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LESSON PLAN (Grades 11-12) - GENOCIDE DEFINED

This short activity gives students a chance to contextualize the creation of the term genocide and to see the specific language that defines that term.

OBJECTIVES

By completing this activity, students will be able to:

  • Define the term “genocide.”

  • Identify the individual elements of a genocide.

  • Explain when and why the term “genocide” was coined.

RATIONALE

To be able to learn about genocide, students need to understand what it is.

TIME EXPECTATION

Students will need about 15-20 minutes to read the page and answer the questions. You may wish to plan another 10 minutes to either discuss as a whole class or have students discuss in small groups.

LESSON

Click on the following link to the UN’s webpage to discover the background and definition of the word genocide:

https://www.un.org/en/genocideprevention/genocide.shtml

Hand out the Genocide Defined Worksheet. Have students find the answers to the following questions:

  • When was the word “genocide” coined? 

  • What do the prefix “genos” and the suffix “cide” mean?

  • What events were responsible for the creation of this word?

  • When was genocide first recognized as a crime?

  • Must a State (member of the UN) have ratified the Genocide Convention to be held accountable under the law? Why or why not?

  • How is “genocide” defined in the “Convention on the Prevention and Punishment of the Crime of Genocide,” Article II? 

COMMON CORE STANDARDS

ENGLISH LANGUAGE ARTS STANDARDS » READING: INFORMATIONAL TEXT » GRADE 11-12

CCSS.ELA-LITERACY.RI.11-12.3
Analyze a complex set of ideas or sequence of events and explain how specific individuals, ideas, or events interact and develop over the course of the text.

CCSS.ELA-LITERACY.RI.11-12.6
Determine an author's point of view or purpose in a text in which the rhetoric is particularly effective, analyzing how style and content contribute to the power, persuasiveness or beauty of the text.

ENGLISH LANGUAGE ARTS STANDARDS » HISTORY/SOCIAL STUDIES » GRADE 11-12

CCSS.ELA-LITERACY.RH.11-12.4
Determine the meaning of words and phrases as they are used in a text, including analyzing how an author uses and refines the meaning of a key term over the course of a text (e.g., how Madison defines faction in Federalist No. 10).

CCSS.ELA-LITERACY.RH.11-12.9
Integrate information from diverse sources, both primary and secondary, into a coherent understanding of an idea or event, noting discrepancies among sources.

ENGLISH LANGUAGE ARTS STANDARDS » LANGUAGE » GRADE 11-12

CCSS.ELA-LITERACY.L.11-12.4.C
Consult general and specialized reference materials (e.g., dictionaries, glossaries, thesauruses), both print and digital, to find the pronunciation of a word or determine or clarify its precise meaning, its part of speech, its etymology, or its standard usage.

Answer Key available. Please e-mail sandra@alst.org