ci 403 vietnam lesson plan
TRANSCRIPT
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Vietnam Protest Lesson
Name: Nick Rossi
Class/Subject: Modern U.S. History (12th Grade)
Date: 11/8/12
Student Objectives/Student Outcomes:
1. Students will demonstrate an ability to interpret events through their own historical
lens and relate a historical viewpoint to students and instructors.
2. Students will work collaborative to interpret the feelings, characters and viewpoints of
historical actors through the analysis of a primary document.
3. Students will utilize historical evidence to build historical argument techniques and
think critically about historical events.
Content Standards:14.D.5. Interpret a variety of public policies and issues from the perspectives of differentindividuals and groups.
16.A.5a. Analyze historical and contemporary developments using methods of historical
inquiry (pose questions, collect and analyze data, make and support inferences withevidence, report findings).
16.B.5b (US). Analyze how United States political history has been influenced by the
nation's economic, social and environmental history.
Materials/Resources/Technology:Computer
ProjectorSmartboardInternet accessRoles Handouts
Teachers Goals:
1. Teacher will provide students with foundational knowledge on the violent protests that
were sparked in the late 1960s, especially dealing with economic disparity, Civil Rightsconflicts and anti-Vietnam sentiment.
2. Teacher will facilitate group and class activities that help give clarity to historical
events and perspectives as well as allow for a certain amount of creativity in interpreting
the motivations and perspectives of historical actors.3. Teacher will encourage students to build their own personal relationships with
historical events by utilizing technology and primary visual sources to make history vivid
and tangible.
Time
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5-7 Start of Class:Open up class by having a quick write about any social/political/economic issue
discussed/addressed/mentioned in recent periods as well as if there were any
reactions to these issues by the public. Have students share examples. Highlight the example of the Vietnam War being a major detriment to Johnsons
administration and sparked many student protests across the country, even inIllinois.Show Chicago Convention The Whole World is Watching from Youtube and
students to take notes on what they see during the video to be turned in as aformative assessment.
8-10 Introduction of Lesson:Using the primary source video as a starting point, give a short lecture on the ori
of the violence seen in the video.
Basic outline for the lecture would mention the growing discontent with Johnso
Vietnam policies, Humphreys connection with those policies, the Chicagoinvolvement in protests, role of Chicago police as well as the influence of M
Richard Daley on the event.Introduce an activity in which students are divided into groups to represent one
following groups in a discussion about the 1968 Democratic National Conve
in Chicago:Mayor DaleyChicago policeProtestors and demonstratorsHumphrey and the Democratic PartyCitizens of the City of Chicago
10-15 Lesson Instruction:Have students number off 1-5 in order to break them into groups and have them
certain areas of the classroom
Once assembled, hand out Role sheets to each group with a short list of speaki
points on the protests that they will use to build their side of the discussion Explain to all groups that they are tasked with using the sheets to build a definiti
character for the group they are representingHave them write down specific notes about their perspective, how they think the
would have reacted to/spoken about the Convention and the surrounding tur
well as choose one representative to voice the opinion of the group.
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10-15 Assessments/Checks for Understanding:Once groups have had time to collect their thoughts and come up with their
embodiment of their side of the issue based on the video, information sheet a
prior knowledge, have them present their perspective in characterfor the cla
When all groups have presented their perspective, come together as a full class a
Discuss the following questions:What are the dangers of a single story in history?Which group/person seem most right and why not? Were the riots anyones fa
particular, or just a complete mash of all factors?Do you know of any examples similar to these demonstrations happening in the
present day?
This discussion will serve as an informal formative assessment as it will give insiinto whether students have developed a personal knowledge of the subject/co
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Nick Rossi
11/6/12
CI 403
Lesson Plan Reflection
Vietnam Protest Lesson
The inspiration for this lesson came from an artifact that I had found last semester
for my methods course and had yet to honestly use in the classroom. Since the artifact
had to do with teaching diverse students and my rationale for choosing this artifact
revolved around the idea of strengthening my teaching strategies and classroom
management skills through presenting and controlling classroom discussion of
controversial issues. Although I initially chose this artifact before ever having read the
article for our class about teaching controversial issues, I found the article encouraging
towards attempting to teach these types of topics and events in the classroom because
they can add life and spark to the atmosphere that brings history to life. I felt that
teaching about violent protest, especially involving police officers and being in an area so
close to where we are teaching, might become controversial because some students might
be decidedly anti-authority while others might have family or belief systems that support
law enforcement and, thus, there would be strong reactions to the video of the riots and
physical conflict between police and civilians at the 1968 Democratic National
Convention. Since we learned that it is important to always remain objective as the
instructor when teaching controversial issues, I chose to put the issue in the hands of the
students themselves as well as, most importantly, breaking the issue up to have several
perspectives instead of just a binary divide. I felt this would help diffuse any real two
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sided issues that may arise since there would be a third perspective to counteract both in
most cases. Lastly, my lesson differentiated instruction in order to play on the strengths
of a variety of students in the classroom. By incorporating an individual think-write, a
primary source that played into the strengths of visual and auditory learners, presenting
foundational information in lecture style, allowing for collaboration and creation
elaborating on the original content, I hoped to build understanding of the social and
historical significance of this and other examples of violent protest as well as begin to
develop a historical lens through which history becomes relevant and tangible for
students.
While the lesson was tweaked and perfected before being given, there were
inevitably modifications during and after the first delivery. Primarily, I greatly
underestimated the time it would take to develop the short presentations and
overestimated the amount of time the presentations would actually take. Once people got
in groups and started discussing what they saw in the video and how their particular role
had reacted or would react based on the lecture and video, the students would become
sidetracked on a tangent quickly and often. Since I was only one person, I could not
monitor all groups at once and spent most of the period in constant rotation between
groups. While most groups put some effort into their role, I felt that on the whole I did
not exactly do a great job of creating a smooth lesson on a controversial issue. Although I
had anticipated discussion and debate on the underlying issues seen in the video, I
thought they would be more manageable and less amorphous than the vague discussions
that developed around the concepts of protest, police, violence and Vietnam that arose in
groups. My cooperating teacher suggested possibly having less groups if the lesson was
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done in the future or possibly constructing a chart or a script of some sort as a whole
class. While I did really like the idea of five different skits or presentations, I do agree
that in the future some sort of modification in delivery or set-up would have to be made
in order for groups and individual students to stay focused and get meet the objectives. I
plan on keeping in contact with my cooperating teacher and asking her for tips on
improving group lessons in the future since it seems as though she has perspective on
working with high school classrooms, especially senior classrooms, with group work
activities.
On the other hand, I did find that students were engaged with the content in
general and found the video particularly visceral and moving. In reaction to the positive
reaction I received in response to the clip, I might try to incorporate more primary
sources, especially videos and audio clips, from the era and topic in the future. While
researching for our previous lesson on Lyndon Johnsons Great Society, I found some
great footage of the Newark, Detriot and Watts riots that might have made that lesson or
this lesson more tangible for students. In addition, I could tweak this lesson to be more
broad and include the violent reaction in various urban centers after the assassination of
Martin Luther King. This particular instance of violent protest was chosen for its
proximity, but maybe these other events would resonate even further with particular
students.
Finally, I think I would modify the lesson in the future to have time to verbally
respond to the video instead of simply having them right down there responses. They had
some insightful comments and I would have liked to have heard them during class to see
if other students connected.