Final Product

[Puruarán Congress coat of arms] In this project you will design a museum exhibit on the Mexican Independence. To do this, you will work in groups of five to create a museum that contains exhibits on five main phases of the war for Independence.

The exhibit must incorporate a variety of elements—pictures, maps, primary-source documents, charts and graphs, timelines—to display the causes, phases, and effects of the war of Independence.

Before preparing the exhibit, you must do deep research on the topics assigned to your role.

Museum Exhibits

Your museum must be comprised of five exhibits, each of which addresses the different aspects of the war for Independence:

Causes: Internal and external

Hidalgo and Early Success

Morelos and the Decline of Rebel Fortunes

Iturbide and the Plan de Iguala

Effects of the war

Visual Elements

Each exhibit of your museum must combine at least four graphic elements of the list below. Each graphic element must be in one letter size poster made in MS Publisher (You can use two pages for the timeline only). A caption must accompany each explaining its significance.

Pictures

Charts and graphs

Timelines

Accounts of personal experience

Collages

Maps

Important quotes

Copies of primary-source documents

Written Information

Each exhibit in your museum must have written information in posters using letter size paper.

Each group member is required to do: research for each topic, prepare a written draft report in MLA format, give it to the Social Studies teacher for review, and make the necessary corrections on them. At the end, the four documents will be part of the Team Report.

Each student must complete one of the exhibits and explain orally your findings as the guests visit your museum.

Team Report

As a team, you must write at least three paragraphs answering the following critical thinking question:

As a result of the war for Independence, was New Spain/Mexico any different politically, socially, and economically than it was before?

Support your answer with historical facts, add your bibliography and use the MLA format to write it.

The team will prepare a report for the day of the exhibit. This report will follow the MLA format in all the pages and must include:

Cover Page: project title, team members, school name, teacher name & date.

Table of Contents (team)

Critical Thinking Question (team)

Researcher (four topics)

Historical Figure Hidalgo (four topics)

Historical Figure Morelos (four topics)

Historical Figure Iturbide (four topics)

Analyst (four topics)

Costumes

On the day of the inauguration of your museum exhibit you must be dressed as your corresponding historical figure.

The Researcher must be dressed either as a Creole or as a member of one of the other castes.

The Analyst must be dressed as a member of the military to show the influence that the military had during the one hundred years after the Independence from Spain.

Every costume must include a corresponding mask.

MLA format for Written Information

Paper:

Use white letter sized paper (81/2 by 11 inch).

Margins:

One-inch margins all around the text of your paper -- left side, right side, and top and bottom.

Paragraphs should be indented half an inch.

Spacing:

All the work must be double-spaced

Heading and Title:

Your research paper does not need a title page.

At the top of the first page, at the left-hand margin, type your name, your teacher's name (Ms. Monique Autrique or Mr. Jerry Freed), the subject name (Social Studies), and the date -- all on separate, double-spaced lines.

Then double-space again and center the title above your text.

Double-space again before beginning your text.

The title should be neither underlined nor written in all capital letters.

Capitalize only the first, last, and principal words of the title.

Titles might end with a question mark or an exclamation mark if that is appropriate, but not in a period.

Page Numbers:

Number your pages consecutively (including the first page) in the upper right-hand corner of each page, one-half inch from the top.

Type your last name before the page number.

Use Header and Footer for this.

Make sure the page-number is always an inch from the right-hand edge of the paper (flush with the right-hand margin of your text) and that there is a double-space between the page number and the top line of text.

Do not use the abbreviation p. or any other mark before the page number.

Example:

"MLA Format." Graphic. Capital Community College. 15 Oct. 2003. <http://webster.commnet.edu/mla/format.shtml>