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Olivia Rodrigo Drops and Breaks One of Her Grammy Awards

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Olivia Rodrigo won best new artist, best pop solo performance and best pop vocal album at the 64th Annual Grammy Awards

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It's relevant because it's our planet

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What’s the aftermath? 👀👀👀

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(CNN) A week after Will Smith famously strode on stage and slapped Chris Rock as Rock was presenting at the Academy Awards, questions still remain about the incident and its aftermath.

Here are just a few of them:

Will Smith's career

From a family-friendly rapper to a sitcom star on "The Fresh Prince of Bel AIr" and later a box office giant, Smith has built his career on being likeable on screen and off.

Which is one of the reasons many initially hailed him for being his wife's "protector" when he hit Rock after the comic and actor made a joke from the Oscars stage about Jada Pinkett Smith's close-cropped hair.

"Jada I love you, 'G.I. Jane 2,' can't wait to see it," Rock said while presenting the award for best documentary.

Smith then walked on stage, struck Rock, walked back to his seat and yelled at the comic to "Keep my wife's name out of your f***ing mouth!"

It is unclear whether Rock was aware that Pinkett Smith suffers from alopecia, which is hair loss that can be caused by an autoimmune response.

Smith should be riding high after his win for best actor - which came moments after the slap - for his role in "King Richard."

But that has been both overshadowed by Smith's actions that night and could well cause studios to second guess working with the actor, or at the very least delay planned projects.

As Scott Mendelson from Forbes pointed out, "the Oscar incident shattered a carefully crafted 30-year image of approachable, harmless and always-on movie star charisma."

Much appears dependent on the moves Smith makes going forward, having already publicly apologized to Rock and resigned from the Academy.

Rock still hasn't fully had his say

Three days after the controversial incident, Rock took to a different stage.

During a comedy show for his "Ego Death Tour" at Boston's Wilbur Theater, he briefly addressed the slap.

"I don't have a bunch of s*** about what happened, so if you came to hear that, I had like a whole show I wrote before this weekend," Rock said. "And I'm still kind of processing what happened, so at some point I'll talk about that s***. And it'll be serious and it'll be funny, but right now I'm going to tell some jokes."

Many await hearing Rock's thoughts about not only being struck by Smith, but also if he knew about Pinkett Smith's medical condition and the aftermath of what has been deemed one of the most shocking moments in the history of the Academy Awards.

Others in Rock's life have been more vocal.

His younger brother, comedian Tony Rock, took to Twitter to answer some questions including how his older brother was doing.

"Still Rich," tweeted Tony Rock, who also addressed his brother getting slapped in one of his own standup performances which has been shared on social media.

Academy sanctions

Days after the Oscars, the Academy of Motion Picture Arts & Sciences announced that it had "initiated disciplinary proceedings" against Smith.

While the actor has already resigned from the Academy, its president David Rubin said in a statement Friday the group "will continue to move forward with our disciplinary proceedings against Mr. Smith for violations of the Academy's Standards of Conduct, in advance of our next scheduled board meeting on April 18."

Those actions could include permanent expulsion and anything else deemed within the purview of the Academy's bylaws and/or standards of conduct.

CNN's Chloe Melas and Brian Stelter contributed to this report.

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Will Smith, Chris Rock slap: Questions remain

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(CNN) A week after Will Smith famously strode on stage and slapped Chris Rock as Rock was presenting at the Academy Awards, questions still remain about the incident and its aftermath.

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https://www.npr.org/2022/04/04/1090789822/elon-musk-twitter-stock-largest-shareholder

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Tesla CEO Elon Musk has taken a 9% stake in Twitter to become its largest shareholder after raising questions about the social media platform's dedication to free speech.

The ultimate aim of Musk's 73.5 million share purchase worth $2.9 billion, based on the closing price Friday, is not clear. Yet in recent weeks Musk, who has 80 million Twitter followers and posts there often, has questioned free speech on Twitter and whether the platform is undermining democracy.

The regulatory filing Monday describes Musk as a long-term investor looking to minimize his buying and selling of the shares.

He has also pondered starting a rival social media network, and industry analysts are skeptical about whether the mercurial CEO would remain on the sidelines for long.

"We would expect this passive stake as just the start of broader conversations with the Twitter board/management that could ultimately lead to an active stake and a potential more aggressive ownership role of Twitter," Dan Ives of Wedbush Securities said in a client note early Monday.

Twitter's stock surged 20% before the opening bell Monday.

Musk told his more than 80 million followers on Twitter that he was " giving serious thought " to creating his own social media platform and has clashed repeatedly with financial regulators about his use of Twitter.

His Twitter stock purchase comes as Musk is locked into a bitter dispute with U.S. securities regulators over his ability to post on Twitter. Musk's lawyer has contended in court motions that the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission is infringing on the Tesla CEO's First Amendment rights.

In October of 2018, Musk and Tesla agreed to pay $40 million in civil fines and for Musk to have his tweets approved by a corporate lawyer after he tweeted about having the money to take Tesla private at $420 per share.

The funding was far from secured and the electric vehicle company remains public, but Tesla's stock price jumped. The settlement specified governance changes, including Musk's ouster as board chairman, as well as pre-approval of his tweets. The SEC brought a securities fraud charge, alleging that Musk was manipulating the stock price with his posts.

Musk's lawyer is now asking a U.S. District Court judge in Manhattan to throw out the settlement, contending that the SEC is harassing him and infringing on his First Amendment rights.

Early in March, Musk asked Judge Alison Nathan to nullify an SEC subpoena and throw out the settlement agreement. His lawyer, Alex Spiro, said the SEC has used the court agreement "to trample on Mr. Musk's First Amendment rights and to impose prior restraints on his speech."

The SEC responded in a court motion, saying it has legal authority to subpoena Tesla and Musk about his tweets, and that Musk's move to throw out the settlement is not valid.

The SEC disclosed that it is investigating Musk's Nov. 6, 2021 tweets that asked followers whether he should sell 10% of his Tesla stake. The commission confirmed that it issued administrative subpoenas while investigating whether Musk and Tesla are complying with disclosure controls in the 2018 agreement.

The commission also is investigating whether Tesla described accurately in public filings with the agency whether it complied with the controls.

The commission maintains that the subpoenas were lawful, and that Musk isn't following proper legal procedure to challenge them. SEC attorney Melissa Armstrong called Musk's challenge "frivolous," and pointed out that Musk and Tesla agreed to have his tweets pre-approved by other company officials.

"Courts have long recognized that 'congress has vested the SEC with broad authority to conduct investigations into possible violations of federal securities laws and to demand production of evidence relevant to such investigations,'" Armstrong wrote.

The subpoenas, issued under seal, come from a formal order by the commission authorizing the investigation. They seek all written communications concerning the Nov. 6 tweets and whether they were shown to Tesla lawyers for pre-approval.

Musk attorney Spiro has asked for verbal arguments in the case.

Musk's revelation about his stake in Twitter shares comes two days after Tesla Inc. posted first-quarter delivery numbers. While the company delivered 310,000 vehicles in the period, the figure was slightly below expectations.

Shortly after the November tweets about the Tesla stock sale Musk began selling off shares, and he wrote on Twitter that the sale would go to pay tax obligations on stock options. Analysts estimate his tax obligation at $10 billion to $15 billion. But some of the money could have been used to buy the Twitter stake.

So far he has sold more than 15 million shares worth roughly $16.4 billion. With some sales in late December, Musk is close to selling 10%.

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Elon Musk just became Twitter's largest shareholder

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Tesla CEO Elon Musk has taken a 9% stake in Twitter to become its largest shareholder after raising questions about the social media platform's dedication to free speech. The ultimate aim of Musk's 73.5 million share purchase worth $2.9 billion, based on the closing price Friday, is not clear.

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Jury selection begins for student’s sentencing after killing 17 in Parkland shooting.

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Jury selection begins for student’s sentencing after killing 17 in Parkland shooting.

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This trial will determine whether or not Nikolas Cruz will be put on death row for killing 17 students and staff at Parkland High School in Parkland, Florida. This was the deadliest school mass shooting in U.S. history

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Dozens of LA's sheriff's deputies are members of gangs, its top watchdog claimed.

The deputies have tattoos to identify themselves as members of gang-like groups, it is alleged.

The revelation is the latest development in an ongoing gang scandal within the sheriff's department.

Dozens of deputies operating out of two of LA's sheriff's stations are members of gangs, the top watchdog for the Los Angeles County Sheriff's Department claimed.

The County of Los Angeles Inspector General Max Huntsman wrote to Sheriff Alex Villanueva on Monday to inform him that his office has compiled a partial list of deputies who are "identified as allegedly being tattooed members of the Banditos or Executioners."

The list includes 11 deputies allegedly belonging to the Banditos and operating out of the East LA sheriff's station. There are 30 alleged members of the Executioners operating from the Compton station.

Members of the Banditos can be identified by their signature tattoos of a skeleton wearing a sombrero, bandolier, and pistol. The Executioners have matching tattoos of a skull with an AK-47 and flames behind it, according to The Daily Mail.

Huntsman did not name the deputies in the letter but said his office had identified additional possible members from other sources.

The revelation is the latest development in an ongoing gang scandal within the Sheriff's department employing over 10,000 sworn deputies.

Los Angeles County Sheriff candidates have previously accused incumbent Sheriff Alex Villanueva of enabling "deputy gangs" in the department.

The "subgroups" within LASD have been debated for decades. Numerous lawsuits have been filed by community members alleging mistreatment by gang-like groups, according to research by the RAND Corporation.

Last month, a Los Angeles County sheriff's deputy associated with the Executioners testified that he had attended seven so-called inking parties.

Huntsman said his office was investigating several other "potential law enforcement gangs," including the Grim Reapers, Jump Out Boys, and the Vikings.

"LASD has never thoroughly investigated allegations of gang corruption, and this case is no exception," Huntsman told the Los Angeles Times.

In the letter, Huntsman requested that the Sheriff's Department instruct its personnel to cooperate with the investigation and provide various documents and information.

In a statement posted to Facebook on Tuesday, the Sheriff's Department claimed Huntsman has an "unhealthy obsession to attack the department" and has "failed to provide any actual evidence or new information."

"The timing of this letter suggests Mr. Huntsman is using his public office and resources to campaign against the sheriff leading up to the June primaries," the Sheriff's Department said.

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Dozens of LA Sheriff deputies are tattooed members of 'law enforcement gangs,' watchdog alleges

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Dozens of LA's sheriff's deputies are members of gangs, its top watchdog claimed. The deputies have tattoos to identify themselves as members of gang-like groups, it is alleged. The revelation is the latest development in an ongoing gang scandal within the sheriff's department.

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https://www.acs.org/content/acs/en/pressroom/newsreleases/2022/march/non-hormonal-pill-could-soon-expand-mens-birth-control-options.html

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SAN DIEGO, March 23, 2022 - Women have many choices for birth control, ranging from pills to patches to intrauterine devices, and partly as a result, they bear most of the burden of preventing pregnancy. But men's birth control options - and, therefore, responsibilities - could soon be expanding. Today, scientists report a non-hormonal male contraceptive that effectively prevents pregnancy in mice, without obvious side effects.

The researchers will present their results today at the spring meeting of the American Chemical Society (ACS). ACS Spring 2022 is a hybrid meeting being held virtually and in-person March 20-24, with on-demand access available March 21-April 8. The meeting features more than 12,000 presentations on a wide range of science topics.

Currently, men have only two effective options for birth control: male condoms and vasectomy. However, condoms are single-use only and prone to failure. In contrast, vasectomy - a surgical procedure - is considered a permanent form of male sterilization. Although vasectomies can sometimes be reversed, the reversal surgery is expensive and not always successful. Therefore, men need an effective, long-lasting but reversible contraceptive, similar to the birth control pill for women.

"Scientists have been trying for decades to develop an effective male oral contraceptive, but there are still no approved pills on the market," says Md Abdullah Al Noman, who is presenting the work at the meeting. Most compounds currently undergoing clinical trials target the male sex hormone testosterone, which could lead to side effects such as weight gain, depression and increased low-density lipoprotein (known as LDL) cholesterol levels. "We wanted to develop a non-hormonal male contraceptive to avoid these side effects," says Noman, a graduate student in the lab of Gunda Georg, Ph.D., at the University of Minnesota.

To develop their non-hormonal male contraceptive, the researchers targeted a protein called the retinoic acid receptor alpha (RAR-α). This protein is one of a family of three nuclear receptors that bind retinoic acid, a form of vitamin A that plays important roles in cell growth, differentiation (including sperm formation) and embryonic development. Knocking out the RAR-α gene in male mice makes them sterile, without any obvious side effects. Other scientists have developed an oral compound that inhibits all three members of the RAR family (RAR-α, -β and -γ) and causes reversible sterility in male mice, but Georg's team and their reproductive biology collaborators wanted to find a drug that was specific for RAR-α and therefore less likely to cause side effects.

So the researchers closely examined crystal structures of RAR-α, -β and -γ bound to retinoic acid, identifying structural differences in the ways the three receptors bind to their common ligand. With this information, they designed and synthesized approximately 100 compounds and evaluated their ability to selectively inhibit RAR-α in cells. They identified a compound, which was named YCT529, that inhibited RAR-α almost 500 times more potently than it did RAR-β and -γ. When given orally to male mice for 4 weeks, YCT529 dramatically reduced sperm counts and was 99% effective in preventing pregnancy, without any observable side effects. The mice could father pups again 4-6 weeks after they stopped receiving the compound.

According to Georg, YCT529 will begin testing in human clinical trials in the third or fourth quarter of 2022. "Because it can be difficult to predict if a compound that looks good in animal studies will also pan out in human trials, we're currently exploring other compounds, as well," she says. To identify these next-generation compounds, the researchers are both modifying the existing compound and testing new structural scaffolds. They hope that their efforts will finally bring the elusive oral male contraceptive to fruition.

The researchers acknowledge support and funding from the National Institutes of Health and the Male Contraceptive Initiative. Georg is a consultant with YourChoice Therapeutics.

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A non-hormonal pill could soon expand men's birth control options - American Chemical Society

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Scientists report a non-hormonal male contraceptive that effectively prevents pregnancy in mice, without obvious side effects.

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Elon Musk purchases stake in Twitter after slamming its approach to ‘free speech’

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Elon Musk purchased Twitter stock after questioning the company’s commitment to free speech

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Olivia rodrigo drops and breaks her Grammy award HOW DATE SHE! 😮

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Grammys Best and Worst Performances of the Night

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Grammys Best and Worst Performances of the Night

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https://apple.news/A5JAGQBM9QFq-npZ9EmCB8w

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The best (and worst) moments from the 2022 Grammys - Apple News Spotlight

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Standout performances from Olivia Rodrigo, Jon Batiste, Lady Gaga, and more. Plus: the wildest looks of the night, Doja Cat's badly timed break, Billie Eilish's tribute to Taylor Hawkins, and a surprise appearance from Ukrainian president Volodymyr Zelenskyy.

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Articles, maps, photos, videos, podcasts and more, as well as suggestions for using them in your classroom.

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Residents salvage their belongings from their homes on March 14 after the shelling of a residential building in Kyiv, Ukraine. Related Article Credit... Lynsey Addario for The New York Times

In no way have I ever been someone to obsess over current events or carve out time in my day to watch the news, probably because of the anxiety it is bound to cause me. However, over the past two weeks I have paid more careful attention to current events and the impending "World War III," watching the news in interest, fear, anger and sadness.

How do you navigate all this with students? In a history class, it might be natural to construct a full unit on Ukraine, but teachers across the curriculum may also want to address questions and emotions about this conflict or teach aspects of it suited to their subject areas. We hope this collection can help.

We've sifted through many of the thousands of news items, including articles, Opinion essays, maps, photos, graphics, videos and more, that have appeared on nytimes.com since the invasion began, looking for what we thought might be best suited for classrooms. Because The Learning Network and everything we link to is accessible without a Times digital subscription, teachers clicking on these resources from our site can use them with their students free of charge.

But this is just a starting point. We know educators from all over are addressing this moment in history, and we'd love to add your voices. How are you talking about the Russia-Ukraine war and its implications? Let us know by filling out the form at the very bottom of this post. We hope to post some of your ideas soon.

To use this collection, choose from the categories in the menu below. In each, you'll find a brief overview; a list of resources; questions your students can think about as they read, watch or listen to; and a short assignment idea you might adopt or adapt.

No matter how much time you'll spend on this conflict in class, here are a few recommendations and resources for helping your students navigate the news.
Part I. Be mindful of mental health.
In her Opinion essay " How to Avoid Drowning in an Ocean of Information," Tressie McMillan Cottom captures how many of us - teenagers and adults alike - feel right now:

Russia's invasion of Ukraine has made it difficult to focus on anything else. Images of people living below ground to escape missile strikes, families trekking across borders, crying children - they are embedded in my mind. We are rightfully awed by the Ukrainian people's resolve in the face of an unprovoked attack, a kind of resolve we see people all over the world have shown in the face of violence.

That human spirit is the reason I feel responsible not just for being informed but also for witnessing. It is easy to look away when the conflict feels remote, but bearing witness is the responsibility of being a citizen of a global superpower.

The piece goes on to recommend ways to replace "doomscrolling" with a healthy media diet and suggests a range of sources. A related article from the Well section addresses a similar stew of emotions - fear, anxiety, helplessness, even guilt - and suggests another course of action to loosen the grip: helping someone else.

You might read either or both of these articles alongside your students, then make a plan. This comic from NPR about how our brains and bodies cope with disturbing news might make a good warm-up. (And to prepare yourself for the conversation, read " How to Talk to Kids About Ukraine." Though the article is aimed at parents, it provides tips that will be useful to educators, too.)
Part II: Help your students be aware of misinformation.
If the Russia-Ukraine conflict is the world's first TikTok war, then your students may be unwittingly taking in a lot of mis- and disinformation. This article, " TikTok Is Gripped by the Violence and Misinformation of Ukraine War," might be a useful starting point for raising the topic with them, perhaps after first asking students to share some of what they know - or think they know - about the war from their social media feeds.

To go further, we have many resources below, in our "Information War" section.
Part III: Recommend a variety of reliable news sources.
To follow the most recent developments - and to find graphics, maps, photos and summaries of the news - visit this landing page: " The Russia-Ukraine War." Since that resource and most of the others we share in this roundup come from The New York Times, you or your students may also be interested in " How We Verify Our Reporting on the Ukraine War."

If your students would prefer a daily Times digest of the most important news, the free Russia-Ukraine War Briefing newsletter is delivered to email inboxes each evening.

But we also encourage students to get their news from a variety of reliable global outlets and platforms beyond The Times. This list from Nieman Lab, which includes Ukrainian sources like The Kyiv Independent, is a good starting point.

This collection also contains a number of Times Opinion pieces, and we have marked them as such throughout. But a "balanced media diet" is just as important for the opinion pieces your students consume as it is for their news. Encourage them to choose pieces from across the political spectrum and from around the world.

Part IV: Try one simple classroom assignment.
Your students are witnessing history. Even if your curriculum doesn't allow you to spend days discussing what they are seeing, the war is on their minds. To help them slow the onslaught of information, react thoughtfully and process the news, you might adapt an assignment as simple as this one, which can be done at any point and about any aspect of the crisis:

Ask students to choose one artifact from the stream of news and opinion about this conflict that stands out to them for any reason. This can be a full article, podcast or video, or it could be something smaller - a photo, fact, map, quote, graphic, statistic, social media post or even a joke. Invite them to write about why it got their attention. As they do, they can analyze the artifact and what it means; explore how it affects them emotionally; connect it to their own lives; list the questions it raises for them; or link it to other things they have read, seen or listened to, whether in or outside of school. (To take this even further, see the exercise in the "Information War" section below that walks students through assessing the reliability of their artifact.)

Then, invite students to share what they have chosen in pairs, groups or with the whole class. Finally, invite them to talk together about how they are making sense of all this news. How is it affecting them emotionally? How is it changing their understanding of the world? What big questions does it raise for them - and how are they seeking answers to those questions?

Early on the morning of Feb. 24 in Ukraine, Russian troops poured over the border, and Russian planes and missile launchers attacked Ukrainian cities and airports. Why did Russia attack? What are the roots of this conflict? Why is Ukraine so important - to President Vladimir V. Putin of Russia, to Europe, to the United States and to the world?
Part I. Start with our lesson plan.
In this lesson plan, published just after the invasion, we use a range of Times resources, including articles, videos, maps, photos and podcasts, to help students answer these questions and understand what is at stake.

To augment what we offer in that piece, here are four more resources that can help students consider the big picture by placing this conflict in the context of political history:

The video embedded above, from Vox, which is part of this piece tracing the history of the conflict.

The War in Ukraine Holds a Warning for the World Order (Article): "The liberal world order has been on life support for a while," begins this News Analysis. The article can help students think about the war through the following lens:

Ukraine is being viewed as a test for the survival of a 75-year-old idea: that liberal democracy, American military might and free trade can create the conditions for peace and global prosperity.

Putin vs. Democracy (The Morning Newsletter): This explainer can walk students through how Russia's invasion of Ukraine fits into the broader geopolitical trends of the past decade and a half - a time when democracy has been on the decline worldwide.

What Is NATO and Which Countries Are Members? (Article): This article presents a series of questions and answers about the alliance and why it is rejecting no-fly zones in Ukraine.

Part II: Encourage students to make historical connections as they follow the news.
Now that they understand the roots of this war, challenge your students to make explicit connections as they keep up with daily developments. How is having background on the political, geographic, economic and cultural history of this region key to understanding what happens? To show their understanding visually, they might choose some small aspect of this conflict and create a one-pager that links the present and the past - via illustrations, quotes or factual details, graphs or anything else that can make the roots or commonalities visible.

The largest mobilization of forces Europe has seen since 1945 is now underway, with Ukrainian soldiers and civilian resistance fighters battling to fend off a Russian assault on multiple fronts.
Part I: Study the maps.
The Times is maintaining a regularly updated page with maps tracking the Russian invasion of Ukraine. By scrolling down the page, students can analyze maps of the Russian push toward Kyiv, Ukraine's capital; the Russian offensive in Ukraine's south along the Black Sea coast; and the extent of Russia's aerial bombardment of Ukraine.

What do you notice about the military progress in the war so far? What do you think the maps show about what might happen in the future?
Part II: Analyze Russian and Ukrainian military strategy and progress.
Since the launch of Russia's full-scale invasion on Feb. 24, Moscow has been denied the swift victory it anticipated and has failed to capture major cities across the country, including Kyiv, the capital. It has been weighed down by an ill-prepared military and has faced tenacious resistance from Ukrainian soldiers and civilian fighters.

To the surprise of many military analysts, Ukrainian troops are mounting a stiffer-than-expected resistance to Russian forces up and down battle lines across Ukraine - a country the size of Texas - fighting with a resourcefulness and creativity that U.S. analysts said could trip up Russian troops for weeks or months.

The Times has been reporting on daily military developments in the war here and here, and the following list of resources provides high-level analysis as well as coverage of significant military events and unexpected outcomes. Choose one or more of these resources to read or listen to, and take notes on significant developments, major revelations, lessons or unexpected outcomes.
Part III: Prepare an advisory report about five important military developments during the war so far.
Imagine you were tasked by your country's advisers to report back about what the Russia-Ukraine war has revealed about the Russian and Ukrainian militaries and modern warfare. What developments would you include on your list? What information do you think might be most important for your country's military to know about this 21st-century war? Why? What predictions would your report make?

Video

Credit Credit... Ukrainian Presidential Office via Associated Press

President Vladimir V. Putin of Russia made the decision to invade Ukraine. President Volodymyr Zelensky of Ukraine made the decision to stay in Kyiv and resist the Russian onslaught. Who are these two political leaders, what does they each want, and how are they both central to this war?
Part I: Who is President Zelensky?
Before Russia invaded Ukraine, President Volodymyr Zelensky was often derided as a comic turned unlikely politician. But with the help of social media, he has become the leader Ukraine did not know it needed.

Dressed in an army-green T-shirt or fleece, unshaven and wan, Mr. Zelensky has inspired Ukrainians to fight for their country - and Europeans to see Ukraine in a different light, as a victim of aggression fighting bravely for independence, freedom and democracy.

To learn more about the Ukrainian president, read the following articles and Opinion pieces or listen to The Daily. While you read, take notes on what is motivating Mr. Zelensky and what decisions he has made so far that attempt to further his goals.
Part II: Who is President Putin?
For most of his 22-year rule, Vladimir V. Putin presented an aura of calm determination at home - of an ability to astutely manage risk to navigate the world's biggest country through treacherous shoals. His attack on Ukraine negated that image and revealed him as an altogether different leader: one dragging the nuclear superpower he helms into a war with no foreseeable conclusion, one that by all appearances will end Russia's attempts over its three post-Soviet decades to find a place in a peaceful world order.

To learn more about Mr. Putin and his rationale for invading Ukraine, read or listen to the following. While you read, take notes on what is motivating Mr. Putin and what decisions he has made so far to further his goals.

After Russia invaded Ukraine on Feb. 24, the world responded with an avalanche of dramatic moves, unfolding in ministries and boardrooms from Washington to London and Brussels to Berlin. In " How the West Marshaled a Stunning Show of Unity Against Russia," The Times offers a summary of how, in a few frantic days, "the West threw out the playbook it used for decades against the Kremlin and isolated Russia with unparalleled sanctions and penalties."

Part I. What measures have been taken so far, and what have been their effects?

To begin, teachers might share just the quote above with students and ask them to list all of the sanctions and penalties they know about. Then, ask them what they know about how well those measures have worked so far. How have they affected ordinary Russians?
Among the sanctions and penalties students might mention:
Thirty countries closed their airspace to Russian planes; Eurovision, FIFA and the Paralympic Games have barred Russians from participating in this year's competitions; Germany discarded six decades of military-averse policy to increase its spending and send Ukraine weapons; technology companies like Apple halted sales in Russia, and Google pulled Russian media off their networks. McDonald's, Coca-Cola, Starbucks and other companies paused operations and halted sales in Russia. The European Union banned Russia's central bank, which holds Mr. Putin's war chest, from selling any assets to European banks; Switzerland set aside a deeply rooted tradition of neutrality to freeze Russian assets. The United States announced it would ban imports of Russian oil, gas and coal on March 8. Two days later, Congress approved $13.6 billion in emergency aid for Ukraine as it battled Russia's invasion. President Biden has also joined with the Group of 7 and the European Union in calling for the suspension of normal trade relations with Russia to further isolate it from the global economy.
Some of the effects of these measures:
Western sanctions have "far exceeded" Moscow's expectations, The Times's Max Fisher explains. Russia's currency has lost about 40 percent of its value in a month and the country may default on its foreign debt payments. Sanctions have isolated Russian citizens from travel and many consumer goods. Russian officials are sufficiently fearful of the effect on stock prices that they halted trading on Moscow's stock market on Feb. 25 and have not yet resumed it. The falling currency and stock prices also seem to be causing anxiety among many Russians. In some cities, customers have lined up at A.T.M.s, fearful that cash will run out. "Such economic instability could stoke popular unhappiness and even unrest," The Times writes. In response to these unprecedented moves, the Kremlin accused the United States of waging an "economic war," and Putin warned that sanctions imposed by the West were " akin to a declaration of war." Putin has also suggested that he might nationalize the assets of Western companies that pull out of Russia.
Part II. Are these enough? If you were advising President Biden or other world leaders, what would you recommend?
Next, you might ask your students for their initial responses to one or more of these questions: What do you think of the world's response to the Russian invasion? Do the measures go far enough? Or do they go too far - risking a wider conflict or retaliation by the Kremlin? Are these punishing sanctions the right move? Do they punish ordinary Russians? Will they make Putin change course? Foment unrest in his country? Should the world do more - like establishing a " no-fly zone"? Or less - instead focusing on challenges at home? Will the world be able to maintain unity, or will cracks emerge if the war drags on and gas prices keep rising, inflation spikes, or other unforeseen developments arise?

Then, put students into small groups and give them the following challenge: If you were advising President Biden, what would you recommend as the appropriate response to the invasion? Why? (Depending on what you teach and how you'd like to structure this, you could substitute or include other world leaders, or global institutions like the E.U., the U.N. or NATO.)

To help students formulate their recommendations, consider the following questions:

What strategic and moral principles would guide your thinking and advice? For example, how might you balance a desire to protect, defend or intervene on behalf of Ukraine with concerns that such efforts might provoke or escalate a broader war with Russia?

How might you distinguish between sanctions that would affect Russia's leadership or its powerful oligarchs and measures that might punish ordinary citizens? How would you balance the moral imperatives for action with a country's own economic or political interests? For example, curbing the importation of oil might raise gas prices, causing political backlash from your own citizens.

What more could be done? Should allies do more to arm Ukraine? Establish no-fly zones? Enact a full financial embargo? Why or why not?

Here are a few pieces that might help students think through their answers:

On Feb. 4, as the Winter Olympics were set to open, China's leader, Xi Jinping, and Mr. Putin vowed that their countries' friendship had "no limits." The Chinese leader also declared that there would be "no wavering" in their partnership, and he added his weight to Mr. Putin's accusations of Western betrayal in Europe.

Now it appears that Mr. Xi's display of solidarity may have, possibly unwittingly, emboldened Mr. Putin to gamble on going to war to bring Ukraine to heel.

A review of Beijing's trail of decisions shows how Mr. Xi's deep investment in a personal bond with Mr. Putin has limited China's options and forced it into policy contortions.

The implications for China extend beyond Ukraine, and even Europe.

Mr. Xi's warm embrace of Mr. Putin only weeks ago advertised their ambitions to build what they called a fairer, more stable global order - one in which the United States is a smaller presence. Instead, their summit was followed by the kind of reckless, unilateral military intervention in an independent state that China has long denounced.

David Leonhardt writes, "The war is arguably the most problematic international development for China in years."
Part I: Learn about how China has responded to the war so far, and what is motivating its decision making.

Individually or in small groups, students can choose from among the following recent news articles and Opinion pieces. As they read, they should take notes on what is motivating China's decision making with regard to Russia and Ukraine. To help, they might make a list using the sentence starter "China wants ...".
Part II: Predict China's path based on its perceived national interests.
After students have read one or more of the above articles, and made their list of factors motivating China's leadership, they can decide which of the following five outcomes seem most likely for China in the short and long term. For each outcome students select, they should explain why China is likely to choose that path based on its own national interests.

China supports Russia and its invasion of Ukraine through military and economic aid.

China supports Russia and its invasion of Ukraine through state media and official statements.

China actively supports mediation and brokering a cease-fire between Russia and Ukraine.

China condemns the invasion and calls on Russia to end the war.

China joins Europe and the United States in imposing economic sanctions against Russia.

Video

At a station in Western Ukraine, mothers and their children boarded evacuation trains to Poland, while many of their husbands stayed to defend the country from advancing Russian forces. Credit Credit... Michael Downey for The New York Times

Another great migration is underway.

At least two and a half million Ukrainians have fled Russia's merciless bombardment to countries across Europe, while roughly another two million have been internally displaced within Ukraine. It is a tragic upheaval: families have been split apart, homes abandoned, lives upended. What's happening is a horror, a human travesty.

Yet the situation, however bleak, is not without precedents.

So begins an Opinion essay by Peter Gatrell, a historian of modern migration, describing the fastest displacement of people in Europe since World War II, and one of the biggest humanitarian crises in recent memory.

But some Ukrainians have stayed behind. Most older adults, who have experienced war in their country before, have decided to stick it out, while some younger people have chosen to take up arms. Others have no choice: A recently imposed martial law prohibits men aged 18 to 60 from leaving the country.

As some stay and others leave for neighboring countries, families have had to say goodbye to one another, not knowing when, or if, they will see each other again.
Part I. React to photos and graphs.
Since Feb. 24, photographers and videographers in and around Ukraine have been capturing a populace struggling with uncertainty and fear, and showing resolve, in the face of an invasion. You can find them in the collection " On the Ground: Ukraine Under Attack." (Please note: Many of the images are graphic.)

Invite your students to scroll through and find an image that stands out for them, perhaps because it shows them something they did not know or understand before.

When they are finished, you might introduce the interactive " How to Think About the Ukrainian Refugee Crisis, in Maps and Charts." What do they notice? What do they wonder?

Part II. Jigsaw to learn more about what life is like for Ukrainians.
Now invite students to learn more about everyday life for Ukrainians during this conflict, both those still in Ukraine and those living as refugees. You might conduct this activity as a jigsaw and have students share what they learned with one another. Below, a starting list. Please note that some of these resources include graphic depictions of violence.

As they read, view and listen to these resources, students might consider the following questions:

What did you learn about life inside Ukraine right now? About life as a refugee?

Why did some decide to stay while others decided to leave - if they had a choice at all?

How does the treatment of Ukrainian refugees compare with the way refugees from other recent and historical global crises have been treated? What social, cultural and political influences may be at play?

Part III. Debate: How should your country respond to this humanitarian crisis?
Invite students to discuss or debate: How should their own country respond to this humanitarian crisis?

Listen to 'The Daily': How Russians See the War in Ukraine

As well as a military campaign, Moscow is also waging a battle over the truth.

Back to The Daily

transcript

Listen to 'The Daily': How Russians See the War in Ukraine

As well as a military campaign, Moscow is also waging a battle over the truth.

sabrina tavernise

From The New York Times, I'm Sabrina Tavernise. This is The Daily.

As Russia steps up its bombing campaign against Ukrainian cities, it's also waging another battle- over the truth about the war. My colleague, Valerie Hopkins, on why so many people in Russia are in denial about what is happening, even as it wrecks the lives of their own family members in Ukraine.

It's Monday, March 14.

Valerie, you've been reporting on the war in Ukraine since the beginning. And you've been hearing stories, again and again, of this pretty shocking misinformation campaign coming from Russia. Can you describe what you've been hearing and seeing?

valerie hopkins

You know, I've been talking to a lot of people here in Ukraine, first when I was in Kyiv, and then on the road. And a lot of them have pretty shocking stories about their relatives in Russia. You know, Ukraine and Russia are really well connected. Millions of Ukrainians have relatives in Russia. Some of them used to live there.

But now, as some of Ukraine's cities are being bombed, as millions of people are being forced to flee, people are trying to tell their relatives in Russia what's going on, and they're being met with denial, resistance, and kind of a refusal to believe what their family members, their blood relatives are telling them. And one person whose story really stuck out to me was this guy, Misha Katsurin.

misha katsurin

Hey, Valerie.

valerie hopkins

Oh, hi, yes. Thank you.

misha katsurin

Can you hear me?

valerie hopkins

Misha is 33 years old. He lives with his wife and kids in Kyiv, and actually owns a really trendy chain of Asian restaurants.

valerie hopkins

And he said, the fourth morning of the war-

valerie hopkins

He woke up and realized that he hadn't heard from his dad at all since the war started.

valerie hopkins

His father lives in Russia in a city called Nizhny Novgorod.

valerie hopkins

So he gave his dad a call and told them what was going on.

valerie hopkins

But he said his father had a really different version of events and didn't really believe him.

valerie hopkins

He said his father basically said, no, no, no, and that he denied what Misha was telling him that he sees with his own eyes.

valerie hopkins

And anyways, he said, the government there, they're all Nazis.

sabrina tavernise

So Valerie, I'm going to stop for a second on this Nazi reference, because it keeps coming up. This is an idea that Russian President Vladimir Putin has often repeated, right? But why is he doing that?

valerie hopkins

I mean, it doesn't really make sense. But for Putin, it's this weird multi-layered argument. He is trying to piggyback on the proud legacy of the Soviet defeat of the Nazis in World War II, and he also cannot really deal with the fact that Ukraine wants to have a separate country and a separate identity from Russia 30 years after the collapse of the Soviet Union.

sabrina tavernise

Right.

valerie hopkins

And Putin sort of sees this Ukrainian rejection of Russia, which has only gotten stronger since Russia invaded Crimea, and now gotten even stronger- he sees all of this as nationalism. And that nationalism, he kind of immediately starts to equate with Nazism, in order to get support for this invasion.

sabrina tavernise

So essentially, when he says this, he's trying to paint Ukrainians as crazy nationalists.

valerie hopkins

Yeah. And I mean, he's actually used those words to refer to President Volodymyr Zelenskyy, who's actually Jewish and also a native Russian speaker. And President Putin has referred to him and the people around him as, quote, "drug-addled Nazis," on Russian TV, even though this is just a completely outlandish, intentional distortion of the truth.

sabrina tavernise

So Misha's dad is getting this idea from Putin's messaging, which is carried by Russian television. What else did Misha's dad say that he believes about the war in Ukraine?

valerie hopkins

Well, he certainly doesn't think a full-scale war is actually happening.

valerie hopkins

Misha's dad thinks it's essentially a rescue operation conducted by the Russian military.

valerie hopkins

And not only that. He believes that Russian soldiers are liberating Ukrainians from this repressive Nazi government, and that the majority of the people want them there.

sabrina tavernise

So it's pretty unbelievable that a father is denying his own son's reality. But how pervasive is this? Is this most Russians' view of the war right now?

valerie hopkins

So we actually have seen some pretty significant street protests in Russia, mostly in large cities, since the invasion started- actually, more than in Russia's recent history. These people are out in the streets chanting, no to war, even though they know that they'll likely be taken away by the police and detained.

But we've also seen reports from Russian cities, including one done by this independent media outlet, Nastoyashcheye Vremya, or Current Time, which went out and spoke to Russian citizens and showed them pictures of the war in Ukraine.

valerie hopkins

And their responses were-

valerie hopkins

"No, that's not happening. These photos are fake."

valerie hopkins

"Ukraine was preparing for an attack on Russia. I'm absolutely convinced of that." And-

valerie hopkins

And "I'm for Putin." They're essentially repeating what they've been hearing from Putin and from talk show hosts on state TV. So you know, it's really hard to get an accurate picture of public sentiment in Russia.

For a pollster now, just asking that question could land them in jail or shut their organization down. But what this video and what my reporting suggests is that this essential, complete denial of what's happening in Ukraine is actually pretty common in Russia.

sabrina tavernise

Valerie, what did you think as you were watching these man-on-the-street interviews? What was going through your mind?

valerie hopkins

I was really sad, but I guess I wasn't so surprised. I mean, this is the product of years and years of clamping down on free press and increasingly escalating rhetoric in media, demonizing the other, and slowly building the case for something exactly like this.

I think I was most shocked, actually, when there was a guy who literally looked into the camera, looked at the photos, and said, Russia's not bombing Kyiv. It's like this alternate reality for so many people. And it's fascinating for me to try and understand why and how that can be.

sabrina tavernise

We'll be right back.

So Valerie, we're talking about Russians who don't believe what's happening to their own relatives, who don't believe and don't want to look at these photographs of bombings in Ukrainian cities. And I think that this leads us to the question of why. What do you think it has to do with?

valerie hopkins

Well, I think it has a lot to do with Vladimir Putin and Russians' relationship to him. Putin came to power at this really critical time for Russia- in 2000, a decade after the collapse of the Soviet Union. And in the intervening period, there was just this total economic upheaval.

You know, people knew what to expect in the Soviet period, even if they didn't love it. And now, there was just this period of total uncertainty.

valerie hopkins

Prices skyrocketed, and people just couldn't afford basic necessities.

valerie hopkins

Half of the economy disappeared.

valerie hopkins

People were living in lawlessness.

valerie hopkins

There was a lack of trust in the government.

valerie hopkins

And there was also this really major loss of national pride that I think a lot of people discount.

valerie hopkins

So I think that many people, especially in the West, saw this moment as Russia's chance to create democratic institutions.

valerie hopkins

But many Russians associated this period in the '90s with instability, economic fear, and this rampant capitalism that didn't really help them.

sabrina tavernise

Right. I remember that time, because I was there then. I started in 1994 in Russia, and I remember we saw the collapse of the Soviet Union as a chance to be free, a wonderful thing. And I think that by the end of the 1990s, many Russians had experienced it as a tragedy.

valerie hopkins

Yeah, I think we have to recognize that that wasn't people's priority back then. It was putting food on the table, and not getting mugged by hooligans in the street, and being able to trust the police and the law enforcement and the institutions again. And through all of this, the personal and national shame and difficulty-

valerie hopkins

Into that situation walks Vladimir V. Putin.

archived recording (vladimir putin)

[SPEAKING RUSSIAN]

archived recording

Vladimir Putin, the career spy, talks about establishing what he calls a dictatorship of the law. Fight corrupt bureaucrats and strengthen the central government.

valerie hopkins

Promising to take control and just promising stability, which is what people craved the most.

valerie hopkins

The economy started to stabilize and a middle class actually emerged that was substantially better off in the years after Putin came to power.

valerie hopkins

He got massively lucky with oil prices, and that sort of allowed the standard of living to rise and cemented the trust that many ordinary Russians were living better under Putin than they ever had before.

valerie hopkins

And sent inequality soaring.

archived recording (vladimir putin)

[SPEAKING RUSSIAN]

archived recording (interpreter)

You know very well what privatization was like in the early 1990s. At that time, some market participants got multibillion-dollar state assets using different tricks-

valerie hopkins

And Putin continues to exert ever more control over Russian society.

valerie hopkins

He starts to bring the national media to heel, to make sure that things that he doesn't like or criticism of him don't appear in the media.

valerie hopkins

And while some people were concerned, more or less, from the beginning of his rise, the majority of the people really accepted it.

archived recording

Vladimir Putin is popular at home because of the economy based on energy.

-Vladimir Putin remains easily the most popular politician across this vast country.

sabrina tavernise

Right. I mean, this is the social contract that Putin made. He said to the Russian people, I'm going to bring you order. I'm going to crack down on the oligarchs. I'm going to make it so that your life is stable, your salary is reliable. But at the same time, you're not going to mess with politics, and you're going to be OK with a media that is not free.

valerie hopkins

Exactly. And while Putin largely consolidated his power over the last two decades, he did leave some pockets- mostly online media, some radio- spaces where people who didn't support the government, who were free-thinking and independent-minded could air their views and hear people who mostly thought like them. You know, it wasn't mainstream national news on the airwaves, but you could find it if you looked for it.

sabrina tavernise

So bring us up to the war, Valerie. I mean, if Putin has been doing this for years, chipping away at independent media, what's different now?

valerie hopkins

Well, now, it's not chipping anymore. It's a sledgehammer.

He's been trying very hard to control the narrative around the war-

valerie hopkins

-which he refers to only as a, quote, "special military operation."

valerie hopkins

And most of the official communications about it don't even mention the Russian military.

valerie hopkins

The state orders some of the few remaining independent media in Russia to stop broadcasting, including the BBC's Russian service, and the German broadcaster, Deutsche Welle. And then, it bans Facebook, and on the same day-

valerie hopkins

-the lower house of parliament, the State Duma, approves a law forbidding the invasion from being referred to as anything besides a special military operation.

valerie hopkins

And it essentially criminalizes independent reporting on the war.

valerie hopkins

And because of this law, the few remaining media outlets left in Russia are being forced to make really hard decisions.

valerie hopkins

Which means that right now, there's only one version of events that Russians are seeing in their country- Putin's.

sabrina tavernise

This is a fundamentally different level of censorship. It's something we haven't seen since Soviet times.

valerie hopkins

That's right, Sabrina. And while it's not clear just how long Putin can sustain his attempts to seal off Russians' access to information about the war, for now, he's been able to dramatically shape their beliefs.

valerie hopkins

And that's forced people like Misha to try to convince his dad of the brutal truth of what's happening in Ukraine.

valerie hopkins

What do you think it is psychologically that prevents him from- I mean, of course there's this media, but you're also his son, and you're telling him the truth, and he doesn't want to believe it? It's too painful? It's too sad?

misha katsurin

I think he won't. I think he won't. He cannot.

That's the power of this propaganda. He won't. He loves me, and he's really scared, and he told that his heart is bleeding. And that's very painful.

And that's why we need to be more wise, and we need to be calm and explain and explain and explain, three times or five times, or 20 times, as more as we need.

sabrina tavernise

Valerie, thank you.

valerie hopkins

Thank you, Sabrina.

sabrina tavernise

On Monday, the Associated Press reported that one of the pregnant women photographed in last week's attack by Russia on a maternity hospital in the city of Mariupol has died. Her baby was delivered but died, too. The attack and Russia's response to it is an example of Russia presenting an alternate reality in the face of facts about the war.

After the bombing, Russia's defense ministry denied having done it, accusing Ukraine of a, quote, "staged provocation." Then Russia began to criticize the reaction with its foreign minister, Sergei Lavrov, calling the international response to the bombing, quote, "pathetic," and that global public opinion had been, quote, "manipulated."

sabrina tavernise

Finally, Russia's embassy in London tweeted photographs of one of the women and claimed that she was a crisis actor who had played several of the women photographed in the immediate aftermath of the attack. Twitter eventually removed the post.

We'll be right back.

Here's what else you need to know today.

On Sunday, Russia attacked a Ukrainian military base 12 miles from Ukraine's border with Poland, bringing the war dangerously close to NATO's doorstep. The target was a base used to train foreign fighters who flocked to Ukraine to help defend the country against Russia.

The missile attack killed at least 35 people and wounded at least 134. Meanwhile, the death count has risen sharply in the city of Mariupol, which has been encircled and bombed by Russian troops and has been without power, water, or phone connection for more than 10 days.

So far, city officials said, the Russian attacks have killed 2,187 residents. Finally, Russian forces have kidnapped a second Ukrainian mayor in what appears to be a strategy of removing local officials and replacing them with Russian puppets. The abduction of the mayor from the town of Dniprorudne follows the dramatic capture of the mayor of Melitopol, who was reportedly taken from a government building with a bag over his head.

sabrina tavernise

In a video message, the mayor's replacement, a Russian appointee, instructed the residents of Melitopol, to adjust to, quote, "the new reality," and to end their resistance to Russian occupation.

sabrina tavernise

Today's episode was produced by Asthaa Chaturvedi, Diana Nguyen and Kaitlin Roberts, with help from Rob Szypko and Michael Simon Johnson. It was edited by Marc Georges and Lisa Chow, contains original music by Marion Lozano and was engineered by Chris Wood. Our theme music is by Jim Brunberg and Ben Landsverk of Wonderly.

That's it for The Daily. I'm Sabrina Tavernise. See you tomorrow.

Russians and Ukrainians are deeply connected. Millions of Ukrainians have relatives in Russia. Many have lived there. Because of that, some have found themselves standing on opposite sides of the conflict from their own family members.

In the days following Russia's invasion, thousands of Russian citizens took to the streets to protest, and many were arrested. Tens of thousands have fled to countries like Turkey, Armenia, Georgia, Uzbekistan, Kyrgyzstan and Kazakhstan. Many who left were outraged about what they saw as a criminal war, worried about conscription or a closed Russian border, or concerned that their livelihoods were no longer viable back home.

Still, in a country where the state controls the media and the last vestiges of a free press have been dismantled, many do not believe that there is a war unfolding. As Mr. Putin has waged war on Ukraine, a digital barricade has gone up between Russia and the world. At the same time, the country's propaganda machine has been busy churning out misinformation aimed at its own citizens.

Life outside of Russia for members of the diaspora from the former Soviet Union is complicated, too. They have long bonded over Russian language and history, a testament to a shared background as immigrants from more than a dozen nations that once constituted the Union of Soviet Socialist Republics. Now generations of those immigrants are re-examining how they define their identities.
Part I. Listen to learn.
Your students might start by listening to the episode of The Daily, embedded above, that explores some of these topics. They might then move on to a Times podcast that features an interview with the Russian American journalist Masha Gessen or read an Opinion essay by the former publisher of Meduza, an independent news outlet in Russia, headlined " Russians Must Accept the Truth. We Failed. "

As your students listen or read, they might try to answer these questions:

What do ordinary Russians know about the war being waged by their government?

What are they being told to believe?

What examples of confusion do these pieces give, as people struggle to reconcile conflicting information?

Part II: See what the news looks like inside Russia.
To help your students see what it might be like to read or watch the news from inside Russia, share with them " Two Days of Russian News Coverage: An Alternate Reality of War."

How might an ordinary Russian citizen, like the father you met in The Daily, make sense of what The Times is reporting?

Frank Bruni's recent Opinion essay, " Russia, Where All the News Is Fake," begins this way:

We are only as good as the information we get. Only as grounded, as enlightened, as capable of forming rational opinions about our political leaders and making intelligent decisions about our lives. If we're fed lies, we're lost. If we subsist on fiction, we dwell in a fantasyland.

In the section above, we delved into what ordinary Russians are seeing in their news. Now we'll consider what your students are seeing and how they can separate truth from propaganda as well as other kinds of disinformation and misinformation.

Part I. Start with TikTok.
What have your students learned about the Russia-Ukraine war on social media? How do they know what's real? Read them these three paragraphs from the article " TikTok Is Gripped by the Violence and Misinformation of Ukraine War " and ask them to react:

Bre Hernandez used to scan TikTok for videos of makeup tutorials and taco truck reviews. Since Russia invaded Ukraine, the 19-year-old has spent hours each day scrolling the app for war videos, watching graphic footage of Ukrainian tanks firing on Russian troops and civilians running away from enemy gunfire.

"What I see on TikTok is more real, more authentic than other social media," said Ms. Hernandez, a student in Los Angeles. "I feel like I see what people there are seeing."

But what Ms. Hernandez was actually viewing and hearing in the TikTok videos was footage of Ukrainian tanks taken from video games, as well as a soundtrack that was first uploaded to the app more than a year ago. The footage and soundtrack were traced back to their original sources in a New York Times analysis of the videos.

Even the White House recognizes what a powerful platform TikTok is. In early March, administration officials invited top TikTok stars to a video call to receive key information about the war, according to The Washington Post. Here, you can see one of them, Kahlil Greene, explaining what happened.

Predictably enough, some of the more stirring footage out of Ukraine has been debunked or had its veracity brought into serious question. This includes video of the so-called Ghost of Kyiv, the purported fighter pilot who took down six Russian planes, and the reported deaths of the soldiers stationed at Snake Island who Zelensky said had died heroically but in fact are all still alive. Widely circulated video that purportedly showed a young Ukrainian girl confronting a Russian soldier actually showed Ahed Tamimi, a young Palestinian activist who was filmed near her home in the West Bank. The footage was shot in 2012.

As a start, you might ask your students to discuss what they already know about media and news literacy and how those lessons might apply as they scroll through their news feeds. What are some general guidelines they should keep in mind? (More on those below, in Part III.)
Part II. Understand how The Times and other reputable news sources verify reporting.
Most of what is in this collection comes from The Times. Why should students believe it instead of information from their social media feeds? What makes legacy news sources different?

Since many have asked, The Times has created an explainer, " How We Verify Our Reporting on the Ukraine War." It describes how dozens of reporters, photographers, videographers, audio journalists, writers and others work in Ukraine and the countries bordering it to deliver real-time, independent, in-depth coverage of the conflict and its reverberations across the region.

As your students read the piece, they might underline the things they didn't know about how news organizations like The Times gather and verify information; then, you might invite them to read those lines aloud. What did they learn about how reliable news gathering operations work? How does that contrast with other sources of information?
Part III: Challenge students to apply the SIFT method to the news they share.
At the beginning of this collection, we suggested that your students pull something from their newsfeed and write about why it got their attention, then share it with classmates. But how do you make sure that what they're sharing is reliable, or at least help them ask that question as they choose?

Many, including Joel Breakstone, the director of the Stanford History Education Group, suggest an approach called lateral reading that teaches students "how to assess not only the reliability of the specific information they've found online but also who published it and for what purpose," Jay Caspian Kang writes. (We have recommended lateral reading ourselves.)

The digital literacy expert Mike Caulfield has created a practical approach to doing this quickly via a four-step model he calls SIFT: stop, investigate, find and trace.

In " Teaching News Literacy in the Midst of Unfolding Crises," he explains in detail how to apply SIFT to the news from Ukraine. Read what he and Elyse Eidman-Aadahl, the executive director of the National Writing Project, recommend, and challenge your students to apply it to the news artifact they brought to class.

In " Again and Again, Literature Provides an Outlet for the Upended Lives of Refugees," Dwight Garner writes:

Since the beginning writers have sought to capture the experience of the outsider, the exile, the parched traveler, the wanderer, the migrant. Ovid wrote the letters in his "Tristia" ("Sorrows") after his banishment from Rome. In "Crime and Punishment," a desperate man asks, "Do you understand what it means when you have absolutely nowhere to turn?" I am not here to suggest that reading necessarily makes us better, more moral. The Nazis liked Dostoyevsky, too. But Joyce Carol Oates was surely correct when she wrote, "Reading is the sole means by which we slip, involuntarily, often helplessly, into another's skin, another's voice, another's soul."

The unrelentingly grim news is a reminder of how much of literature is fueled by crises of migration and its aftermaths, and how writers have tried to capture the texture of upended lives.

What have your students read that can help them understand the current crisis?
Part I: Make thematic connections.
Invite your students to read Mr. Garner's essay, then ask them to brainstorm a list: What stories, novels, poems, films or other works of art have they read or seen that speak to "the outsider, the exile, the parched traveler, the wanderer, the migrant"? How might those works help us understand the current crisis? You might challenge them to find passages from one or more of the works they identified that speaks especially well to something in the newsnow, and explain why.
Part II: Read the work of Ukrainian writers.

Since the war began, I have received emails from journalists asking me to explain my poem "We Lived Happily During the War," which went viral on the day Vladimir Putin's troops began bombing my birth country. The poem was published on Poetry International in 2013, the same year the Maidan protests began in Ukraine. Viktor Yanukovych, Ukraine's president at the time, was trying to lean closer to Putin and crush protests. Ukrainians rejected him; Putin stole Crimea; and the war in Donbas began.

Your students might read the essay to learn about the origins of his poem, then move on to the poem itself. Together, they might then answer the question Mr. Kaminsky poses: Why do so many find poetry comforting in times of crisis? For a final challenge, your students might find more poetry that offers wisdom, comfort or courage for times like ours, perhaps even creating a class anthology of some of their favorites.

Part III: Compose found poems from the news.
For years, The Learning Network ran a found-poem contest, in which we invited students to create original poetry by taking words and phrases from Times articles. The process of creating a found poem requires students to read closely to identify the words and details that resonate for them, then recombine those words to create something that summarizes, reacts to or comments on their topic.

Share these examples with your students, then invite them to take an article related to Ukraine and create a found poem from it. Full directions, and many tips, can be found here. If you would like to consider doing blackout poetry instead, we also have directions, tips and examples for that.

Part I: Do something.
We open and close this collection of resources with advice from a Well article: " What's the Best Way to Cope in an Anxious World? Do Something." As the piece points out, there are many ways to help. You can donate to aid organizations working in Ukraine or volunteer with a local group sending supplies abroad. Find an organization that helps refugees from all over the world. Give blood to the American Red Cross. Or work in your own community, since, as donations flow into Ukraine, other groups may receive less. Consider supporting local food banks or other nonprofits in your community. Your students can make individual plans, or you can do something as a classroom or school.
Part II: Look for the other helpers.
Your students may know the famous quote from Mr. Rogers:

When I was a boy and I would see scary things in the news, my mother would say to me, "Look for the helpers. You will always find people who are helping." To this day, especially in times of "disaster," I remember my mother's words and I am always comforted by realizing that there are still so many helpers - so many caring people in this world.

Here are just a few of the recent Times articles that describe what some helpers are doing. Perhaps they can inspire their own efforts:

We hope to post a collection of ideas from teachers around the world soon. Please let us know what you're doing, how and why - and suggest resources beyond what we have included here, such as "The Ukraine Crisis" from The Choices Program or "Defending Ukraine" from The Council on Foreign Relations. Thank you!

Natalie Proulx, a senior staff editor for The Learning Network, provided additional help with this collection.
Want more Lessons of the Day? You can find them all here.

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Teaching Resources to Help Students Make Sense of the War in Ukraine

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https://www.google.com/amp/s/www.fox4news.com/news/2-killed-in-north-fort-worth-crash.amp This article is newsworthy, because it’s local news. Because of this awareness, people can learn to be more careful on Texas’ rural, dark highways at night.

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Two people were killed after a tow truck ran into a car on the North Freeway near Highway 287 in Fort Worth.

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https://apple.news/AW8yn1iZgQOOdDw1gk1xUCQ

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West pledges to punish Russia over civilian killings in Bucha — Reuters

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International outrage spread on Monday over civilian killings in northern Ukraine, where a mass grave and tied bodies of people shot at close range were found in a town taken back from Russian forces, as Moscow shifted the focus of the fighting elsewhere.

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https://fox8.com/news/man-wins-10m-scratch-off-twice/

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https://www.google.com/amp/s/www.wfaa.com/amp/article/weather/dfw-weather-forecast-timeline-were-under-enhanced-risk-for-severe-storms-what-does-that-mean/287-5e6bb9f2-9c1c-4617-9366-896f703b8eaa

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Here's an overview of each risk category, and how it ties into what we see here in North Texas.

DALLAS - The spring storm season is getting into full swing, with another round of severe weather expected to develop across North Texas on Monday evening.

Ahead of the storms, the National Weather Service's Storm Prediction Center (SPC) put most of our region under an "enhanced" risk for severe weather.

The "enhanced" designation is part of the SPC's five-category scale for determining severe storm chances and risks.

An enhanced risk is considered Level 3 out of five.

In recent weeks, North Texas has been under a "slight" risk, or Level 2, for storms. And as we've seen, even that threat level can produced damaging storms, including strong winds and hail.

Here's an overview of each risk category, and how it ties into what we see here in North Texas.

What are the five risk categories?

In order or risk and severity, here are the five categories and what they mean, according to the SPC:

1. Marginal (Green): This initial level means isolated severe thunderstorms are possible. Storms would likely be limited in how long they last, how much area they cover and how intense they become.

2. Slight (Slight): A slight risk means scattered severe storms are possible, though they'd likely be short-lived and not have widespread coverage over an area. While they might not be as persistent, these storms could still produce isolated intense conditions.

3. Enhanced (Orange): Under enhanced conditions, numerous severe storms are possible. This level is marked by more persistent and widespread storms, a few of which could be intense.

4. Moderate (Red): Jumping to a moderate risk level means more widespread severe storms are likely, and they could be long-lived and intense.

5. High (Pink): The highest risk category means widespread severe storms are expected to happen and they'll be long-lived, across a wide area and "particularly intense," according to the SPC's guidance.
Latest forecast for North Texas on Monday:
Why are we in "enhanced" on Monday?

The Storm Prediction Center increased our risk level for today to an enhanced risk, or Level 3 out of five.

This is due to the heightened risk of damaging winds and how widespread the event is expected to be. Storms that develop initially to the west of the Metroplex will be isolated storms. This is where the risk for hail and strong winds comes.

As storms approach I-35, they'll develop into a long line of showers and thunderstorms. This increases the damaging wind risk and covers more area.

Since this system is expected to cover more ground, the category was elevated to enhanced.

Bottom line: Everyone today will experience the storms, but not everyone will experience severe weather.

What would happen for the risk to be elevated?

Will this storm get updated to the "moderate" risk category? Likely not.

For this to happen, we would have to be confident that most storms that form today would be severe or contain 60+ mph winds, at least quarter size hail and/or tornadoes.

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How DFW's 'enhanced' storm risk today compares to other threat levels

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Here's an overview of each risk category, and how it ties into what we see here in North Texas. DALLAS - The spring storm season is getting into full swing, with another round of severe weather expected to develop across North Texas on Monday evening.