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From the start of World War I in 1914 to the end of the Cold War in 1991, the world experienced almost a century of continuous global conflict. While the end of each of these major conflicts of the twentieth century was celebrated as the potential end of global conflict, in each case, new conflicts arose, and in many cases, the conflicts were more deadly and expansive than the ones that preceded them.
In this lesson, students will investigate the causes and consequences of twentieth-century global conflicts. Then, they’ll use what they’ve learned to assess the impact of these conflicts on our world today.
Opener
Students assess a series of claims to determine if they’re true or false. This helps access prior knowledge and dispel common misconceptions about the era of global conflict and its connections to conflicts today.
- Have students read each of the following claims below and determine if they’re true or false:
- The global conflicts of the twentieth century (the First World War, Second World War, and Cold War) are one long continuous war that lasted almost a century.
- The war between Ukraine and Russia that began in 2022 is linked to the Cold War and the end of the Soviet Union in 1991.
- The current hostilities between China and Taiwan are linked to the Cold War and the Chinese Communist Revolution of 1949.
- The Syrian Civil War has many similarities to the proxy wars that took place during the Cold War.
- For each of the claims, have students write a one- or two-sentence explanation for why they determined the claim was true or false.
- Ask students to pair up, share their assessment of each claim with their partner, and revise their answers, if necessary.
Causation and Comparison: Global Conflict
Students read an article and answer a set of questions to help them determine the causes of each major twentieth-century conflict.
- Break the class into small groups of three to four students, and assign one of these articles to each group:
- As students read their assigned article, have them answer these questions:
- What were the causes of this conflict?
- What were the political, economic, and social effects of this conflict?
- Draw a large table on the board or create a shared Google Slide with a column for each conflict. Have students write their responses in the table.
- After all groups have shared their responses, ask students to read across all the columns of the table and, working on their own, respond to these prompts:
- To what extent were these conflicts similar?
- To what extent were these conflicts different?
- Finally, have students return to their groups and briefly research the combatants and causes of the following twenty-first century conflicts. You could have them add their findings to the table on the board or the Google Slide.
- Ukraine-Russia
- Syrian Civil War
- Taiwan-China
Closer
- Have students return to the claims they evaluated in the opener and ask student groups if they would change any of their answers.
- Then, have students use what they’ve learned in the lesson to answer this prompt: To what extent are the conflicts of the twenty-first century continuities of the global conflicts of the twentieth century?
Cover image: A revolutionary poster from communist China c. 1966, near the start of the Cultural Revolution (1966-76), Ó Universal Images Group Editorial / Getty Images. Chiang Kai-shek, Franklin D. Roosevelt, and Winston Churchill at the Cairo Conference, 1943. Public domain.
