Conspiracy Theory Class

Jacqui Duvall
Jul 20, 2017
6 min read

One benefit of being at a smaller, rural school is that I have a lot of flexibility and control over my curriculum, other than state standards, of course. I mentioned in my bio. that in addition to teaching geography four periods of the day, I also have two elective classes that I teach in the afternoon. These classes are quarterly, so I have a new set of students every 8 weeks or so. One class is for seventh grade and the other is for eighth.

The first year, I was a little thrown when I was asked to come up with not only one, but TWO classes on my own without any curriculum to go off of. Some of you might be thinking,

"Jacqui, why are you complaining?! I would kill to be able to make up my own classes about anything I want!"

And if you asked me today, I would tell you that I absolutely love the opportunity to plan classes around things that I am passionate about! BUUUUT, as a first year teacher, the thought of having to come up with two brand spankin' new classes all on my own, in addition to my brand new core class, was little scary to say the least.

I decided after some consideration, that I would teach a current event class for my seventh graders and a youth leadership class for the eighth graders. I ended up LOVING the current events class because it perfectly tied in with my Political Science minor and I was able to incorporate a lot of the election and primaries into the class. Believe it or not, most of the students enjoyed it, too! I will

get into the specifics of that class another day. The youth leadership class, was not as successful and we are just going to leave it at that... ;)

Fast forward to Fall 2016...

I decided to do something different and take a leap of faith. I really had to fight to get these two classes changed, but in the end I am so glad that I did! You may be wondering why I changed my current events class if it went so well...? I don't regret teaching it at all and I actually want to get back to it, but it wasn't quite right for seventh graders. Don't get me wrong, I think that you can teach politics to any age, but the way I want the class to be laid out, it would work a lot better for eighth graders.

This left me with a problem, though, because the seventh graders I had the year before, were going to be eighth graders, and I didn't want them to have the same class twice. Thus, I came up with TWO new classes for the second year in a row! I had confidence that after doing it my first year, I could do it again and just come up with a one year rotation, until I got a new set of eighth graders to start over my current events class with. I chose Computer Basics for my seventh grade elective and for the eight graders

DRUM ROLL, PLEASE..........

I chose 'CONSPIRACY THEORIES'! I love learning about conspiracy theories, the background behind them, why they last, and who they are about. Just like adults, students love talking about things that aren't necessarily true or false and gossiping about them, so I knew we would have a mutual passion for the topic. (The focus of this post is on the Conspiracy Theories class that I created, so if you are interested in the other seventh grade elective, Computer Basics, wait for the upcoming post in the next month or so... but keep reading away -- you're already this far)!

I did each quarter a little differently by varying the conspiracies we discussed based on the students interests and intellectual ability, but the general layout each week was pretty much the same. Watch a video or read about the basics of the conspiracy, pick an initial argument, research that argument and find evidence, write a new, formal thesis and then present the evidence. Each conspiracy we presented differently, whether it was a PowerPoint presentation, a Twitter debate, a newspaper article, a mock trial, an in-class debate, or a skit/I-Movie. The students would get so pumped to debate their theories with each other and sometimes I swore they almost came to physical blows, which thrilled my historian side that students could get so excited about something in my class it actually inspired violence and scared the bazookas out of my teacher side!** :)

**Disclaimer: No children were harmed in the making of this course.

Here is a list of the conspiracy theories I covered:

Area 51
Amelia Earhart
JFK Assassination
9/11 - Who was behind it? Why did it happen? Something happened differently than the way it was explained to the public?
The Loch Ness Monster
Lost City of Atlantis

I started with Area 51 each quarter because all of the students seemed to know a little about it and it was a good basis for explaining how the class would be laid out. Area 51 also has a lot of resources online for them to look into (Always keep that in mind when picking a conspiracy, or you could run into some problems -- they can't support an argument without any resources!).

Most of my research sheets looked the same. At the top was a question or the main focus for the theory. I put this because some students need it written out, but also because it helps them to focus their research and know exactly what they are looking for.

Using Area 51 as an example, we know that it is an actual base that existed and was once used. President Obama confirmed this, but we still do not know for sure what it was used for. Therefore, the conspiracy theory is NOT whether or not Area 51 is real, but if it was used for secret government research or for testing on aliens and their technology. I had an equal number of students for both sides.

Then of course, we have the initial argument area where I have the students write down a short argument after just learning the basics about the conspiracy. It does not have to be in perfect thesis format, because at this point, they have no evidence to back it up. After they research this argument, if they want to change their mind based on what they find, they absolutely can.

Students must record four pieces of evidence, including the website they found it on and how it proves their argument. The reason I put this on here is because many students will simply find evidence about Area 51 and write it down, regardless of it's relevance to their thesis. This helps them really think about the importance of the evidence and if it truly helps make their argument better. This step is probably the most difficult of anything in this entire class. Teaching students to not only find good evidence, but to be able to explain why and how it is important is an incredibly difficult task!

Bless you, English Teachers, bless you!

I can attach documents to this blog post, but I have to have a picture first and then attach it and that would take me a long time. SO, if you want anything from any of these units, please contact me and I will send them to you. If enough people ask, I will put them on the site under the Unit Studies section.

One last thing I want to talk about before I go, is the final project at the end of the quarter. I have a choice board of different projects. This is the opportunity for students to choose any conspiracy theory they want, other than ones we have already covered, and present their thesis and research in a well thought out project.

Most students choose the Movie/Skit and they are HILARIOUS! This is one of my favorite parts about the class and the students get really excited to FINALLY research about the conspiracy they have been thinking about all quarter.

This is a final video that my students created about the Black Eyed Children. It made me cry it was so funny. They did the filming mainly at home.

I have rubrics and many more documents if you are interested, so as I said, ask and I you will receive! I hope you enjoyed reading this post and can use some of these ideas in your class as a mini-unit, exploratory, or as part of your core studies.