WW2 - Why Did the U.S. Drop the Atomic Bomb?

This lesson contains:

• A starter to get students thinking about an object from Hiroshima and why the watch may have stopped. This then feeds into discussions about what they know about the bombings.
• An introduction to Japan’s involvement in the war and how the U.S. had planned to deal with them. This leads to an activity where students stick a map in the centre of their books and they annotate as you go through a number of slides which show the progress and main events of the ‘leapfrogging’ tactics. There is also a video that shows this. It gives the students an introduction and timeline of the progress up until the decision to drop the bombs.
• A brief video on the atomic bomb and the events of their dropping. The students complete the multiple choice sheet as the video plays.
• A final activity to study information about the impact of the bombing. Students use this to make a table of the short and long term consequences for both sides.
• A plenary task to review some of the knowledge/key words they have learned.

Attachments:

• 1 x Powerpoint Presentation
• 3 x Powerpoint Files