High School Block:

Modern History 111/2/3

The Modern History 111/2/3 curriculum is designed to highlight significant events in Western modern history which are examined based on three criteria: historical knowledge, historical thinking, and making connections. Citizenship concepts are inherent in the study of history, for example the concept of dissent (and its importance within a democracy). For learners to be engaged and make a difference in their communities and in the world, they will need history instruction consistent with best practices and current research for teaching and learning such as historical thinking. Historical thinking requires learners to critically examine the past – to think deeply about history. Thinking historically emphasizes both historical processes (e.g., critical analysis of evidence) and historical knowledge. The course emphasis is on big ideas rather than a survey of historical facts. Larger themes in the course include the struggle for rights that has and continues to define Western history. Experiences of the past are diverse and varied, whereas popular and public histories often offer singular views on experiences of the past. Modern History 111/2/3 considers major events in Western history alongside examination of how dominant ideologies shape historical narratives. The geographical focus is on modern European history with increasing global connections in the 20th and 21st centuries to examine how the historical events highlighted within were experienced by many groups. The course balances social histories and history of major western events, and provides learners with opportunities to connect the past with the present by examining the historical roots of current events .

*The content in this course is important and challenging learning. It is important to acknowledge that experiences of war, genocide, discrimination and trauma are not in the past for all learners. Educators must take care to be sensitive to learners’ diverse beliefs and levels of awareness, while also respecting human rights principles. Genocide is a topic that must be treated with the utmost respect to survivors. Educators must consider the potential of this content to traumatize or re-traumatize.

CONTEXTS AND CONCEPTS

Revolution

  • Causes of revolutions: new ideas, social conflict, political factors, economic conditions
  • The Scientific Revolution
  • Liberalism and republicanism
  • The Atlantic Revolutions
  • The evolution of rights and citizenship
  • Individual and collective rights
  • Democratic freedoms vs. protection of the state
  • Colonization and the trans-Atlantic slave trade
  • Technological innovations; social change/conflict; economic conditions.
  • New ideas (eg. Marxism, Socialism, Liberalism, The Concept of Property)
  • Technological innovations and resources
  • Social change/conflict:
  • Children’s rights
  • Economic conditions
  • Local examples of industrialization
War and Violence

  • World War I and II
  • The role of nationalism in the exercise of power by European nations from 1860 to 1945
  • Colonialism, imperialism and totalitarianism
  • Nativism as a consequence of nationalism
  • National Socialism, Communism, Stalinism, and fascism
  • Power potential
  • Power relationships in the interwar period
  • The stock market crash of 1929 and the Great Depression
  • German expansionism
  • The global scale of war
  • Effects of mechanized/industrialized warfare
  • US emergence as a superpower
  • The Atomic bomb as a warning to the Soviet Union
  • Collective security
  • Government propaganda
  • Civilian casualties/effects
  • Public reactions to war
  • Displaced persons
  • Economic impacts of war
  • Immigration
  • Changing gender roles
  • Women’s rights and civil rights
Crimes Against Humanity

  • Jewish life in Europe before the Holocaust
  • The progression of the Holocaust from 1933 until 1945
  • Resistance movements
  • International response to Jewish refugees during and after the Second World War
  • The Geneva Conventions
  • International action and human rights legislation resulting from the Holocaust
  • International responses to genocide
  • Human rights
Competing Ideologies

  • The concept of Cold War and Containment
  • The Gouzenko affair
  • Arms race
  • The Korean War
  • Decolonization/Civil Rights Movement
  • Western presence in Afghanistan
  • International perspectives and measures taken in the 1950‘s and early 1960‘s re. nuclear weapons.
  • Nuclear threat and responses
  • Anti-communism (McCarthyism)
  • Iraq
  • Crimea
  • Anti-nuclear/peace movements post-1945
  • The “war on terror”
  • Indigenous perspectives on collective security
  • The fall of the Soviet Union
  • The end of apartheid
  • Internationalism and international cooperation
  • Globalization
  • The European Union
  • China as a superpower
  • The information age
  • Pop culture
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GRADE

Strand: History

Big Idea: Revolution

Skill Descriptor: Analyze the conditions that lead to revolution.

Global Competencies: CTPS, CM

Achievement Indicators:

  • Discuss the causes of revolutions.
  • Examine the severity of economic conditions as contributing factors to revolutions.
  • Summarize the main Enlightenment ideas that influenced the Atlantic Revolutions.
  • Compare conditions that led to the Atlantic Revolutions.
  • Compare Enlightenment ideas with some contemporary ideologies.

Skill Descriptor: Examine the social, political, and economic changes brought on by revolution.

Global Competencies: CTPS

Achievement Indicators:

  • Rank the causes of revolution according to their influence.
  • Identify intended and unintended consequences of revolution.
  • Examine the historical roots of rights and freedoms today.
  • Compare a modern event with an historical revolution in the context of rights and freedoms.

Skill Descriptor: Assess the social, political, and economic changes of industrialization.

Global Competencies: CTPS, CM

Achievement Indicators:

  • Rank the consequences of industrialization according to their impact.
  • Describe the immediate and long-term impacts of urbanization on societies.
  • Discuss technological innovations of the 19th
  • Illustrate the evolution of workers’ rights over time.
  • Compare aspects of the Industrial period with a modern industrialized society.

Big Idea: War and Violence

Skill Descriptor: Analyze the differences between how power is exercised in democracies and autocracies.

Global Competencies: CTPS, CM

Achievement Indicators:

  • Describe how political ideologies in Europe prior to WW1 create conceptions of “other”.
  • Explain the concept of ethnic nationalism.
  • Examine differences between autocracies and democracies.
  • Investigate aspects of life under totalitarian regimes.
  • Examine the benefits of democratic freedoms.
  • Assess the role nationalism plays in a modern society involved in conflict

Skill Descriptor: Examine the causes and consequences of WW1 and WW2.

Global Competencies: CTPS, CM

Achievement Indicators:

  • Describe how power is exercised on a continuum.
  • Assess the power potential of nations.
  • Describe the short- and long-term consequences of the wars.
  • Illustrate the effects of industrialization on warfare.
  • Discuss which were unintended consequences of the wars, including the atomic bomb.
  • Assess whether WW1 and WW2 should be considered two distinct and separate events, or one war.

Skill Descriptor: Evaluate the end of conflicts and how governments achieve collective security.

Global Competencies: CTPS, CM, SGC

Achievement Indicators:

  • Research collective security aims of the Peace and Friendship treaties.
  • Examine historical perspectives on the 1919 treaty negotiations.
  • Compare the quest for collective security in the 20th century to present day efforts.
  • Consider how nations determine that a war is over.
  • Assess modern efforts to maintain peace and security.

Skill Descriptor: Investigate the effects of war on individuals and societies.

Global Competencies: CTPS, SGC

Achievement Indicators:

  • Corroborate inferences from multiple sources to describe experiences on the Front and the Home Front.
  • Research the involvement of Black and Indigenous people in World War I and II.
  • Investigate the economic impacts of war.
  • Research experiences of interned citizens.
  • Analyze the development of women’s rights and civil rights, during and post-war.

Big Idea: Crimes Against Humanity

Skill Descriptor: Investigate the causes and consequences of the Holocaust.

Global Competencies: CTPS, CM, SGC

Achievement Indicators:

  • Cite historical and modern examples of antisemitism.
  • Investigate the events of the Holocaust using primary and secondary sources.
  • Examine survivor testimonies.
  • Explain the causes, method and scope of the Holocaust
  • Discuss the role of Canadian and European citizens in perpetuating the Holocaust.
  • Assess historical accountability and contemporary responsibility for the Holocaust.

Skill Descriptor: Analyze international responses to genocide.

Global Competencies: CTPS, CM, SGC

Achievement Indicators:

  • Explain that genocide is not restricted to the Holocaust.
  • Identify the ten stages of genocide.
  • Describe how countries and organizations respond to
  • Analyze the role of power and privilege in reconciliatory processes.
  • Assess historical accountability and contemporary responsibility for genocides.

Skill Descriptor: Evaluate historical responsibility and contemporary accountability for oppression and discrimination.

Global Competencies: CTPS, CM, SGC

Achievement Indicators:

  • Explain how historical events inform decision-making today.
  • Examine how historical narratives inform perceptions of events in the past.
  • Share own perspective on individual and collective responsibility to human rights and dignity.
  • Discuss own responsibilities as a treaty person.
  • Discuss own actions/potential to uphold the rights and dignity of all people.
  • Identify groups and movements in my communities working to uphold rights and dignity of all people.

Big Idea: Competing Ideologies

Skill Descriptor: Analyze changes in the global political order during the Cold War.

Global Competencies: CTPS, CM

Achievement Indicators:

  • Discuss the concept of Cold War.
  • Define and identify propaganda.
  • Analyze representations of “good” and “evil” in popular culture.
  • Analyze the effects of colonialism and how it led to civil wars.
  • Research anticolonial movements in Africa and other global regions.

Skill Descriptor: Evaluate individual and collective responses to threats to security.

Global Competencies: CTPS, CM, SGC

Achievement Indicators:

  • Analyze public reactions to perceived threats to national security.
  • Examine the role of nuclear weapons in political relationships, including the Cold War.
  • Analyze western society‘s response to the nuclear threat.
  • Examine xenophobia and Islamophobia.
  • Discuss Indigenous and other rights movements as efforts towards collective security.

Skill Descriptor: Examine post-Cold War social and political changes.

Global Competencies: CTPS, CM, SGC

Achievement Indicators:

  • Assess the long-term impact of the nuclear arms race on perceptions of Russian culture.
  • Discuss the influence of the Space Race on popular culture and the arts.
  • Analyze the rise and fall of superpowers on the global stage.
  • Examine the global impact of the emergence of independent countries formerly part of the USSR.
  • Discuss the influence of the information age on globalization.
  • Examine the influence of the European Union on immigration across Europe.
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