My high schoolers needed to do a history report on moments that changed the world…

[WellPreserved]

This is such a great topic for a report and the answers are interesting. It really goes to show you how Western centric and current kids in the US think and I'm sure it's the same everywhere. It would be interesting to compare answers/reports with kids around the world.

McDonalds is kind of strange but it's a year ending in "4" so we are being bombarded with McDonalds history so it might be that it's in their heads.

I asked my son and he said "birth of Christ". I asked my daughter and she said "invention of Gutenberg Press".

[KendallsMom]

What a great assignment!

I have no idea how my 16 year old DD would do this.

I'm definitely going to ask her tomorrow.

[PoplarGrove]

Did your Dd just focus solely on the invention of plastic or did she include how its invention not only changed the world in that moment but the future both positive and negative impacts? The first would be fine but I hope the teacher graded her higher if she did the later, including extra credit points. Coronavirus pandemic would have been a good topic as well, it’s very broad not only have human and societal impacts but environmental, medical science, etc.

I would not have been impressed with any of the McDonald’s ones though tbh. They weren’t the first or even the oldest fast food restaurant.

McDonald's changed the face of fast food and brought in an era of food service efficiency that was unparallelled. Not only did they change the way food was prepared they were the first to use "self serve" back in the 60s (I think it was the 60s), eliminating the need to have wait staff and essentially creating the fast food that we know today.

[highlandmum]

Great assignment. I'm not impressed with the McDonald's topic but your kids chose interesting ones. Especially your son since covid just happened.

Glad I’m not the only one unimpressed with McDonalds.

I was just kind of puzzled/surprised.

All the other topics I could really see as moments that changed the world, but this was a resturant opening lol…

You are just looking at it as a restaurant and not the concept behind the brand. McDonalds brought the Henry Ford assembly line format to restaurants, allowing the business to turn out food quickly, for less money and also consistent. It is said that competitors would peer in the windows holding notepads to see how they managed to deliver the food quickly to the customer. They revolutionized the fast food industry and that is what we still see to this date. By direct comparison - what Henry Ford did for the car industry (assembly line) the McDonald brothers did for the restaurant (fast food) industry.

[mommy_jules]

Did your Dd just focus solely on the invention of plastic or did she include how its invention not only changed the world in that moment but the future both positive and negative impacts? The first would be fine but I hope the teacher graded her higher if she did the later, including extra credit points. Coronavirus pandemic would have been a good topic as well, it’s very broad not only have human and societal impacts but environmental, medical science, etc.

I would not have been impressed with any of the McDonald’s ones though tbh. They weren’t the first or even the oldest fast food restaurant.

McDonald's changed the face of fast food and brought in an era of food service efficiency that was unparallelled. Not only did they change the way food was prepared they were the first to use "self serve" back in the 60s (I think it was the 60s), eliminating the need to have wait staff and essentially creating the fast food that we know today.

They also had a huge impact on our modern economy with their way of franchising.

[Anonymous 1]

Did your Dd just focus solely on the invention of plastic or did she include how its invention not only changed the world in that moment but the future both positive and negative impacts? The first would be fine but I hope the teacher graded her higher if she did the later, including extra credit points. Coronavirus pandemic would have been a good topic as well, it’s very broad not only have human and societal impacts but environmental, medical science, etc.

I would not have been impressed with any of the McDonald’s ones though tbh. They weren’t the first or even the oldest fast food restaurant.

McDonald's changed the face of fast food and brought in an era of food service efficiency that was unparallelled. Not only did they change the way food was prepared they were the first to use "self serve" back in the 60s (I think it was the 60s), eliminating the need to have wait staff and essentially creating the fast food that we know today.

Exactly
My 16 year old said he would do it on world War 1.

[Quorra2.0]

Did your Dd just focus solely on the invention of plastic or did she include how its invention not only changed the world in that moment but the future both positive and negative impacts? The first would be fine but I hope the teacher graded her higher if she did the later, including extra credit points. Coronavirus pandemic would have been a good topic as well, it’s very broad not only have human and societal impacts but environmental, medical science, etc.

I would not have been impressed with any of the McDonald’s ones though tbh. They weren’t the first or even the oldest fast food restaurant.

McDonald's changed the face of fast food and brought in an era of food service efficiency that was unparallelled. Not only did they change the way food was prepared they were the first to use "self serve" back in the 60s (I think it was the 60s), eliminating the need to have wait staff and essentially creating the fast food that we know today.

Not really. By the time Kroc bought into the company becoming a franchisee and subsequently pushing the brothers out, much of what he implemented was already being used in other fast food chains. As far as self serve, pre-assembled meals, pre-cooked, etc it was already used in automats. The only thing that was actually done different was in the franchising and advertising. But regardless, the assignment was a moment that changed the world. I’d hardly call the start of McDonald’s a moment that changed the world. Most countries don’t even eat nearly the amount of fast food that the US eats.

[Anonymous 2]

Great assignment. I'm not impressed with the McDonald's topic but your kids chose interesting ones. Especially your son since covid just happened.

Glad I’m not the only one unimpressed with McDonalds.

Who says it has to be impressive? When I did projects/papers, I often picked things I knew I could get a good grade on, not on what was "most impressive".

[Quorra2.0]

Great assignment. I'm not impressed with the McDonald's topic but your kids chose interesting ones. Especially your son since covid just happened.

Glad I’m not the only one unimpressed with McDonalds.

Who says it has to be impressive? When I did projects/papers, I often picked things I knew I could get a good grade on, not on what was "most impressive".

There isn’t a single history class I’ve taken or my kids have taken in which they would have gotten a good grade on that for an assignment on a moment that changed the world.

[WellPreserved]

Glad I’m not the only one unimpressed with McDonalds.

Who says it has to be impressive? When I did projects/papers, I often picked things I knew I could get a good grade on, not on what was "most impressive".

There isn’t a single history class I’ve taken or my kids have taken in which they would have gotten a good grade on that for an assignment on a moment that changed the world.

I would assume if well researched and reported, it would receive a good grade. McDonalds has become a symbol of globalization and free-market capitalism and with McDonald's present on six continents, there is no denying the global influence. Indirectly, it changed the way weather is presented, lol. In some ways I think that it's an easier topic to defend than some of the others which while significant and certainly changed the US and Western part of the world, didn't change the entire world but of course there is an argument that if you enact change in the US, the rest of the world will follow. Kind of like McDonald's!

I really liked the topic question as it requires students to think globally but also about singular moments, sometimes seemingly insignificant, that can alter or change the world sometimes for the better and sometimes for the worse. The grade, IMO, shouldn't be on what moment is selected, but how well defended.