DBQ News

Each month, we will be sending out DBQ News detailing PD opportunities, tips and tricks, new stuff, and support information to help you get through these challenging times.

Inside This Edition:

• Do You DBQ ... Online?
• DBQ Tips and Tricks
• Upcoming Professional Development
• What's New with DBQ?
• May DBQ Unit Spotlights

The DBQ Online team is reaching out to inform you that our Summer Rollover will occur in July. During the Rollover, as part of our efforts to protect student data; all classes, assignments, and work will be removed from the site. Teachers and students will still be able to login, and teachers will be able to access binders and units, but the content in their “Classes & Assignments” page will be removed. The only exemption is for teacher’s Assignment Templates (see below).

If you have summer school classes, we can adjust the rollover date to occur after summer school concludes. Please reach out to support@dbqproject.com with the appropriate dates.

Assignment Templates: Templates are the best way to save teacher work between school years (follow the link below for instructions on making them). The specific supports and any annotations made in Teacher Markup Mode will be saved in the template and will be available after the rollover for use next school year.

Note: The template will not save any annotations created outside of Teacher Markup Mode (like the teacher “View” or “Manage” modes).

The DBQ Project is unapologetically a writing program. We are also a social studies program, and a literature program, and a literacy program. Most importantly, the DBQ Project resources are inquiry. Inquiry-based learning not only piques students’ curiosity and engagement but also leads to deeper learning! The DBQ Project offers structured and scaffolded lessons to guide students through this inquiry process culminating in an evidence-based writing exercise. But, writing a 5-paragraph essay is not the only way for students to demonstrate their learning and articulate their arguments. Writing can also take many different forms. Have you considered creating an alternative end product for a DBQ or Mini-Q your students are working through? If you are a choice board person or love project-based learning, this is for you!

Some Possible Alternative Endings:

• Historical Report Cards
• Anatomy/Autopsy Reports
• Debates/Socratic Discussions
• TED Talks or NPR Podcast
• Letters to Gov’t or Organizations
• Storyboards & Comic Strips
• Team Essays – DBQ Relay
• DBQ Escape/Breakout Rooms
• TikTok/Flipgrid Videos
• Discussion Boards, Twitter Feeds, Padlet
• Prezis, Powerpoints, or iMovies
• National History Day ideas

These self-paced courses familiarize teachers with The DBQ Project Method. Teachers will learn how to make the DBQ process engaging and powerful for students. Participants will work through the steps of The DBQ Project Method at their own pace, pausing to reflect and practice along the way. These courses are FREE to our DBQ Online districts and schools.

The Basics

• DBQ 101 is equivalent to our DBQ Full Day Introductory Workshop.
  
• Courses are available at no charge to DBQ Online districts, throughout the pandemic.
• This self-paced course takes between 5-6 hours to complete.
• Courses will be open for 3 weeks after launch.
• Courses will launch on June 7, June 28, and July 19. Choose the 3-week window that best fits your schedule.
• Participants will receive a certificate of completion when they finish the course.

Available Courses:

Note! While the self-paced courses center around specific units, The DBQ Project Method, which drives them, is applicable to all DBQ Project material. The main focus of the course is the DBQ process, which is the same for every DBQ/Mini-Q unit available.

• Early Jamestown: Why Did So Many Colonists Die? - Elementary focus
• Valley Forge: Would You Have Quit? - Elementary and Middle School focus
• What Were the Primary Reasons for the "Fall" of Rome? - Middle and High School focus
• A Question of Scale: How Wealthy is Brazil? - Middle and High School focus
• What Was The Underlying Cause of World War I? - High School focus

A New District Administrator Portal

• District leaders will have the power to select schools, create groups of schools, and share out assignments and customized rubrics.

Customizable Rubrics

• Teachers and administrators will be able to create customized rubrics to score student work directly on the platform.

New e-Binders Added to the Platform

• Spanish translations are included at no cost. Civics and Geography will be added for next school year, along with additional US history units, and Mini-Qs in Lousiana History.

We've been busy at the DBQ Project writing new lessons for American History. Our goal is to add twelve new lessons to Volume 1 of our Mini-Qs in American History, and fourteen lessons to Volume 2. DBQ Online subscribers to the original volumes will receive these lessons at no additional cost for the 2021-2022 school year. For print customers, these new lessons will be sold in two new volumes. Tentative topics include:

• Volume 1B - the Cahokia, California Missions, the Atlantic Slave Trade, the Stamp Act, impact of the cotton gin, the Louisiana Purchase, workers in the Lowell Mills, maintaining humanity during enslavement, Andrew Jackson, the Trail of Tears, Seminoles resistance, and Sherman's March
• Volume 2B - the Chinese Exclusion Acts, Booker T. Washington vs. W.E.B. Du Bois, the Panama Canal, the Tulsa Race Massacre, the Great Migration, the Great Depression, women in World War II, the Bracero Program, the dropping of the atomic bomb, the beginning and end of the Cold War, the Interstate Highway System, the Vietnam draft, the Stonewall Uprising, the ERA, and 9/11.

It's finally coming, Louisiana!!! Keith and Tyler have been busy the last several months writing and putting together our new Mini-Qs in Louisiana History. The new binder will include 10 high-interest, engaging teacher units on various topics in Louisiana History. The tentative titles include:

1. How Did the Mississippi River Shape Louisiana's Early History?
2. What Drove the Acadians to Louisiana?
3. The Louisiana Territory: Would You Have Supported the Purchase?
4. Why Was the Battle of New Orleans a Watershed Event for the United States?
5. How Free Were Free People of Color in Louisiana?
6. Why Did Louisianians Join the Confederate Fight During the Civil War?
7. From Plessy to Ruby: How Did Blacks in Louisiana Resist Jim Crow Segregation?
8. Huey Long: Would You Have Voted for "The Kingfish"?
9. What Was Louisiana's Greatest Contribution to the WWII War Effort?
10. Hurricane Katrina: Why Did So Many People Die?

We are excited to announce the release of our Spanish language Mini-Qs. If you have Spanish-speaking and dual language students, this is an excellent opportunity to promote equity and ensure greater student success with DBQs. See below for the order form.

Spanish versions of 11 of our most popular Mini-Q binders provide opportunities to support more students more effectively than ever before.

• Content and design match the English Version
• Translated by a combination of machine and native speakers
• Ideal for both bilingual and dual-immersion students
• Text documents, maps, charts, graphs, all in Spanish
• Graphic organizers, outlines, and rubrics in Spanish support reading, thinking, and writing
• Different versions of each lesson provide supports for students with different abilities

Also, if you have DBQ Online, or are thinking about going digital with your DBQ instruction, the Spanish translations have been integrated into the DBQ Online platform at no extra cost to subscribers. The Spanish translations are an option to include when creating an assignment.

"Helping ALL students read smart, think straight, and write clearly"

Email: info@dbqproject.com
Website: www.dbqproject.com
Location: 1234 Sherman Avenue, Evanston, IL, USA
Phone: 847-475-4007
Facebook: facebook.com/dbqproject
Twitter: @dbqproject