findingEducation’s Digital Teachers’ LoungeTips and insights from the findingEducation team.

Michael Ryan is an 11th-grade English teacher at Wilsonville High School in Wilsonville, Ore. He earned his master’s degree in education at the University of Florida and has been teaching for eight years.

When it came time to cover transcendentalism in class, Ryan was looking for a way to truly engage his students and make the material relevant to their lives. The Right Action project was the perfect answer. Developed by his friend and fellow Wilsonville High teacher, Jay Rishel, the Right Action project focuses on the principles of transcendentalism and asks students to make a positive change in their lives or their world.

“The kids LOVE this project, although it’s a test for many of them,” Ryan said. “They see their lives and identities as not being static but something that they have a great deal of control over.”

fE: What aspects of transcendentalism do you cover with your class?

MR: We study Thoreau, Whitman and Emerson and focus on the three principles of the transcendentalists: Unity (”We are part and particle of God and the universe”), Inwardness (”Self-Reliance” in all its forms), and Right Action.

fE: How did the Right Action project come about?

MR: The transcendentalists believed that action was more important than contemplation. The highest form of man was one who 1) accepted oneself as you were, 2) cultivated the observational powers and talents within you, and 3) believed in the self as the highest authority—’trust thyself; every heart vibrates to that iron string’—we know what is right and wrong for us and within us.

So as a fun project, we challenge the students to trust themselves to make a positive change. They can select something that they know needs to be changed in their lives or in their world.

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Subject: Uncategorized
Tags: Educator Profiles

Did you take the Quiztory last week? Now it’s time to check your answers:

1. What treaty was President Kennedy trying to work out when he gave his famous “Ich bin ein Berliner” speech? A test ban treaty with the Soviet Union

2. Where did Joseph Smith and his followers go after being driven out of Missouri? Nauvoo, Ill.

3. For Germany, what was the most contentious part of the Treaty of Versailles? Article 231

4. What was the first play performed at the Globe Theatre? Shakespeare’s “Julius Caesar”

5. Who invited President Abraham Lincoln to speak at the opening ceremony of the Gettysburg National Cemetery? Lawyer David Wills

Subject: History, Other History, Social Studies, U.S. Government, U.S. History, World History
Tags: Quiztory, The Answer Sheet

Test your students’ knowledge of the notable events covered in findingDulcinea’s “On This Day” column this week with Quiztory. It makes a fun extra credit assignment.

1. What treaty was President Kennedy trying to work out when he gave his famous “Ich bin ein Berliner” speech?

2. Where did Joseph Smith and his followers go after being driven out of Missouri?

3. For Germany, what was the most contentious part of the Treaty of Versailles?

4. What was the first play performed at the Globe Theatre?

5. Who invited President Abraham Lincoln to speak at the opening ceremony of the Gettysburg National Cemetery?

What’s Coming Up?

Next week, “On This Day”will examine the Declaration of Independence, Elvis Presley’s first professional recording, the first all-star baseball game and a UFO sighting in Roswell, N.M. We’ll also take a look at the U.S. Navy and an Iran Air passenger flight, the 14^th Amendment and Saddam Hussein.

Subject: History, Other History, Social Studies, U.S. Government, U.S. History, World History
Tags: Quiztory