The curriculum is arranged by geographic region, with each team of teachers starting in a different part of the world. This allows for the English teachers to have the requisite number of books available for each section. The major regions studied are the Middle East, South Asia, Southeast Asia, East Asia, Latin America, and Africa.

 

Beginning with 17th-century British exploration, the course offers students an examination of the United States from a European colony to a continental world power at the turn of the 19th century. Its goal is to view American development through the examination of social movements, foreign policy decisions, and economic developments. The overarching themes for this course include the following: the ideals of the Declaration of Independence and the way many Americans agitated to be included within the ideals; the American frontier/the West as a metaphor for economic opportunity; the economic growth of our nation from colonial mercantilism to Gilded Age industrialization that was fueled by an entrepreneurial spirit, technological innovation and labor (both enslaved and later free).

 

The following curriculum reflects our department’s belief that in the twenty-first century, our students need to be prepared to live as global citizens who need to acquire knowledge of the diverse people with whom they share this world. Moreover, as the world is experiencing a virtual revolution in information and communication technologies, MLHS students need to be trained to acquire and critically evaluate the abundance of information. That is why this curriculum stresses key “21st-Century Skills” in each unit.

This is a one-semester introduction to the field of Economics. Such basics as economics vocabulary, factors of production, supply and demand, determination of price, saving and investment, entrepreneurship, marketplace functions, employment and productivity, money and monetary policy, stock market operations, and other fundamentals of capitalism will be studied. Key concepts will also be taught through videotapes from the Annenberg collection. Guest speakers and individual research projects will be used to make the course relevant to students’ interests.