Wednesday, September 6th: Today's lesson focused on building a compelling case or a rationale for taking this course seriously. An attempt was made to convince my students of the inherent necessity for understanding both macro and micro political system. Whenever and wherever a group of people meet there exists a complex interplay of five essential or basic sociological factors (or forces or variables), namely: power, culture, structure, social action, and functional integration. Rightly, power is often singled out in terms of the study of politics and governments, but power does operate or even exist in a vacuum. Power is almost always a function of culture, structures, social acions, and degrees of functional [or dysfunctional] integration. I took time to explain each of these factors using examples that hopefully were relevant and interesting. Several kids asked good thought-provoking questions. Tomorrow, I make the case for asking lots of questions. On Friday, hand out text books...