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Teacher's Guide
LESSON PLANS

Overview: These lessons should be used in conjunction with the film THE CITY. Students will discuss the experiences of the people depicted in the film and compare them to the experiences of their own families and other cultural groups. They will learn the difference between migration and immigration and compare the experiences of European immigrants that came to the United States in the early 20th century with those experiences of African Americans, Native Americans, Asians and Latin Americans. Students will also discuss stereotypes and compare them to facts, and discuss how the film director's aesthetic choices help to create a certain mood.

Vocabulary (see Dictionary)
  • Migration
  • Immigration
  • Stereotype
  • Xenophobia
Web Resources
Feel free to incorporate the sites listed below as you see fit.

PBS' New Americans
This site features information on the immigration history of the United States and a teacher's guide complete with lesson plans.

National Network for Immigrant and Refugee Rights
This site provides current information about issues affecting the immigrant and refugee communities, as well as links to pertinent sites and publications.

American Immigration Law Foundation
This link will take you to a poster of famous immigrants to the United States, past and present. Biographies of the people featured are available on the same page. Teachers can develop an extension exercise using this site.


LESSON ONE - Family Histories (50 minutes)
Introduction to the THE CITY film and issues that affect immigrants' lives. Students will have an opportunity to think about their own families' immigration history and make analogies to the experience of the immigrants depicted on the film.

Standards
This lesson addresses the following national standards, established by McREL:

  • Understands the factors that prompted new immigration in contemporary American society (e.g., new immigration policies after 1965, areas of the world from which most immigrants have come)
  • Understands aspects of contemporary American culture (e.g., the international influence of American culture)
  • Understands contemporary issues concerning gender and ethnicity (e.g., the range of women's organizations, the changing goals of the women's movement and the issues currently dividing women; issues involving justice and common welfare; how interest groups attempted to achieve their goals of equality and justice; how African, Asian, Hispanic and Native Americans have shaped American life and retained their cultural heritage)
  • Understands how recent immigration and migration patterns impacted social and political issues (e.g., major issues that affect immigrants and resulting conflicts; changes in the size and composition of the traditional American family; demographic and residential mobility since 1970)

Teacher Preparations
  • Watch THE CITY and choose which segment(s) you will use in class.
Materials
Television and VCR
Newsprint or other large-format paper for wall chart
Markers

Lesson Plan
  • Choose a segment to view with the class.
  • After viewing, write the name of the segment on the wall chart and ask students to summarize the story. Record their answers on the wall chart.
  • Ask students what the overall theme of the story is and record their answers on the wall chart under the heading "Theme."
Homework
  • Ask students to go home and conduct interviews with relatives about their family's immigration to the United States.
  • Ask them to write a short essay based on what they learn about their family.
Follow up exercise (50 minutes)
  • Ask students to share their essays with the class.
  • Ask students to compare the stories of the people in the segment they watched with their family's story. What are the similarities? What are the differences?
Lesson One Extension
If students have access to the Internet, have them go to the THE CITY website and read the other stories presented there (The Stories). Ask students to compare the stories on the site with the one(s) that they saw in the film and the ones they shared in class.


LESSON TWO - What Makes a Nation? (50 minutes)
A discussion on the meaning of the words "migration" and "immigration," with a follow up discussion on the migration/immigration experience of different groups who are part of American society.

Standards
This lesson addresses the following national standards, established by McREL:
  • Understands how early state and federal policy influenced various Native American tribes (e.g., survival strategies of Native Americans, environmental differences between Native American homelands and resettlement areas, the Black Hawk War and removal policies in the Old Northwest)
  • Understands shifts in federal and state policy toward Native Americans in the first half of the 19th century (e.g., arguments for and against removal policy, changing policies from assimilation to removal and isolation after 1825)
  • Understands how immigration affected American society in the antebellum period (e.g., the connection between industrialization and immigration, how immigration intensified ethnic and cultural conflict and complicated the forging of a national identity)
  • Understands different economic, cultural and social characteristics of slavery after 1800 (e.g., the influence of the Haitian Revolution and the ending of the Atlantic slave trade, how slaves forged their own culture in the face of oppression, the role of the plantation system in shaping slaveholders and the enslaved, the experiences of escaped slaves)
  • Understands perspectives that influenced slavery in the antebellum period (e.g., changing ideas about race, the reception of proslavery and antislavery ideologies in the North and South, arguments used to defend slavery
  • Understands influences on the development of the American West (e.g., cross-cultural encounters and conflicts among different racial and ethnic groups)
  • Understands influences on economic conditions in various regions of the country (e.g., effects of the federal
  • government's land, water and Indian policy; the extension of railroad lines)
  • Understands the background and experiences of immigrants of the late 19th century
  • Understands opposition to discrimination in the late 19th century (e.g., how Asian Americans and Hispanic Americans responded to discriminatory practices, leadership roles of those who spoke out against discrimination)
  • Understands challenges immigrants faced in society in the late 19th century (e.g., experiences of new immigrants from 1870 to 1900, reasons for hostility toward the new immigrants, restrictive measures against immigrants, the tension between American ideals and reality)
  • Understands how racial and ethnic events influenced American society during the Progressive era (e.g., the movement to restrict immigration; how racial and ethnic conflicts contributed to delayed statehood for New Mexico and Arizona; the impact of new nativism; influences on African, Native, Asian and Hispanic Americans)

Teacher Preparations Materials
Newsprint or other large-format paper for wall chart
Markers

Lesson Plan
  1. What are some of the differences in the immigration/migration experiences of Europeans, African Americans, Native Americans, Asians and Latinos?

  2. What are some of the differences between Europeans who came here in the early 20th century and immigrants coming here today? What are the similarities?

Note: Make sure each group has one person taking notes as they discuss the questions above.

Follow up exercise: (50 minutes)
  • Have the note takers report on their group's discussion.
  • Write the comments of each group on the wall chart.
  • Once all groups have reported, have the class look at the wall chart and compare comments. Make sure all students participate in the discussion and say why they (or their group) hold a particular view.
Lesson Two Extension
If students have access to the Internet, ask them to visit the THE CITY site and report what they learned about migration and immigration on the site's bulletin board/discussion area. Ask students to read the articles on working conditions and workers' rights featured on the site. If students cannot go online, please print the articles mentioned above and distribute them to the class.


LESSON THREE - Immigrants: Myth v. Reality (50 minutes)
This lesson will provide an opportunity for students to discuss immigrant stereotypes and discuss perception versus reality. The words "stereotype" and "xenophobia" will be introduced.

Standards
This lesson addresses the following national standards, established by McREL:
  • Understands challenges immigrants faced in society in the late 19th century (e.g., experiences of new immigrants from 1870 to 1900, reasons for hostility toward the new immigrants, restrictive measures against immigrants, the tension between American ideals and reality)
  • Understands contemporary issues concerning gender and ethnicity (e.g., the range of women's organizations, the changing goals of the women's movement and the issues currently dividing women; issues involving justice and common welfare; how interest groups attempted to achieve their goals of equality and justice; how African, Asian, Hispanic and Native Americans have shaped American life and retained their cultural heritage)
  • Understands how recent immigration and migration patterns impacted social and political issues (e.g., major issues that affect immigrants and resulting conflicts; changes in the size and composition of the traditional American family; demographic and residential mobility since 1970)

Teacher Preparations
  • Make copies of the Immigration Quiz, the Immigration Fact Sheet and Anti-Immigrant Backlash article for distribution in the classroom. Provide one copy per student.
  • You will introduce the words "stereotype" and "xenophobia" (see Dictionary) to the class. Please review the meanings and have them available for the classroom discussion.
  • Carefully review the texts below. In the piece entitled "Anti-Immigrant Backlash," you will need only the sections which mention common stereotypes against European immigrants.
  • You will need the wall chart sheet(s) that contain the segment summary done by students in LESSON ONE.
Materials
Television and VCR
Newsprint or other large-format paper for wall chart
Markers

Lesson Plan
  • Distribute the Immigration Quiz to students. Give them 10 minutes to complete it.
  • Ask various students for answers to different questions and record them under the heading "What I Think" on the wall chart.
  • Ask students whose answers are on the wall chart to explain why they chose the answers they did. Encourage students whose answers are not on the wall chart to discuss their choices and the reasons for them.
  • Share the answers to the Immigration Quiz with the class.
  • Write the correct answers on the wall chart under "Facts."
Follow up exercise one: (50 minutes)
  • Compare the answers under "What I Think" to the ones under "Facts," highlighting any discrepancies between them.
  • Ask students why they think their answers are different from the correct ones. Where did they get their viewpoints?
  • Write the words "stereotype" and "xenophobia" on the wall chart and ask students to define them. As students speak, write their answers on the chart and then redefine them as needed.
  • Ask students to give examples of stereotypes about immigrants. Write their answers on the wall chart.
  • Distribute Immigration Fact Sheet to students and ask them to read the text in silence (10 minutes).

Follow up exercise two: (50 minutes)

  • Ask students to say what they learned by reading the Immigration Fact Sheet and write their answers on the wall chart. Encourage as much discussion as possible.
  • Give students the Anti-Immigrant Backlash article, asking them to read only the sections on the stereotypes against European immigrants.
  • Have students compare the list of stereotypes they created with the Anti-Immigrant Backlash piece. Are there any similarities? What are the differences?
Follow up exercise three: (50 minutes)
  • Show the THE CITY segment used in LESSON ONE again.
  • Put up the sheet with the segment summary (LESSON ONE) on the wall.
  • Are there any differences in the way students would summarize the segment now? Why?
Lesson Three Extension
Ask students to administer the Immigration Quiz in their communities and tabulate the results. Ask students to create a Public Service Announcement (PSA) so they can share what they have learned with the community at large.


LESSON FOUR - Immigrant Images
Discussion on the creative choices made by the THE CITY director and the impact they have on the film. Review Vittorio de Sica's BICYCLE THIEF as a model for neo-realism and black-and-white filmmaking in comparison with THE CITY. Students will revisit the exercise they did on LESSON TWO and discuss if/how the film has affected their viewpoints.

Standards
This lesson addresses the following national standards, established by McREL:
  • Understands contemporary issues concerning gender and ethnicity (e.g., the range of women's organizations, the changing goals of the women's movement and the issues currently dividing women; issues involving justice and common welfare; how interest groups attempted to achieve their goals of equality and justice; how African, Asian, Hispanic and Native Americans have shaped American life and retained their cultural heritage)
  • Understands how recent immigration and migration patterns impacted social and political issues (e.g., major issues that affect immigrants and resulting conflicts; changes in the size and composition of the traditional American family; demographic and residential mobility since 1970)

Teacher Preparations
  • Review the THE CITY Information sheet to familiarize yourself with some of the aspects of the film and the way it was made.
  • Visit the Neo Web - The Italian Neo Realism Homepage and review the piece on Vittorio de Sica's film BICYCLE THIEF to help with the discussion on the making of THE CITY.
Materials
Newsprint or other large-format paper for wall chart
Markers

Lesson Plan
  • If you have only shown some of the segments, please show THE CITY in its entirety (the film is 88 minutes long, so please plan accordingly).
Follow up exercise one: (50 minutes)
Ask students why they think the director chose to make the film in black and white. Write their answers and refer to the film Information sheet and the Making of the Film section for additional discussion points.

  • Put up the sheet that compared the experiences of the European immigrants of the early 20th century with the immigrants of today (LESSON TWO). Ask students to read the answers and see if their opinions have changed. If so, how?
  • Ask students to comment on the impact THE CITY and the classroom discussion have had on their viewpoints.
Homework:
Ask students to write an ending to the film segment they watched in class.

Lesson Four Extension
Visit the PBS New Americans website and choose a film to watch with your class. Ask the class to compare it with THE CITY.

Ask students the following questions:
  • How did the film differ from THE CITY?
  • Were there any similarities in the way the directors told the stories?
  • How were the immigrants portrayed?
  • Did you agree/disagree with the portrayals?
  • What is the most important lesson you learned in the discussions the class has had on migration/immigration?
For Grades 6-8
Distribute copies of the quote below and ask students to read it in class.

"In Germany they first came for the Communists and I didn't speak up because I wasn't a Communist. Then they came for the Jews, and I didn't speak up because I wasn't a Jew. Then they came for the trade unionists, and I didn't speak up because I wasn't a trade unionist. Then they came for the Catholics, and I didn't speak up because I was a Protestant. Then they came for me -- and by that time no one was left to speak up."
- German Pastor Martin Niemoller
Ask students to discuss the consequences of intolerance and prejudice. Ask them to give examples. Ask students if they think intolerance and prejudice can be overcome and how.

For Grades 9-12
If students have access to the Internet, ask them to read the Educating Our Children, Immigration and Workers' Rights and Women and Immigration articles featured on the THE CITY website. If students do not have access to the Internet, please download the articles and distribute them to the class. Once students have read the articles, have them prepare a debate session where they can express opinions on what they learned in class and by reading the articles. Try to make the debate a school-wide event for other grades 9-12 students.

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