GCSE Exam Dates - June 2012

Exam dates for GCSE History - June 2012 are as follows:

• A971 Aspects of International Relations, 1919-2005; 2 hour exam, Tue 12 June pm.
• A972 British Depth Study; 1 h 30 min exam, Fri 15 June am.

http://www.ocr.org.uk/download/admin/ocr_57813_admin_gcse_june_2012_exam_timetable_gcse.pdf

Aspects of International Relations is the Year 10 exam, which is also relevent for those Year 11s retaking this summer.
The British Depth Study is the Year 11 exam.

You will find links to revision activities and resources on the Years 10 & 11 pages of the Blog.

FDR's Fireside Chats

Follow this link to watch a number of Franklin D. Roosevelt's 'Fireside Chats' from 1933:

http://havefunwithhistory.com/movies/chats.html

Kony 2012: Should we donate to InvisibleChildren?

The latest viral fauxtivist (faux activist) ad sweeping the interwebs is the Kony 2012 appeal by InvisibleChildren Inc. An extremely shady American nonprofit organisation aiming to wipe LRA leader Joseph Kony from the face of the earth.

IC has received widespread criticism from academics and press alike. The group currently has a low two out of four star rating from Charity Navigator (an international organisation that rates charities) as they won't let their finances be independently audited. Of the money that IC receive from donations, just 31% (by their own admission) goes directly towards helping those displaced by LRA operations across Central Africa. The IC advocate direct military intervention against the LRA through increased American aid for Ugandan armed forces. (President Obama has recently agreed to send 100 special-ops troops into Uganda to hunt down Kony.) The problem with this is that the Ugandan army itself has a poor record in terms of human rights abuses over the last 30 years.

Most shocking of all, perhaps, is a photograph of IC founders posing with weapons and personnel from the Sudan People's Liberation Army.

InvisibleChildren Inc have released a statement of retaliation on their blog - worth a read.

That is not to say that the LRA are not an evil, genocidal organisation and Kony a war criminal. However, it is important to remember to research your causes thoroughly - before being swept away in the media/twitter/facebook hysteria (take that Rhianna).

KEQ: Should we support Invisible Children? on Prezi

Year 10 and Year 12 individual blog-pages are now live.

I will be adding a further page for Year 11 over the next couple of days.

I've put links to the Exam Board website, student forums, revision resources and (most importantly) to the PREZI presentations that I use in class. All for you to access from anywhere.

Further updates will follow...

How to create a great prezi on Prezi

p.s. If you know of any good links for GCSE or A-level come and find me and I'll upload them to the blog.

Documentary series looking at the Cold War.

The video includes a number of first-hand accounts of events during the Cold War. It is a useful source for Year 10 work and well worth a watch.

Billy Joel - We Didn't Start the Fire

At request from Will Goodey...

 "I'm a history nut. I devour books. At one time I wanted to be a history teacher." - Billy Joel

When he turned forty Billy Joel decided to sit down and write out what had happened in his lifetime.

The result was a fantastic overview to the Cold War era summed up in one song.