Rationale

In designing this unit, we chose to create it using principles of understanding by

design. This meant we started with the curricular outcomes we wanted to address,

determined how we could assess those in a meaningful performance task, and then

created our lessons around enabling our students to attain those skills and concepts

through a variety of learning strategies. This unit is designed to ask the questions of

how and why nations participate internationally. It builds off of the concepts of

nationalism and national interest developed in the units prior, and is intended to scaffold

students into the next and final unit of the course discussing the global aspects of

internationalism which asks what the impacts of internationalism are and if it should be

pursued. Our unit lays the foundation for discussing global citizenship by introducing the

concept of internationalism, and providing students guidance and opportunity to analyze

actions as supportive or not of internationalism. As this is the one related issue in Grade

eleven without curricular ties to identity, it is not a main focus of our unit.

This unit is designed to not only demonstrate multiple perspectives, for example,

our discussion on the importance of peacekeeping in Canada, but to explicitly teach

students to look for multiple perspectives. This is achieved during our classes teaching

the research process, both in the context of their performance task and not. This unit is

framed under the question of how and why nations and nation-states participate

internationally. It is also informed by the broader question of related issue 3, should

internationalism be pursued, as it works with the following unit to help students answer

this question.
 Another primary objective of this unit is to develop our students’ ability to

effectively use and draw meaningful conclusions from the research process. We have

two classes devoted to not only the practice of the research process, but also deliberate

instruction, demonstration, and guided learning about the skill itself. This involves

having students evaluate sources individually, as a group, and as a class, and is

demonstrated and assessed in their performance task. Also taught, practiced, and

assessed in these classes are skills of citation, media literacy, and interaction with

sources to reach reasoned conclusions.

We are using current events throughout the unit to introduce classes for creating

relevance of the material for students and begin engagement at start of the day by

allowing students to share some current events of interest to them. This is also part of

our effort to create student-centered lessons, along with providing 5 minute brain breaks

in the middle of the classes to promote engagement, providing flexibility of format in

their performance task, and diversifying our instructional strategies. This is intended to

help address the diverse social context of our students. In teaching this unit, we

incorporate multi-disciplinary skills that are valuable in other subjects such as finding

and interpreting research, as well as written and verbal communication, and provide

students with a solid framework to understand and evaluate internationalism.