History Lesson Plan

 

 

World War I: Road to War

Input:  This lesson is to familiarize students with the various countries involved in World War I and how they had been planning for war beforehand.  Students will explore information to find out some of the secret alliances and public alliances along with plans that had been thought up decades before the actual event.   

Materials Needed:

á Computers with Internet Access

á Page with acceptable website links

á Projector

Lesson Objectives:

Standard 3.    Research and Information Fluency of the NETS standards will be a focus.  Students will be asked to look for primary documents and using the internet will help in a large part because many of the primary documents they could find in the library have also been put onto the internet.  They will also be learning how to research critically and intelligently because their sources that are not primary must be credible which the teacher will review.

EALRÕs: 

4.2 Understands and analyzes causal factors that have shaped major events in history.

5.2 Uses inquiry-based research.

Anticipatory Set:

Students will be shown pictures of various political figures in the world at the time before and during the war and asked to write down what they know about each one.  Students will then be asked what they know which will be written on the white board.  Then select facts will be given to segue into the actual lesson.  15 minutes

Explanation of Lesson:  Students will be put in groups and assigned a country that they must find primary and secondary documents about their country and its foreign policy plans before and leading up to the war.  Students will use the Internet to compile this data and create power points in order to display the information they have found.  Students will have all of the rest of the period to research.  35 minutes and part of the next class period.

Assessment:  Students will be asked to come back to their seats for the last 2 or 3 minutes in order to have a Q & A and share a little of the info they have found about their countries.  2-3 minutes.