11th Grade American History

Mr. Dalton’s Class

Subject: Chapter 14

The Roaring Twenties!!!!

Objectives:

• Describe the social tensions that arose in the United States after World War One

• explain how the policies of Presidents Harding and Coolidge encouraged business expansion and prosperity

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Objectives:

• Describe new sources of popular entertainment during the 1920s

• describe the messages and forms of artistic expression in the 1920s

Objectives:

• Identify and explain the reasons for divisions in American society

• explain what led to the wave of strikes in industry

• describe what developments characterized the literature of the 1920s

Activity One:

• Have the students read excerpts from the book The Great Gatsby, by F. Scott Fitzgerald. It is a coming of age story illustrating the moral emptiness of society during the 1920s.

Activity Two:

• The students will be put into groups of 4 and each will create a short visual or oral report on some aspect of American society during the twenties. The students may create a tape of popular songs, a poster of famous sports figures, examples of fashions in clothing or a model of a speakeasy

Activity Three:

• The students will watch the video, The Reckless Years, 1919 - 1929. It demonstrates how corruption and government inaction contributed to the worst depression in the nation’s history. Then they will discuss the main points of the video.

Activity Four:

• The students will get into their groups and work at the computers on the CD ROM, America’s Presidents Series: world Wars, Prosperity and Depression - Presidents between the two World Wars. After they are done reviewing the Presidents from this time period, they will write a paragraph explaining what they would have done if they were president

Activity Five:

• The students, as a class, will create a newspaper called, The Tense Times. By using the book they will come up with headlines that dealt with this decade and come up with stories to write and they will have the chance to read the other class’s papers and discuss their ideas as well.

Activity Six:

• Each student will list five important events of the country’s adjustment after WW I and write an explanatory statement about each. They will share this with the class. Mainly discussing the atmosphere of the U.S. after WW I.

Activity Seven:

• Working in groups the students will imagine that they are part of the Harding administration and list the people that they would indict as well as list the reasons for doing so. We will then discuss it as a class, making notes on the board

Activity Eight:

• The students will do a short report researching the automobile industry during the 1920s. They may draw a diagram of an assembly line, create an illustrated timeline of the styles of cars, or write a history of the development of the nation’s major car manufacturers.

Activity Eine:

• As a class we will discuss the prosperity of the 1920s, with the class after listening to the question, how were the lives of the workers affected by economic growth in the 1920s.

Activity Ten:

• The students will get into their groups and discuss the things that parents criticized in the 1920s, and compare that to what their parents criticize of them today.

• They will also discuss how radio changed life in America.

Important Terms:

• Red Scare• Palmer Raids• American Plan• Ohio Gang• Teapot Dome

Scandal

• Flapper• Harlem

Renaissance• Lost Generation• Volstead Act

Important People:

• Al Capone• F. Scott Fitzgerald• Henry Ford• Marcus Garvey• Ku Klux Klan

• Charles A. Lindbergh

• John Scopes• Bartolomeo

Vanzetti• Warren G.

Harding• Calvin Coolidge

Web sites to get more information:

• Http://www.wic.org• http://www.whitehouse.gov/library• http://ethics.acusd.edu/

roaringtwenties.html• http://www.yahoo.com/hist/

greatdepression• http://www.yahoo.com/

stockmarketcrash.html

More Web sites:

• Http://www.altavista.com/roaringtwenties/

• http://www.history-journals.de• http://www.classroom.net/1919-

1929.hmtl• http://www.mindspring.com/

history/stockmarketcrash.htm