Human Rights and World War II
Cate—Social Science
Annie—Mathematics
Kelly—Social Science
Jamie—Science
Kate—Language Arts
Tim—Science
Theme/Unit Rationale
Human rights are an issue that involves all humankind. In fact, the universal declaration of human rights was written as a direct result of the Holocaust. In considering a theme that students would be able to make connections with, the issue of human rights became a logical choice.
Adolescents in today’s society struggle with a tremendous number of obstacles, such as independence, self-identity, educational demands, awkwardness, and puberty. During this stage of development adolescents are prone to feelings of inferiority, peer pressure, and depression. This human rights unit was specifically designed to help students better understand their own feelings of inferiority and their struggle for independence. Throughout the unit, students will discuss society’s trend to discriminate towards others, society’s trend to make others feel inferior, and the unjustified hated of others. Students will make real life connections between their own issues of inferiority and discrimination compared with issues faced by individuals in World War II.
In our multidisciplinary unit students will learn about human rights and the dehumanizing effect war has on all human beings. They will examine Hitler and his views on white supremacy, concentration camps, the bombing of Pearl Harbor, and the events leading up to the decision of the United States to drop the atomic bomb on Hiroshima and Nagasaki. In the Language Arts portion of this unit students will read and recognize literature as a record of human experience, write from the perspective of others, and discuss how dehumanization makes it easier for people to justify the hatred of others. In the social science portion of this unit, students will be given background information on events that occurred during World War II and will use problem solving strategies to better understand the cause and effect of actions taken in WWII. In the math portion of the unit, students will be presented with statistics on the loss of human lives, a timeline of events, and will calculate the radius of the atomic bomb and the devastating effect this had on the citizens of Japan. In the science portion of this unit, students will learn to create a Punnet square to determine possible outcomes from specific genes. Through this activity students will conclude that a person’s genetic characteristics are determined at random and that a person’s value cannot be determined by their genetic makeup.
Issues and lessons discussed in this unit that will tie into reoccurring issues adolescents face today are those of inequality, inferiority, discrimination, unfairness and unnecessary harm. Core concepts that will be taught in this curriculum will include respect, fairness, identity, diversity, cooperation, and ethics. Core skills the students will develop throughout the unit include self-expression, reading, writing, listening, and working in small groups. Students will use problem solving strategies to understand not only the cause and effect of war, but the effect war has on all human beings. They will analyze the reasons for various actions in World War II and will develop empathy for the loss of human life and its effect on individuals. Students will cultivate critical thinking skills by working in groups and will come to their own conclusion of the rights humans should have, the issues they face in today’s society, and moral responsibility. In the culminating activity students will study their individual rights and work together as group to create their own human rights code for their school.
Communicating
Express and interpret information and ideas
Communication is defined as the ability to express and interpret information for a variety of purposes. Learning communication skills is important because it provides students with the ability to more effectively share ideas in both written and oral contexts. In order for adolescents to gain success in the workplace and to become more productive citizens, it is essential that students master basic communication skills such as reading, writing, speaking and listening. In our unit students will not only learn to read and write for a variety of purposes in all disciplines, but will use verbal and non-verbal communication strategies to solve problems and resolve conflict. In addition to this, students will work in groups in order to formulate and discuss their own ideas, as well as demonstrate competence in speaking and listening as tools for learning and communicating. As a result of our multidisciplinary unit students will be able to read, write, speak and listen more effectively so that they may reach their maximum potential in the classroom and experience success.
Solving Problems
Recognize and investigate problems; formulate and propose solutions
supported by reason and evidence
In order for an adolescent to learn to effectively propose solutions for a problem, they must first learn to recognize and investigate problems, as well as support their conclusions with evidence. The ability to problem solve is an important skill for students to learn because they will have to apply this skill in the real world. In our unit, students will be taught problem solving strategies so they will understand not only the cause and effect of war, but the effect war has on all human beings. Students will also analyze and come to their own conclusions about actions taken in World War II, and will cultivate critical thinking skills by working in small groups. As a result of this unit, students will learn to apply reasoning and problem solving skills in reading, writing, speaking, and listening through all disciplines.
Making Connections
Recognize and apply connections of important information and
ideas within and among learning areas.
As an educator, it is our goal to see that light bulb flicker in our student’s minds when they understand a concept. That same light bulb appears whenever a student realizes that something that they once learned can be applied to a new lesson. Making connections is an application of learning that runs throughout this thematic unit. With each and every lesson, there are aspects of other subjects that help to build and bridge connections in learning. After completing this unit, students will be better equipped to make connections using the knowledge that they obtain on a daily basis combined with the concepts and ideas that they are already familiar with.
English Language Arts Rationale
In the language arts portion of the unit, various language arts standards were used to facilitate student learning. In order to teach students better communication skills, lessons were structured so students could relate the material they read to other sources. Students also composed narrative, informative and persuasive writing throughout the unit, and were required to write from the perspective of others. During the atomic bomb and Pearl Harbor portion of the unit, students were instructed to write “faked” eyewitness accounts, and newspaper articles. These activities were designed in order for students to fully comprehend the many dimensions of human rights and the effect this had on individuals in WWII.
Throughout the unit, lesson plans were structured around reading a wide range of literature and text to build not only an understanding of themselves, but the issue of human rights. The purpose of these readings was to enable students to read and comprehend literature as a record of human experience. Students also examined letters written by survivors of the holocaust, and other material relating to World War II. Drawing on their prior reading experiences, and their interactions with members of their group, students studied the issues of human rights and compared them to the issues individuals faced in WWII. In the culminating activity, students reviewed material from all disciplines, decided what rights all humans should have and made a human rights code for their school.
In order to teach the students problem solving strategies, students were instructed to break into groups and use information read in the class to form, explain, and support questions and predictions. Students discussed how the Nazi’s dehumanized the Jewish people and discussed how such dehumanization made it easier for people to justify their hatred of the Jewish people. Throughout these group proceedings, students were responsible for working within their groups to compare, contrast, and evaluate individual’s loss of human rights by using various readings from different genres of literature. Students responded to issues of human rights from a personal, creative, and critical point of view, and supported their conclusions with evidence obtained from the required reading.
Mathematics Rationale
Our theme is human rights, and as a group we decided to make the connection to World War II. Our connections were made through studying Hitler and Germany, concentration camps, the attack on Pearl Harbor, and the dropping of the Atomic bomb. Our theme was weaved through each activity dealing with WWII. Once we came up with our theme we decided to use communication and making connections as our applications to be used throughout our thematic unit. I accomplished this goal in mathematics by looking at the learning standard and addressing what was appropriate for the middle school level.
Communication is addressed in many different ways. First of all, a large amount of group work was done throughout the unit. Working in groups takes an enormous amount of communication. Without communication in a group nothing could get accomplished. Communication also occurred through teacher-student involvement. In the activity on Pearl Harbor, many guidelines were set. As a class, the students had to work together and communicate to ensure that everyone was aware of what was being asked and guidelines were being met.
Making connections was also important to us in our unit. We wanted to make sure that students could understand what human rights were affected during WWII, which allowed them to appreciate their human rights even more. We also wanted to connect our lessons to concepts the student cared about. One way this was done with math was through statistical information. By creating graphs and tables relevant to the war, students could also see what an impact the war had on civilian human rights. There was also a connection made with the Atomic bomb activity. Having the students draw out the area destroyed by the bomb, I believe, gave them a better understanding of the destruction that occurred, which in the end can be related to the loss of human rights.
Science Rational
Throughout this unit, a variety of science learning standards were used. These standards range from learning about the environment to genetics to nutrition and more. In addition, each lesson, while incorporating the issue of human rights, also applied learning through making connections and working on teams.
The two science standards for the “Comfortable Genes” lesson plan both deal with the understanding of genetics. With the understanding of genetics comes the realization that possible combinations of our parent’s genes determine physical characteristics. No person is given the choice as to what parents they are born to, and therefore should not be denied human rights based on their genetic make up.
The one mathematics standard for the lesson focuses on understanding ratios and proportions. This is essential in determining the possible genetic outcomes of an offspring given the genetics of the two parents. The mathematic portion of this lesson helps the students to realize the true randomness of all the possible combinations of genes. When students realize that genetic structure is so heavily based on chance, it will reinforce the notion that basing human rights on genetic characteristics is unjustified.
The goal of “making connections” is met by showing the students two very critical connections. The first connection is that one subject, such as math, can be applied to another subject area like science. By making this connection, students can begin to see other opportunities to apply their skills from other subjects to tasks they are working on. The second connection that students have made by participating in the lesson is to see why their appearance is connected to their parent’s appearance. Sometimes seeing that adolescents are connected to their parents in ways other than simply sharing a house helps them to become a little more appreciative of their parents, and perhaps even all adults in general. Realizing that we are all connected is possibly the greatest connection that can be made.
Social Science Rationale
Standards 14.C.3, 14.E.3, 14.F.3a, 17.C.3a , 16.C.3c(W) were chosen for this unit on WWII. (To see the full standard see the appendix.) The war and the holocaust are perfect topics to address the issue of human rights, which is addressed by 14.C.3, as well as being the theme. Seeing how human rights can be lost is a way to impress upon students how valuable their rights and the rights of other’s are. The Holocaust is an extreme example of a group of people that lost all of their rights, even life. By presenting this, young adults recognize that everyone has human rights. Through Hitler, the atomic bomb and Pearl Harbor, students can see how political entities have a role in the issue of human rights. War tends to affect the most basic human rights, such as life, liberty and safety. The impact of technology can be seen through Pearl Harbor and the atomic bomb. Clearly the attack on Pearl Harbor was able to occur because the technology was available to fly from Japan to Hawaii. The atomic bomb was a huge technological advance that drastically affected the war in the Pacific. This directly relates to standard 16.C.3c (W). Students will also look at how geographic factors played a role in what countries were involved in the war and discover why that information is important. The issue of United States foreign policy is always addressed when discussing foreign and world wars of which the United States has been involved. In this instance, the response to Japan during the Second World War will be looked at. A prime example is the dropping of the atomic bomb on Hiroshima and Nagasaki. In addition, students are able to recognize how historical events can influence political ideas, which addresses standard 14.F.3a. The unit addresses this goal by examining how international issues had a direct effect in the United States by the development of Japanese internment camps.
This unit addressed the overall learning goals of communication and making connections very well. The students are continuously involved in communication while satisfying the social science standards already discussed. The students use multiple resources to receive information, but it does not stop there. After listening, reading and researching, they use what they have received to communicate their own understanding, ideas and feelings through verbal and written response. They produce graphic organizers, journal entries and newspaper articles. Throughout the entire unit, students are making connections. The theme is used in all subject areas, in all lessons. Moreover, many lessons are directly related to each other. They utilize what has already been learned or done in other areas. Also, many lessons directly build on others, creating a web
of information with multiple connections throughout that result in a firmer knowledge base.
Introductory Activity
Adolescence is a time of transition. It is during this transition that finding ones identity may become a battle. In finding your true personality it is important to realize that it is completely acceptable to be different from your peers. According to the Universal Declaration of Human Rights (1948) Article 29, “Everyone has duties to the community in which alone the free and full development of his personality is possible.” Seeing that developing your personality is indeed one of your human rights, it is important to understand what your other human rights are as well. As an introduction to a thematic unit on human rights through the eyes of World War II, it was decided that what better way to teach students what their human rights are than by depriving the students of them. The introductory lesson goes on to discuss the impact of technology on various human rights movements. Students will complete a survey which addresses the “human rights temperature” of their school to finish the day. This survey is also a precursor for the culminating activity at the end of the unit. It is our hope, that by learning about human rights, the fight to have these rights, and their importance in society, students will have a greater understanding of who they are and will have a stronger appreciation for what is rightfully theirs.