WWII+First+Lesson+Plan


 * -1.) After the anticipatory set, I will talk about Japan as a whole by showing the students the websites listed under the “Technology” section. There will a WebQuest on Japan and the students will answer the questions from the WebQuest.

-2.) Afterwards, I ask the students how they would feel if someone came to them, from another country, speaking a different language, and you had no idea what they were talking about. I will ask the students who did know another language to speak in their native or second language to us. I will then explain to the class how in 1853, President Millard Fillmore sent Commodore Matthew C. Perry to Japan to get them to trade with the United States. I will ask a student if they would trade with me after I come to him or her uninvited (I might whisper to them to say no). When he or she said no then I would say, “Well I got my navy ship over there with all of my very powerful canons pointed at your town. Unless you sign this treaty saying you will trade with my country, then I will blow up your town. I would explain that it was pretty much what Commodore Perry did.

-3.) Explain to the class that in 1900 Japan’s 49 million and it mostly covered in mountains and only 15% of the land was useable for farming. Japan was quickly loosing resources, almost of all the iron ore, industrial grade coal, petroleum were gone (all are needed for industrialization). The Japanese wanted more resources but did not want to be dominated by the western world. Japan decided to expand it power and conqueror Korea, China, and Manchuria. Japan controlled the people, resources, factories, and ports.

I will be sure to mention how the United States and other countries later on tried to prevent Japan from taking over other countries and stealing their resources. The United States put an embargo on Japan. Along with the U.S., Great Britain, and the Netherlands froze Japan’s assets.

Give the students a copy of an excerpt from a letter written by General Giichi Tanaka, the prime minister of Japan and believed to have been given to the emperor of Japan in 1927. I will have the students read the letter and write their own interpretation of the letter.

-4.) Give the students my Unit 5, Pre-Assessment. I will tell them that the pre-assessment will show what we have already gone over and what we will go over. This will be taken up for a grade. ||