Introduction~

My name is Anna, and I am currently enrolled in Mr. Gallagher's Facing History and Ourselves course at WHS. As a senior, I'm finding this class to be very interesting and informative, especially now that I'm about to go out into the real word in less than 5 months. At the same time, this class also serves as a break from my stressful day-to-day schedule. I heard about the class while taking Mr. Gallagher's U.S. History I class during my sophomore year and was curious about it from the start.

Facing History and Ourselves is a course that is designed to teach its students about bias, racism, and prejudice of history and its people. The course also examines diversity, identity, the individual, and how that one individual deals with everything the society throws at him. During the semester, we learned valuable lessons of life by going through examples of history and placing ourselves in people's shoes. Sometimes articles, books, documentaries, movies, and other films were used to help us as students understand what the people from the past were going through and see the messages behind the media. Later, discussions were held and/or reflections through blog entries were encouraged to promote thinking in ways one might have not thought of while thinking on their own.

As geeky as this sounds, a few of the things that we discussed in class I had already thought about on my own free time before taking the actual course. I guess I'm just weird that way. (Who said being weird is a bad thing?) I have my own blog, and I sometimes talk about one thing or another if I feel strongly about the subject. Taking this course, I actually had a the opportunity and a way of hearing other people's opinions and could hold an intelligent conversation with someone about certain topics that interested me. Now THAT is something I don't get to do every day!! I really enjoyed taking this course.