What research did you need to complete in order to understand these texts? 

Research I would need to do complete in order to understand these texts are:

1. Having a basic understanding of Muhammad, who we was, and the overall impact on belief systems.
2. As a 6th grader, I may need to research specific key words such as:
   1. Caliphate
   2. Islam
   3. Battle
   4. Prophet

How would you make these texts relevant to your classroom? 

One way I would make these texts relevant to my classroom is to have students visualize the events that happened. I think one that would be interesting for them to visualize is Battle of the Yarmuk. An assignment we can do with this is to create a graphic novel on the events.

What information would you share with your students when you presented these texts? 

Key information that I would present to my students for important background knowledge would be the following:

1. Where we are in the timeline of Islam.
2. Where we are in world history timeline.
3. Basic knowledge of who the people are and what their roles are.

Discuss how you would contextualize these readings for your students in a larger unit that you teach on medieval history. 

For the readings on the Battle of Yarmuk, I would contextualize it by how war connects with the desire of gaining power. In my class, one of the largest themes we talk about is how people throughout history gained power in different ways. One of the ways we do discuss is by force. For this reading, we will connect it to other battles we have spoken about. We will talk about the details of the battle, motivation, and outcomes of the battle.

For the readings on the life of Muhammad, we can contextualize it by connecting it to the impact he had on people and civilizations around him, the world, and the future. We can compare him to other religious leaders that we have discussed.