SUBJECT: US History
GRADE: High School
TECHNOLOGY: PowerPoint
BY: Audrey Rackley, Julie Glover, Brian Bachelor

SOLVING THE GREAT DEPRESSION

Target Grade/Subject

We will be teaching US history to a group of eleventh grade students. More specifically we will teach the Great Depression of 1929-1939, and governmental attempts pull the country out, using a PowerPoint presentation and student participation. Because high school upper classmen tend to show apathy towards history, this activity is designed to cultivate interest and variety in the lesson. This will be done by having students critically analyze and solve economic and social issues resulting in the Depression. This activity will provide a way for the teacher to increase participation by actively engaging students in historical problem solving. Because these students are high school juniors, they are capable of formal operational thought, and this lesson will encourage students to analyze the historical events and provide their own creative solutions to these problems designed to pull the US economy into better economic health. The power point presentation will provide chronological visual and auditory cues that will highlight the major problems that students will solve.

Objectives

Students will demonstrate their knowledge of the causes and consequences of events in the Great Depression, emphasizing:

SOL 11.10

The student will analyze and explain the Great Depression, with emphasis on :

- causes and effects of the Stock Market Crash

- the impact of the Depression on the American people

- the impact of New Deal economic policies

- the impact of the expanded role of government in the economy since the 1930's

After reading the chapters in their texts on the stock market crash of 1929, and presidential attempts to alleviate the country's economic woes, students will use their knowledge to create their own New Deal in small cooperative learning groups. Mastery of the material will be evaluated in a short paper written by each group in which they summarize their New Deal Policy.

Materials

1. 1 windows98 PowerPoint program

2. computer hooked up to television for students to view the PowerPoint presentation.

3. assuming 25 students, 5 groups of 5.

4. 25 text books- Andrew Cayton, Elisabeth Perry, Alan M. Winkler, eds. America: Pathways to the Present., Needham: Prentice Hall, 1998. Chapters 22-23.

5. For PowerPoint presentation:

- various images from the 1930s

- sound bytes (songs)

- links to these images & sound bytes at:

- http://www.xroads.virginia.edu/~1930s/front.html

- http://www.leweb2.loc.gov/ammem/ammemhome.html

6. assumed students have their own note paper & pencils/pens

Lesson Description

The teacher will:

1. explain the activity to the class: students will come up with historical and creative solutions to problems presented on successive PowerPoint slides, keeping in mind social, political, and economic consequences to their solution.

2. set up & present PowerPoint presentation one event at a time

events are:

a. stock market crash

b. run on banks

c. bank closings

d. dust bowl & farm foreclosure

e. world-wide economic depression hits

f. election of 1932

g. unemployment = 13 million

h. first round of your government programs is declared unconstitutional

i. Hitler is elected 1933

j. labor unions strike for higher wages

k. KKK membership hits all time high

l. women forced out of work force

m. organized labor demands more rights

n. Japan invades China

o. election 1936

p. minority groups feel left out of your aid packages

q. Germany invades Poland

3. have students use their solutions to create their own New Deal, that they think will alleviate the nation's problems, leading to economic prosperity.

4. have groups compile their solutions in a short summary (1 page) of their New Deal, and why they think their program will work ( in the last 30 minutes of class).

Evaluation

To measure students' mastery of this lesson, the teacher will read essays looking for solutions that attempt to solve the problems of the Great Depression using both historical solutions to these problems, and creativity. Good answers will take into account the economic, political, and social ramifications of the solution, and address in some manner every event presented. This paper count in their participation grade- which is 10% of the total grade average.