

Be sure to register here, and join your colleagues for what will be an excellent weekend! 

Good morning, dear friends in social studies and civics. Today, let’s highlight the keynotes and special events. We have referred to these in prior posts about the conference (here and here and here, for example), but let’s talk about them a bit more today. And of course be sure to register for the conference here!

Friday, October 19, 2018

So Friday will be fun! Friday evening, there will be a reception open to all attendees to get us into the ‘Sunshine State of Mind’ and celebrate the great work being done with social studies in the state. The reception will be in the Heroes Ballroom at the hotel/conference center, and there will likely be some excellent food and drink available to enjoy as you mingle with colleagues, make new friends, and connect with some of the sponsors and vendors that will no doubt be attending and offering you some stuff! And to make it even more fun, folks are asked to wear something that represents key events,. people, or social or cultural aspects of this state of ours. Let’s show folks that there is more to Florida than Disney!

Saturday, October 20, 2018
Morning Keynote

Is social studies a constitutional right?  What a question, and one that in many ways is even more pressing than before as we struggle to make our way through civic life. UNC-Charlotte professor Dr. Tina Heafner, a renowned researcher, writer, and scholar of the social studies, will talk with us about why social studies can have such an impact on the quality of life and the quality of our nation, and why it matters so much. I have had the great pleasure of talking with Dr. Heafner in the past, and have heard her speak numerous times and this will be an excellent and engaging keynote about a provactive and important question. You can learn more about Dr. Heafner here.

Saturday, October 20, 2018
Awards Dinner

It’s time to have some fun! Join your friends and colleagues as social studies educators from all levels of instruction and from across the state are recognized for their hard work and leadership! This will be in the Legends Ballroom, from 6:30-8:30 PM.

Sunday, October 21, 2018
Brunch Keynote

The Sikh Coalition has been generous in providing a keynote speaker for Sunday Brunch. Satjeet Kaur, Executive Director of the Sikh Coalition, will talk about creating a healthy and inclusive classroom and provide us tools that we can use to do so! In the current climate that sometimes can boil over into our classrooms, this is something I think that we all can find useful!

Have I told you to be sure to register for the conference here!

About this time last year, the Florida Joint Center for Citizenship, as part of the Lou Frey Institute, was honored to be invited to attend and participate in the CivXNow discussion in Washington, DC with leading figures in Civics education. This Thursday, throughout the day, we will be participating in an online Twitter discussion about the state of civic education in the country today, and we encourage you to join us using #CivXNow, and feel free to @ us @FL_Citizen. And if you aren’t able to join, please consider taking the pledge to dedicate yourself to improving civic education in the United States!  Take the pledge if you believe every young person deserves to understand their rights and be equipped with the skills necessary to be informed and effectively engaged!

American Founders’ Month continues in Florida. Today, we look at an actual Founder of Florida, William Dunn Moseley. Governor Moseley was the first elected of governor of the new state of Florida, from 1845-1849. Before Moseley, Florida had the legendary Andrew Jackson as military governor and a series of territorial governors. So how was Moseley as a governor?

Like the vast majority of other Florida governors, Moseley was a Democrat (though we should recall that the meaning of ‘Democrat’ and ‘Republican’ has changed over time). Also like many of his peers, he was a supporter of states’ rights and slavery, owning a plantation near what is now Lake Miccosukee in Jefferson County. It is under Moseley, however that the first real efforts were made to establish a peaceful relationship with the Seminole Indians and the establishment of an agricultural industry focused around citrus.

You can learn more about Governor Moseley from the Florida Department of State!

Grab the PPT slide featured at the top of this post here: Governor of Florida Moseley FM

It’s that time again, dear friends! Time to check out Florida Council for the Social Studies conference sessions, scheduled for late October. Today, let’s take a look at some more early Saturday sessions. And of course, don’t forget to dress up for the Friday night reception!

Saturday, October 20, 2018
Concurrent Session 1
What if Everything You Knew About Hinduism was Wrong? 
Aesha Mehta, Hindu American Foundation

I have attended versions of this session at other conferences, and it is an EXCELLENT introduction into Hinduism, especially for those that may be teaching world history! And of course, the Hindu American Foundation has always been generous supporters of FCSS in the past! 

Conduct Relevant and Engaging Civil Conversations
Jennifer Jolley, Palm Bay Magnet High School
Frank Stockman, Bayside High School
Steve Masyada, FJCC at the Lou Frey Institute

This session draws on the work of the Constitutional Rights Foundation T2T Collab, and the effort to provide teachers with diverse pedagogical tools for teaching and learning about controversial issues and having difficult conversations. 

Concurrent Session 2
Teaching the Civil Rights Movement: Beyond Martin Luther King, Jr. and Rosa Parks
Judy Lindquist, Orange County Public Schools/UCF

There is way more to learning about civil rights than the traditional standbys. This session will show you how to use primary sources, complex texts, and engaging literacy activities to go deeper!

Fostering Civic Engagement Through Design Thinking

Brian Furgione, University of Central Florida
This is a CUFA-oriented session open to practitioners (like you!)  that focuses on creating engaging and authentic experiences for civic learning in the classroom. Certainly worth a look, as we think about new ways to engage our kids! 

We’ll explore more sessions, including Sunday’s sessions and the keynotes, in a later post, but don’t forget that you are also invited to attend the Awards Dinner Saturday evening, where your peers will be recognized for their contributions to our field and our wonderful profession!

Be sure to register for the conference here.

So over the last month, we have been doing posts on various Founders, and I thought it might be nice to feature a post written by a middle school student about someone important to the founding of this country. So today, I ask that you please read this post about a Founder by the name of James Armistead Lafayette, brought to us by a young lady named Hannah, in Marion County.

James Armistead Lafayette: The Forgotten Founder

As the British generals discussed their war plans, they had no idea of the traitor in their midst.  After all, they believed him to be one of their own.  Little did they know, that their spy, a slave, was a double agent for the colonists.  There should be no reason for the officers to have been suspicious, in all likelihood the slave could not read or write.  He spied on the colonies and gave good information.  He took the crucial information learned in the British camp back to General Marquis de Lafayette himself.  Those acts are an important reason why America prevailed in the Battle of Yorktown and won our independence.  How could a man of such low status have gained the trust of General Lafayette?  Why is the impact of such a vital character in the story of American independence often omitted?  This American patriot, James Armistead Lafayette, was born into slavery and died a free man after his service in the Revolutionary War.  Armistead Lafayette infiltrated the British forces as an American spy, provided information that helped America win the Battle of Yorktown, and went on to take Lafayette’s name when he gained his freedom.  Based on these historical events, James Armistead Lafayette is the most important American founder.

James Armistead was employed by Lafayette as a spy because the general hoped to gain intelligence on British movements.  Posing as a runaway slave, he was able to infiltrate the British forces.  The double agent’s espionage resulted in the possession of the locations of British troops, arms and battle strategies by British Generals Benedict Arnold and Cornwallis.  The information he gathered would prove to be essential to the Founders’ victory at the Battle of Yorktown.

Leading up to the battle, Armistead obtained indispensable knowledge of British preparations.  In his time as a British agent, Armistead helped guide British troops through local roads.  While In camps, officers would openly speak about war strategies, which he then documented and turned over to other American spies.  Armistead had gained the trust of both the American and British war camps and could pass freely between the two.  In his reports back and forth, Armistead with the help of General Washington and General Lafayette, was able to prevent the British from sending 10,000 reinforcements to Yorktown.  Because of this the British military was crippled and eventually surrendered to the colonies on October 19, 1781, resulting in the birth of our nation.

After Armistead Lafayette helped America win her independence, he went on to gain his freedom and take Lafayette’s name.  Unfortunately, following the American victory, James Armistead was returned to slavery because a law freeing slaves who fought in the war did not apply to him.  However, he petitioned the Virginia Assembly to obtain his freedom.  His petition was supported by his owner and a letter from Marquis de Lafayette saying, “He properly acquitted himself with some important commissions I gave him and appears to me entitled to every reward his situation can admit of.”  This provides sufficient evidence that while in Lafayette’s service, Armistead deserved not only his freedom but every right that could be offered to him.  The words alone are empowering, but considering that the man behind them is a general makes them all the more credible.  After James gained his freedom, he took the name of the man who advocated for him when nobody else would.  There is an engraving from the 1780s on display in the Jamestown-Yorktown Foundation Museum of Marquis de Lafayette standing next to a man believed to be James Armistead Lafayette.  The fact that Armistead, a slave, is depicted in the foreground with General Lafayette is so incredible due to the fact that artists rarely produced works with enslaved persons in the foreground of a picture, much less with a well esteemed general.  This gives further support for the status, contributions, and importance of James Armistead Lafayette.

After all of the information has been reviewed the question as to why James Armistead Lafayette is forgotten from the narrative of American history looms even larger. In the face of slavery and oppression, James Armistead Lafayette went on to help America gain their freedom in the face of tyranny and in turn, gained his own. In his life, James Armistead Lafayette infiltrated the British forces as an American spy, provided information that helped win the Battle of Yorktown, and went on to take Lafayette’s name when he gained his freedom to become the most important American founder.

Thanks so much, Hannah, for sharing this with us, and for teaching us about someone who deserves more attention for his contribution to American freedom. You can learn more about James Armistead Lafayette here. 

The other day we shared some upcoming FCSS conference sessions that caught our attention. But oh my goodness there are so many more that are worth a look! Let’s pick up with a look at sessions later in the afternoon! Oh, and register for the conference here. 

October 20th, 2018
Concurrent Session 4
Complicating the Narrative: Teaching 9/11 in a Changing World
Jennifer Lagasse, 9/11 Memorial and Museum

This is a session that intrigues your bloghost greatly. How do we balance instruction about a topic that is, increasingly, becoming less of a memory for the next generation of students? How do we approach teaching about civil liberties, national security, religion, and more? A presenter from the 9/11 Memorial and Museum will lead the discussion!

Politics-in-Action: Transforming Your Semester-Long U.S. Government Course through Project-Based Learning
Chris Spinale, FJCC at LFI Action Civics Coordinator
Dr. Jane Lo, Florida State University

Project-based learning. Can we ever get enough resources to implement it in the classroom? Learn about a simulation-oriented approach to teaching government that has proven successful in many classrooms. This is a free, ready-made curriculum you can use and adapt for your own classrooms.

The State of the Assessment: The Civics EOCA
Dr. Stacy Skinner, Test Development Center, Florida Department of Education
Lots of folks involved in test development and review

So, what’s going on with the state assessment for Civics? Learn from the person that is in charge of putting it together! This session will be similiar to the earlier U.S. History session on this topic. 

Concurrent Session 5
Contextualizing Equality: Founding Fathers and Founding Principles
Jennifer Jaso, Florida Council for History Education

This interesting session uses primary sources to explore whether the Founding Fathers truly supported the principles expressed in the Declaration of Independence. 

Step Up America: A Call to Good Citizenship
Terri Lynn Demmon, Step Up America

Learn about how this how this non-partisan organization can help you teach your students about good citizenship, patriotism, and history!

Simulations, Technology, Oh My!
Jillianne King, Davidsen Middle School
Cory Puppa, Martinez Middle School

Engage your students in civics through the use of technology! Check out some cool resources that you can use to deepen your kids’ understanding of civics while also engaging them deeper in their learning! 

In a later post, we’ll further explore sessions and the excellent keynotes for Saturday and Sunday, but don’t forget that Saturday will be an awards dinner where you can see your peers and colleagues recognized for their contributions to the social studies community! So be sure to get your tickets in advance!

And of course you can register for the conference here. Be sure to check this space for additional highlights of scheduled sessions and events and sponsors and vendors!

American Founders’ Month continues in Florida. Today, we look at Thomas Jefferson. Out of all of the Founders’, it may be Thomas Jefferson that most schoolchildren are most familiar with. They know him, of course, as the author of the Declaration of Independence. The Declaration, of course, is considered on of the clearest rebukes of tyranny ever written, and it remains to this day a symbol of the pursuit of liberty the world over.

Like many of his peers, however, Jefferson was a man of massive contradictions. An advocate for liberty who owned a great many slaves, a slaveowner who recognized the evils of slavery (‘the rock upon which the Union would split’) but never freed his own slaves (unlike his colleague and friend George Washington, who freed his own upon his death), an opponent of an activist and strong central government who nevertheless used his power to purchase vast swathes of land from the French (despite his doubts about whether the Constitution gave him that power), and a believer in the importance of civility and comity in politics and life who was involved in one of the most brutal presidential campaigns in American history.

Thomas Jefferson was indeed many things, some good, some bad, but all important to the legacy of freedom and the Founders of this country. As one of his successors as president, John F. Kennedy, once said while hosting a dinner for Nobel Prize winners,

I want to tell you how welcome you are to the White House. I think this is the most extraordinary collection of talent, of human knowledge, that has ever been gathered together at the White House, with the possible exception of when Thomas Jefferson dined alone.
Someone once said that Thomas Jefferson was a gentleman of 32 who could calculate an eclipse, survey an estate, tie an artery, plan an edifice, try a cause, break a horse, and dance the minuet.

Log in and learn more about Thomas Jefferson from this excellent lesson provided by our friends at iCivics! 

You can grab the PowerPoint featured at the top of this post here: Thomas Jefferson AFM