American Centuries

Pocumtuck Valley
Memorial Association

American Centuries > Lessons > History Lessons By Teachers > Is Reading Believing?

Is Reading Believing?

Details

Author
Jeremy Rogers
Topic/Subject Area
Media, Periodicals, Communication; Military, Wars, Battles
Historical Era
Revolutionary America, 1763–1783, The New Nation, 1784–1815, New Millennium, 1990–Present
Grade Level
High School (9–12)
Creation Date
2005
Last Revision Date
2024

Related items

About This Lesson

Summary and Objective

Students will examine primary documents and try to determine whether there is a bias instilled within them by the creator. The students will then create a written account from the opposite point of view. The comparison between the two will be used to generate discussion about the use and purpose of propaganda. Students will seek out and bring into class contemporary examples of wartime propaganda.

Materials & Resources

Collection Items

Teaching Plan

  1. Students will access the American Centuries website and first examine the engraving “The Bloody Massacre perpetrated on King Street, Boston on March 5th, 1770”.
  2. Students will carefully examine the “Bloody Butchery, by the British Troops; or the Runaway Fight of the Regulars” document. What is the purpose of the coffins at the top of the poster? How many British troops were involved 2,000, 800, eight or nine hundred…? Why are the numbers different and always larger than the actual? Look at the wording used. How does the wording invoke emotions?
  3. Students will read the Boston Tea Party Report. In light of what we’ve looked at already how accurate might this account be?
  4. Students will carefully examine page 222 from the pages from the Journal of Dr. Elihu Ashley. How do rumors start? When the traveler says he heard it from a man etc. Does this make it true? We’ve all heard those “Urban Legends.” How does this fit that description?
  5. Students will consider the Editorial “To the Public” on the Constitution published in the Hampshire Gazette. What is the newspaper’s position on the upcoming vote? How is the newspaper trying to influence the reader’s opinion?
  6. Students will create an editorial response for the Hampshire Gazette Op/Ed page using the opposite argument to that of the Gazette. Students will be prepared to defend their view.
  7. For homework students will seek out newspaper, magazine, internet, TV or other media sources which have an opinion about the “War on Terrorism” or other current conflicts. Students will write a short essay about what the bias that they perceive in the media piece is and why the writer/creator inserted it there.