Introduction

It's Monday morning and as usual, you arrive at school at 7:00 AM ready to start your week. After picking up your mail in the teachers' workroom, you proceed to your classroom to prepare for the day. You power up your computer and begin to review your lesson plans.

When you hear the computer make its last "I'm ready" sounds, you open your email to check for important messages.

"Wait a minute" you think to yourself as you see a message from your department chairperson, "I wonder what Mrs. Smith has to say."

As you read this message you discover that you have been chosen by a local community group to participate in a collaborative project on an important historical issue of local, national, and international magnitude. The essential question they would like answered is, "How did the construction of the Poston, Arizona Japanese-American Internment Camps affect the lives of Japanese Americans and residents of the Parker, Arizona area who lived on or near the camps, then and after?

The group would like you and one other teacher to team up to prepare a PowerPoint presentation to share with your students and your colleagues. Although they will not be able to pay you for your time, they are sure you will consider this opportunity a privilege.

"Whew! What a task! This project will take hours and hours!" Yet, you are proud to be chosen and know that you will accept this important, though time-consuming task. "At least they don't need it until after summer break." Then you take a long, deep breath and hit reply.