Lesson plan by Phyllis Hayashibara of Venice High School and Tim Henderson of Palisades High School.
Narrative Summary
Materials and Resources
Suggested Web Sites

Overview
  • This unit is to be taught as part of an Interdisciplinary 10th grade curriculum.
  • Disciplines incorporated: Social Studies, Geography, Science/Math/Engineering, and Fine Arts.
  • Sections of the California History-Social Science Frameworks addressed: "Unresolved Problems of the Modern World," and "Nationalism in the Contemporary World - The Middle East."
  • The unit takes approximately one week of class time for a team of up to four teachers.
  • Classroom size: 25-35 students

Narrative Summary

The purpose of this unit is to explore the issues stipulated by the California Framework by focusing on a necessity of life that every human being can relate to: water. This is done by using a variety of appropriate texts and activities to increase knowledge and understanding throughout a range of disciplines.

General objectives for the unit are:

  1. to understand how water as an economic good drives regional politics,
    2.
  2. to understand how water as an environmental essential interweaves with regional culture, and
    3.
  3. to understand how the water problems of the region can reflect similar or corresponding issues in our own lives.
    4.
Students will be asked to examine the physical and cultural impressions made by water in the Middle East, as well as their own lives, through exercises in reading, writing, geography and art. The unit will culminate in the following assessment:

"How do historical developments in the Middle East factor into current problems and conflicts involving water in that region? How might these problems develop in the future? How do they relate to water issues in other areas and in your own life? How might they be solved? Respond with a minimum of five paragraphs, cite three examples studied and refer to a minimum of three different areas of study (e.g., social studies, science & art)."

Ultimately, it is hoped that a common ground between peoples with superficial dissimilarities will be discovered, and based on that discovery, an even more tolerant attitude toward others will be founded.

Materials and Resources for Student Activities

  • Current geopolitical maps of the Middle East, including a blank map. (Names of countries, cities and bodies of water to be supplied by students in geography activity.)
  • "The Women's Baths," short story by Ulfat al-Idlibi
  • Selection of readings by Middle Eastern poets: Sadi, Rumi, or Hafiz
  • First chapter of Abdelrahman Munif's, Cities of Salt
  • Dune, the novel by Frank Herbert
  • Slides of Orientalist paintings that contain water-related subject matter, (e.g., sea ports, garden design, water wells, etc.) to compare them with actual photographs of the Middle East.
  • Calligraphy pens for iconic design exercise.
  • Vocabulary list of pertinent terms (aquifer, arabesque, arid, caliph, Islam, kohl, mosque, Orientalism, Quran, riparian, saline, steppes, Sufi, Sunni, vegetal, etc.)
  • Collected articles from local papers regarding water issues in your area.

Suggested Web Sites for Further Inquiry

Send your suggestions for related web sites to humanitas@lalc.k12.ca.us.

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