Karen Dick
@krdick.bsky.social
(she/her) 🇨🇦 History teacher, cat lover, avid reader.
#hamont (but actually Dundas)
#hamont (but actually Dundas)
I teach in Ontario and use it to teach about propaganda but we usually talk about what the State wan’t out of an education system.
Wow! Didn’t know about that! I don’t teach world history anymore but I will keep this in my pocket as general purpose pedagogy. I imagine it opens up some good meta conversations about what the purpose of education is in the states too!
January 22, 2026 at 8:40 PM
I teach in Ontario and use it to teach about propaganda but we usually talk about what the State wan’t out of an education system.
Questions I tried to answer from the young men in my grade 12 history class today:
What do I think the chances are we’ll reinstate conscription?
What are our chances if US troops mass at the border?
If we do conscript, what is our capacity to arm and train them?
Heart broken to hear their worries.
What do I think the chances are we’ll reinstate conscription?
What are our chances if US troops mass at the border?
If we do conscript, what is our capacity to arm and train them?
Heart broken to hear their worries.
January 7, 2026 at 11:58 PM
Questions I tried to answer from the young men in my grade 12 history class today:
What do I think the chances are we’ll reinstate conscription?
What are our chances if US troops mass at the border?
If we do conscript, what is our capacity to arm and train them?
Heart broken to hear their worries.
What do I think the chances are we’ll reinstate conscription?
What are our chances if US troops mass at the border?
If we do conscript, what is our capacity to arm and train them?
Heart broken to hear their worries.
and Hamilton Place.
and the Skydome.
The Kennedy Center is still the Kennedy Center, and will always be the Kennedy Center.
Just like the Gulf of Mexico.
Just like the Gulf of Mexico.
December 18, 2025 at 11:37 PM
and Hamilton Place.
No thank you.
The 11 Emerging Mega-Regions Of The United States
Do you think the map is missing any?
More about them: brilliantmaps.com/usa-mega-...
Do you think the map is missing any?
More about them: brilliantmaps.com/usa-mega-...
December 18, 2025 at 2:02 AM
No thank you.
This would be a fun jigsaw puzzle. 🧩
December 9, 2025 at 12:00 AM
This would be a fun jigsaw puzzle. 🧩
It was so great. My family still calls the plaza where it was located "The Consumer's Distributing plaza". It's been gone for DECADES!
(It also had a Ponderosa restaurant.)
(It also had a Ponderosa restaurant.)
We had a catalogue shop called Consumer’s Distributing.
You would walk in place your order on a tiny card with a pencil and then a few minutes later your item would roll out to you on a conveyor belt like you were king of the goddamn world.
Still chasing this high.
You would walk in place your order on a tiny card with a pencil and then a few minutes later your item would roll out to you on a conveyor belt like you were king of the goddamn world.
Still chasing this high.
December 3, 2025 at 7:18 PM
It was so great. My family still calls the plaza where it was located "The Consumer's Distributing plaza". It's been gone for DECADES!
(It also had a Ponderosa restaurant.)
(It also had a Ponderosa restaurant.)
100% agree. I have a handful of brilliant gr. 12s. But most of them can’t be bothered to show up on time, clash their clans or day-trade their bit coins while I’m teaching. I’ve done everything I can think of to help them care and they just don’t. It breaks my heart.
November 29, 2025 at 3:32 PM
100% agree. I have a handful of brilliant gr. 12s. But most of them can’t be bothered to show up on time, clash their clans or day-trade their bit coins while I’m teaching. I’ve done everything I can think of to help them care and they just don’t. It breaks my heart.
I’m not sure that the Overton window moves in both directions. 😕
We sometimes speak of pendulums. Does it swing back after this? Sometimes something terrible has to happen (war, etc) for it to move. That's the frightening thought. Hope I'm very wrong.
Trump calls Times reporter ‘ugly’ days after branding another journalist ‘piggy’
November 27, 2025 at 2:06 AM
I’m not sure that the Overton window moves in both directions. 😕
The school I teach at has plant elves. We have a plant club that propagates many different plants so we can have them in our classrooms. On Fridays after school the elves visit all the rooms to water AND mist the plants. Our plant elves are the best.
i hate all elves but i nevertheless have an Important Question: what kind of elf is best? forest elf? city elf? dark elf? snow elf? high elf? there's so many kinds
November 27, 2025 at 1:51 AM
The school I teach at has plant elves. We have a plant club that propagates many different plants so we can have them in our classrooms. On Fridays after school the elves visit all the rooms to water AND mist the plants. Our plant elves are the best.
You left off hot water crust. What makes a Scotch pie superior (especially if it comes from Christies’ the baker on the High Street in Airdrie Scotland 🏴).
en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hot_wat...
en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hot_wat...
November 26, 2025 at 12:27 AM
You left off hot water crust. What makes a Scotch pie superior (especially if it comes from Christies’ the baker on the High Street in Airdrie Scotland 🏴).
en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hot_wat...
en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hot_wat...
Same. But medicine.
Mr. Allum
7th & 8th grade history
Dundana Public School
Wentworth County District School Board
Mr. Allum
7th & 8th grade history
Dundana Public School
Wentworth County District School Board
Mr. Segura
7th grade history
Jackson Middle School
Albuquerque Public Schools
That's why I became a teacher.
7th grade history
Jackson Middle School
Albuquerque Public Schools
That's why I became a teacher.
November 21, 2025 at 2:11 AM
Same. But medicine.
Mr. Allum
7th & 8th grade history
Dundana Public School
Wentworth County District School Board
Mr. Allum
7th & 8th grade history
Dundana Public School
Wentworth County District School Board
Always praise a student who asks a question. And, about this time of year, the students realize if they ask me something I will take myself on multiple tangents (all round the houses) and I end up asking “did I answer your question?”
The actual secret to why I know stuff is that I ask a question any time I don’t understand literally anything. I don’t care how simple it is. Anybody who makes fun of you for asking a simple question likely doesn’t know the answer either
November 20, 2025 at 2:00 AM
Always praise a student who asks a question. And, about this time of year, the students realize if they ask me something I will take myself on multiple tangents (all round the houses) and I end up asking “did I answer your question?”
Not sure if this is still the case, but when Netflix had "Five Came Back" at first, they also had (nearly?) all of the films mentioned in the documentary. Extraordinary collection.
Have you seen “Five Came Back”? It’s a documentary about 5 Hollywood directors who went to war and the films they made during/after.
November 18, 2025 at 12:12 PM
Not sure if this is still the case, but when Netflix had "Five Came Back" at first, they also had (nearly?) all of the films mentioned in the documentary. Extraordinary collection.
All non-fiction books should have decent margins. 3/4 of an inch is not sufficient. I bought a PHYSICAL book. I need room for my marginalia. #ShoutingIntoTheVoid
November 15, 2025 at 6:28 PM
All non-fiction books should have decent margins. 3/4 of an inch is not sufficient. I bought a PHYSICAL book. I need room for my marginalia. #ShoutingIntoTheVoid
LOVE THIS! I show this film to my genocide studies class when we’re talking about dehumanization. It sticks with them and it comes up in conversation all semester.
Oskar Schlemmer ~ Wire Figure and Abstract Figure from the Triadic Ballet, c.1924
#Bauhaus #Constructivism #Cubism
#Bauhaus #Constructivism #Cubism
November 14, 2025 at 3:47 AM
LOVE THIS! I show this film to my genocide studies class when we’re talking about dehumanization. It sticks with them and it comes up in conversation all semester.
And this is why I gave up driving and now take the bus.
November 14, 2025 at 12:05 AM
And this is why I gave up driving and now take the bus.
Putting together our Remembrance Day Assembly. I’ve done it for 27 years and this is my last one.
Writing the script, it feels like a three hankie event.
Writing the script, it feels like a three hankie event.
November 8, 2025 at 10:12 PM
Putting together our Remembrance Day Assembly. I’ve done it for 27 years and this is my last one.
Writing the script, it feels like a three hankie event.
Writing the script, it feels like a three hankie event.
Today’s lessons: the rise of totalitarian regimes in the 1930s and then the long term causes of the French Revolution. I was happier teaching history that was properly in the past instead of this current events nightmare. #HistoryTeacherProblems
October 28, 2025 at 12:07 AM
Today’s lessons: the rise of totalitarian regimes in the 1930s and then the long term causes of the French Revolution. I was happier teaching history that was properly in the past instead of this current events nightmare. #HistoryTeacherProblems
Could this be a reverse Reichstag fire moment? The destruction of a national treasure galvanizes the people against the State rather than the other way around?
I'm not a West Wing obsessed lib or anything but the more I see pictures of this the more fucked up I think it is. It's like he cut off one of the hands of the Lincoln memorial with an angle grinder so he could add a big gun to it.
The Treasury Department instructed employees not to share to share photos of the demolition of parts of the White House’s East Wing
October 21, 2025 at 2:57 AM
Could this be a reverse Reichstag fire moment? The destruction of a national treasure galvanizes the people against the State rather than the other way around?
Teaching the American War of Independence today: so, the Quartering Act….. you’re gonna want to remember that.
I've been living in interesting times (derogatory) for so long, I forgot what normal is like.
October 21, 2025 at 1:51 AM
Teaching the American War of Independence today: so, the Quartering Act….. you’re gonna want to remember that.
I said to my grade 12 history class AGAIN today: I was much happier teaching history than living through it.
I've been living in interesting times (derogatory) for so long, I forgot what normal is like.
October 21, 2025 at 1:49 AM
I said to my grade 12 history class AGAIN today: I was much happier teaching history than living through it.
Tinned ham mixed with mayo* and lots of diced dill pickles spread thick on toast.
* definitely not a recommended amount of mayo. So. Much. Mayo.
* definitely not a recommended amount of mayo. So. Much. Mayo.
What foods do you love that you fully acknowledge make you a pervert for loving them?
October 7, 2025 at 10:06 PM
Tinned ham mixed with mayo* and lots of diced dill pickles spread thick on toast.
* definitely not a recommended amount of mayo. So. Much. Mayo.
* definitely not a recommended amount of mayo. So. Much. Mayo.
I always recommend this to my students after we finish WWII. It was my high school history teacher, dear Mr. VanDuzer, who recommended it to me.
The Best Years of Our Lives is really a miracle of a movie for how beautifully it speaks to the moment in which it was made while keeping one eye open for how it can serve as a kind of historical record. It's so hard to tell stories directly about the immediate present, but it manages it.
October 7, 2025 at 10:02 PM
I always recommend this to my students after we finish WWII. It was my high school history teacher, dear Mr. VanDuzer, who recommended it to me.
October 3, 2025 at 12:38 AM