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Activates, Day Two

Purpose/Goals
The purpose of this activity is to teach students why Wars are controversial, and remind
students that every story/event has multiple viewpoints. By incorporating a Mexican viewpoint
of the Mexican American War, and a U.S. viewpoint of the Mexican American War, disciplinary
literacy is incorporated into the classroom (Winburg & Reisman, 2015). Students are encouraged
to use sourcing and contextualization skills in order to help them learn to evaluate articles for
accuracy, and to understand how the same event can be told from multiple viewpoints (Winburg
& Reisman, 2015). Hopefully, this will also teach students critical thinking skills, and teach
students to consider and look for biases when reading different sources. After this lesson,
students should be able to analyze primary sources to from an opinion about whether the U.S.
was justified in crossing the Nueces River in 1846, and should be able to defend their opinion
with document based evidence and facts. Similar to the first activity, this lesson also helps meet
C3 Framework standards by requiring students to form and express their opinion through
writing, using primary source evidence to support their arguments. Students should also be able
to relate the controversy surrounding the Mexican American War to other U.S. wars, to help
create authentic, relatable learning in the classroom.

Method/Activity
The teacher should open class with a brief review about the border dispute between Texas
and Mexico, and allow a few student volunteers to share their recruiting posters they completed
the day before with the class. The teacher will then prepare the class for a debate, which will be
the activity for the lesson. For the debate, students will be divided into two groups, determined
by the teacher prior to class. Students will receive either an opinion from a Mexican viewpoint
on the Mexican American War, or President Polks address to Congress asking for a declaration
of war. (Links to printable copies of the documents are located under each document on the
Resources tab). Students will also receive a document analysis worksheet, and be given time to
read their document and complete the worksheet. (Document analysis worksheets can be
found under the Handouts tab under Lesson Materials).
After reading the documents, everybody who read the Mexican viewpoint will be put on
one side of the room, and everybody who read President Polks address to Congress will be on
the other side, so the students are facing each other. The class will have a mini, structured debate
about whether Congress should grant President Polk a declaration of war. The teacher will act as
Congress, and each side will take turns presenting an argument for either why there should or
should not be a declaration of war granted. Before the debate starts, each side will nominate
someone to present the closing arguments. This person should take notes based on what their
classmates say during the debate, and at the end of the debate use their classmates points to sum
up their sides argument. After all arguments have been presented, each side will present their
closing statements, and the teacher will make a decision whether to grant or not grant a
declaration of war. Whether or not a declaration is granted may vary by class period, based off
which side presents the better argument.
To conclude the activity, the teacher will announce whether Congress will grant a
declaration of war. Students will then write a newspaper article about the Mexican American
War based on the viewpoint they argued. The article should be structured based on the decision
made by Congress to either go to war or not.
Student Product
Students final assessments will be the newspaper article either written for a Mexican or
American newspaper, and will be based off whether a declaration of war was granted. If the
declaration of war is granted, the U.S. will write an article from an excited viewpoint explaining
why the U.S. should go to war with Mexico, and Mexico will write an article from an upset
viewpoint explain why the U.S. was wrong for crossing the Nueces River. However, if the
declaration of war is not granted, the U.S. will write an article from an upset viewpoint
explaining why a declaration should have been granted, and Mexico will write an article from a
victorious standpoint explaining why a declaration of war not being granted is a good thing
because the U.S. was in the wrong, and a war between Mexico and the U.S. was avoided. The
final article should include the items listed below.

Articles should include a creative article title.


Articles should include the author of the article (AKA the students name).
The article must be a minimum of five sentences, although more will be encouraged,
explaining why war either has or hasnt broken out, and whet the next steps should be.
o If the declaration of war is granted, the U.S. will write an article from an excited
viewpoint explaining why the U.S. should go to war with Mexico, and Mexico
will write an article from an upset viewpoint explaining why the U.S. was wrong
for crossing the Nueces River.
o If the declaration of war is not granted, the U.S. will write an article from an upset
viewpoint explaining why a declaration of war should have been granted, and
Mexico will write an article from a victorious standpoint explaining why a
declaration of war not being granted is a good thing because the U.S. was in the
wrong, and a war between Mexico and the U.S. was avoided.

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