Introduction |
Task |
Process |
Resources |
Evaluation |
Conclusion
The Great Depression in the United States,
which lasted from the
end of 1929 until the early 1940's, was the worst and longest economic
collapse in the history of the modern industrial world. The
Wall Street stock-market crash of 1929 began the Great Depression.
The depression had devastating effects on the country. The stock
market was in shambles.
The Great Depression saw rapid declines in the production and sale
of goods and a sudden, severe rise in unemployment. Businesses and
banks closed their doors,
farmers fell into bankruptcy, people lost their jobs, homes, and
savings, and many depended on charity to survive. In 1933, at the
worst point in the depression, more than 15 million Americans,
one-quarter
of the nation's workforce, were
unemployed.
Back to Top
You and your team have been elected to be the potential curators
for a new Depression Museum in New York City. The objective
of this museum is to ensure that future generations do not forget the
hardships that our ancestors encountered. You will be responsible
for the selection of the artifacts to include in the museum.
These artifacts may include real objects, pictures, accounts from
people who lived through the time, music, movies, or anything else
that you may find documenting this era. You have limited
space so you need to be careful in the selection of items and your use of your
area. You want
to make sure that you s
elect the most important and powerful images. 
You will only have room for 10 items in this museum. Yo
u will also need to "sell" your ideas for the museum to the museum
board of trus
tees. You will be competing for the curator job against other
teams. You will nee
d to prepare a PowerPoint presentation of your choices with detailed
explanat
ions as to why you believe your choices are the best ones to include
in the museum. The board
of trustees will be making the ultimate decision as to which item
s will be included in the museum based on how well you "sell" your
ideas.
Back to Top
1.
You will be assigned a partner and you will work
together to prepare this presentation. You may
want to assign roles and expectations of each partner before you
do anything else. One person may be the information gatherer
and the other the PowerPoint expert, you may want to have each person
responsible individually for half of the presentation, or you may
want to work cooperatively with the whole project. That is
up to you but both students are expected to share the work
equally.
Both students should be prepared to speak during the PowerPoint
presentation.
Again, choosing who will speak about which part of the presentation
is up to you.
2.
Your first
step is to fully research
the
main events of The Great
Depression. You may use the links provided in the resources
section but you are not restricted to these sites. You may
research other sites on the web however, remember to look for reliable
sites.
3.
The first slide or two of your presentation should be an
introduction
that includes some background information on why this museum is
important.
4.
Once you have fully researched the events of The Great
Depression
you should begin choosing the ten most important items to be placed
in your museum. Remember these can be any number of things.
Feel free to be creative!
Some suggestions of things to include in
your museum:
Pictures
of memorable events (The Dust Bowl, bread lines)
Lyrics to
popular songs of the time
Graphs or
charts of the stock market
Prices of
the time
5.
Each item you choose should be made into a separate PowerPoint
slide. Included on this slide should be a picture of the item
as well as a detailed description of the item.
6.
The last slide of your presentation needs to be a bibliography
slide giving credit to all of the websites you imported pictures
and/ or information from. Please designate which site was used
for which items in your presentation.
7. You will also need to present a printed version of your slide presentation to the board members so please have as many copies as their are board members. (One for each teacher in the class that day.) Color copies are
8. Remember that this is a presentation to the board members who will ultimately be choosing the ten most impressive finds to include in the museum.
1. When you launch PowerPoint click on the blank presentation icon. This will allow you to import your pictures and use them as backgrounds.
2. When the New Slide auto-layout box pops up choose the blank slide.
3. Insert a picture. You can enlarge the picture to the size that you wish. Use text boxes to insert your text on the slide. Make sure the text is easily read if you are writing over the picture.
4. Each slide should be dedicated to only one item. Do not put two items on the same slide.
Back to Top
Click on the links below to get you started on your research. Please remember that you are not limited to these resources! You will need to do further exploration! You can also use the sites listed under credits for additional information.
Great Depression: American Cultural History Songs of The Great Depression
We Made Do : Recalling the Great Depression The Great Depression
America in the 1930's Photographs of The Great Depression
The Great Depression Remembrances
The Bonus Army The Stock Market Crash
The Great Depression on African-Americans A Decade of Hardship
Back to Top
Evaluation:
Please
click
here to see the grading rubric that will be used to formulate your
grade
for this project. You will earn points for each of the areas
listed. The points earned will be divided by the total possible
points to
find a percent grade.
Back to Top
Congratulations on completing your museum presentation!! You will be contacted shortly by a representative of the board of trustees (your teachers most likely) as to which items you presented will be included in the new museum in New York!
You have hopefully had the opportunity to experience life in the age of The Great Depression from a little different perspective than a text book. Your teachers hope this project has helped to forge an understanding of what life was like for the millions of people whose lives were greatly effected by this economic collapse.
