Course Description

Welcome! This site is for students, parents, teachers and anyone else interested in the tenth-grade World History 2 Course at Santa Fe Prep.

The overall course covers the history of the world from roughly 1500 to the present. The first quarter opens with the time when Asia was the center of world affairs, then traces European encounters with Asia and the Americas, and the complex interactions and consequences of the so-called "Columbian Exchange" between Europe, Asia, the Americas and Africa. The first quarter ends with a survey of the European Renaissance and Reformation, in both its local and global dimensions. The second quarter will focus on the rise of absolute monarchies and new ideas and practices, especially with the scientific revolution and Enlightenment. The second quarter ends with assessments of the legacies of the French Revolution, Napoleon and the emergence of the British Empire. The third quarter starts with the implications of the French Revolution and Napoleonic Wars in the wake of the Congress of Vienna, i.e., the discourse on rights, reaction, revolution and reform, the rise of new ideologies, in particular, Classical Liberalism, nationalism, and romanticism, and conservative reactions to the changes wrought by the American and French Revolutions. The course then examines the rise of industrialization and social change in 19th-century Europe, and the emergence of middle and working class cultures, followed by new iterations of liberalism and conservatism, the proliferation of more ideologies, e.g., socialism, communism, ultranationalism, social Darwinism, and antisemitism. Then the course examines the unification of the Italian and German nation states, and the creation of the modern welfare state. From there the course traces the rise of a new wave of Western imperialism, followed by the rest of the world's reactions to the rise of European empires and ideas, and in particular, the emergence of industrial Japan and their surprising victory over Russia. The third quarter ends with the outbreak of the First World War. The fourth and final quarter surveys the effects of the First World War, followed by the brief peak of classical liberal nation states and promises for peace, and the rapid rise of authoritarianism, in both communist and fascist variations, with a special focus on the rise of Nazism, the Nazi racial transformation of Germany and the Holocaust and Shoah of modern Europe. The fourth quarter concludes by looking at the causes and effects of the Second World War, the Cold War, the end of European empires in Asia and Africa, the emergence of the Modern Middle East and China, the end of the Cold War, history since 1989, all the way to the present, including current events.

Thursday, March 31, 2016

Week 12 - Into the Fire Again: World War II (1939-1945).

Monday through Friday, April 4-8, 2016
Long periods: In some periods, research presentations continue, and then time to work in the library.
Quiz #4 opens online on Friday, April 1 and closes Thursday evening, April 7 at midnight; covers materials from Weeks 10 and 11, i.e., the legacies of the First World War from before break, and materials on authoritarianism, fascism, Nazism, and Stalinism. 

Day 1, Monday, 4/4: The Nazi Seizure of Power, Part 2.
In-class: Discuss primary and secondary source handouts on the Nazi seizure of power and Stalinism; review for Quiz #4, and chronicle current events.
Homework for Day 2/3: Read “Into the Fire Again: World War II, 1939-1945,” in The West in the World, eds. Sherman/Salisbury, pp. 711-721 (Up to ""Behind the Lines"), and answer the following question.
Key Terms and Persons: The Popular Front, Chiang Kai-shek, Mao Zedong, Nanking, The Spanish Civil War, Guernica, The Axis Powers, The Anschluss, The Munich Conference of 1938, Appeasement, Nazi-Soviet Nonaggression Pact, blitzkrieg, the Battle of France, the Battle of Britain, Operation Barbarossa, and Pearl Harbor.
Homework question: What were the origins of the Second World War? What connections between Hitler, Nazism, and appeasement might have led to the outbreak of war?  

 Day 2/3 Long Periods: In some periods, meet in classroom for presentations; time in library to work on capstone projects and oral history interview research.

 Day 2/3 Short Periods: The Road to War.
In-class: Discuss the origins and early stages of the Second World War.
Homework#2: Read “Into the Fire Again: World War II, 1939-1945,” in The West in the World, eds.Sherman/Salisbury, pp. 721-733, and answer the following question.
Key Terms: The Holocaust (Shoah), Death camps, Stalingrad, the Battle of Midway, kamikaze, the atomic bomb, and the United Nations.  
Homework question: How did the Allies turn the tide and defeat the Axis powers in the Second World War - what were the key actions and turning points? 

 Day 4: The Second World War.
In-class: Discuss the key actions and turning points of the war.
No new homework over the weekend; work on capstones and/or oral history interview projects.
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