History Lesson Slide Shows and Creative Content
2022
The following slide shows are extracts from three History lessons that I gave while teaching at the Afrikaans High School for Girls. All three these lessons were designed to look at the French Revolution in unexpected ways. Once the content of the topic is secured in our students' minds we have the opportunity to help them think through the topic in interesting and novel ways.
Lesson 1: What does the French Revolution and
Covid-19 have in common?
Which things that happened during the French Revolution sound familiar today? Do revolutions today look the same as they did then? Are we still fighting for freedom and equality today? Why if it already happened in the 1700s?
For this lesson, we drew a comparison between the French Revolution and the 2020 Covid-19 pandemic. Both periods can be considered as times of turmoil in which propaganda was widely spread. We then had a look at different propaganda pieces - eg. the famous Jacques-Louis David painting The Death of Marat (1793) and viral pictures that can be considered as persuasive or fake news. We also looked at the rise of different cult personalities, for example Maximilien Robespierre and Donald Trump, in these periods. The lesson further the discusses the concept of freedom and how a fight for freedom still does not equate to equal freedom for all - for example: women still could not participate in politics after the French revolution and #BlackLivesMatter and its global reach highlighted the systemic inequalities that we still have today.
By drawing such parallels between a far away past and a very real present students learn that we can look to the past to better understand our present.
Lesson 2: A Trip to Versailles
For this lesson, we pretended to take a trip to Versailles. There the class appointed a Marie Antoinette and a King Louis XVI (the timekeepers), the rest of the class was divided into three groups - the Equals, the Freedoms and the Sisters (inspired by the French motto Liberté, Egalité, Fraternité). We then played various fact-based games (eg. a spin on 30 seconds and a scavenger hunt in the classroom) for the students to practice their knowledge of the French Revolution.
Lesson 3: Viva La Vida
For this short lesson, we listened to the famous Coldplay song, Viva la Vida (2008). We then analysed the lyrics of the song to highlight the references that the song makes to the French Revolution. We also discussed the deeper meanings the song might carry.
