Ohio Northern Lesson Plan: Audio Recording as Primary Sources

  1. Ohio Standard: State requirement to present a lesson on November 11th (Veterans)
  2. Grade Level: 5
  3. Purpose, Background, and Context:
  4. This is an introductory lesson to Pearl Harbor attached to a Veterans Day lesson or unit. The purpose of the lesson is to allow students to uncover the emotional mindset of America post Pearl Harbor.
  5. Goals/Objectives/Student Outcomes/Performance Expectations:
  6. Students will be introduced to the specific events that transpired on December 7, 1941.
  7. Students will inquire as to the emotional mindset and political views held by a sample of Americans post Pearl Harbor.
  8. Students will take that knowledge and use it to create a sample primary source document (mock diary) to represent what they’ve learned.
  9. Materials:
  10. Keynote Presentation with images of Pearl Harbor.
  11. Small age appropriate reading that discusses Pearl Harbor.
  12. Sound recording from the library of Congress: “Man-on-the Street” series.
  13. Mobile Macbook computer lab “C.O.W.”
  14. Materials for creating student mock diaries
  15. Procedure:
  16. Introduce Pearl Harbor with a series of images used to create discussion and pull out student background knowledge.
  17. Distribute an age appropriate reading (read in class, read in partners, read groups, individually, etc.)
  18. Discuss reading together and pull out main ideas. Complete a “TMD” Topic, Main Idea, and Supporting Details graphic organizer and discuss. END DAY ONE
  19. Divide students into 6 groups and place each group at a station. Each station would have a Macbook with an audio link already pulled up.
  20. Groups will move from station to station listening to recordings and completing their graphic organizer.
  21. Where were they when they heard the news about Pearl Harbor?
  22. How did people feel when they first heard the news? Emotions discussed?
  23. How do they feel now? Different?
  24. How do they feel about the war and moving forward?
  25. Get back together and discuss what we’ve learned (time permitting) If not, move discussion to the next day.
  26. END DAY TWO
  27. Review the organizers and discuss the answers students have written. (Could trade a groups organizer with another groups, so that they have an opportunity to compare their work and thoughts with their peers.) OPTIONAL
  28. Assign mock diary activity.
  29. Students would create sample diary entry of a fictional person who lived during December of 1941.
  30. The focus of the entry would be:
  31. Hearing the news
  32. How they felt
  33. Providing some type of commentary on what the country should do now.
  34. Assessment Outcomes:
  35. Graphic Organizers
  36. Mock Diary
  37. Extension and Adaptations:
  38. Find a way to bridge the feelings and emotions of the 1941 to the current feelings in the country regarding the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan.