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Education

9/11 Reflection Activity

Length
25 Minutes
Grade Level
High School
Course
AP U.S. History, AP World History, U.S. Government and Foreign Policy, U.S. History, World History

Learning Objectives

  • Students will use the Question Formulation Technique to investigate reactions to 9/11.

Instructional Plan

  1. (Introduction: 5 minutes) - Project the image from the slide deck on the board (deck linked below). Tell students: “You will not get any more information than this right now. Your job is to ask questions — as many as you can.”
  2. (Producing Questions: 5 minutes) - Post and briefly explain the rules below. Working in groups of 3–4, have students generate as many questions as possible about the image on the board, numbering each question on their paper. Enforce the rules strictly — no answering, no debating yet.
    • Ask as many questions as you can.
    • Do not stop to discuss, judge, or answer any question.
    • Write down every question exactly as it was stated.
    • Change any statement into a question.
  3. (Categorizing Questions: Closed vs. Open: 5 minutes) - Introduce students to “closed” versus “open” questions. Explain that closed-ended questions are answerable with yes/no or a single fact, whereas open-ended questions require explanation.
    • Students mark each of their questions “C” (closed) or “O” (open).
    • Discuss the difference between these types of questions as a class, paying particular attention to the level of detail open questions allow, for example, “Who is talking to the seated man?” (closed) vs. “What is happening between the seated man and the other person in this image?” (open)
  4. (Prioritizing Questions: 5 min) -  Ask each group to choose their top 3 questions they most want to investigate, with this guiding criterion: “Choose the questions that would best help us understand what conversation is taking place in this image. If you want to edit a closed question into an open question, now is the time to do so.”
  5. (Revealing the Moment: 5 minutes): Return to the image on the slide deck and reveal the caption of the image. “Then-President George W. Bush listens as White House Chief of Staff Andrew Card informs him of a second plane hitting the World Trade Center while Bush was conducting a reading seminar at the Emma E. Booker Elementary School in Sarasota, Florida, September 11, 2001. REUTERS/Win McNamee.”
    • After revealing the caption, ask students to return to their group’s question list and work through two quick tasks individually and silently:
      • “Look at your group’s top three questions. Now that you know what this image shows, can you answer any of them? Annotate your list: circle questions the caption answers, put a star next to questions it raises.”
      • “Write one new question you have now that you did not have before you knew what was happening in this image.”
  6. (Reflect and Synthesize: 10 minutes) - Use the discussion prompts below to facilitate a full-class discussion regarding the activity.
    • “Which of your original questions did the image answer? Which are still open? What more do you want to know? “
    • “Consider an important person in your life. What open-ended questions would you like to ask them about 9/11?”

Notes:

Materials