Student mahi
WW1 orientation / WW2 distinction
WEEK 1 · ORIENTATION / NGĀ TAKE · PHASE 1 · DECK ph-o + o1–o35
What war are we actually studying — and why did it begin?
WALT / We are learning to
- distinguish the First World War from the Second World War;
- identify the main sides and locate key countries / empires in 1914;
- explain why this became a world war;
- explain and weight several causes of the First World War;
- distinguish long-term conditions, a trigger and human decisions.
Identity question: How can national belonging, empire and political loyalty make conflict easier to imagine?
Reo used for a purpose: He pātai / question · whakaaro / thinking · mātakitaki / view · kōrero / discuss · tuhia / write. Te Pakanga Tuatahi o te Ao is encountered alongside other names for the war; it is not decorative duplication.
Lesson 1 · Which war? What world?
Do not begin with MAIN. First build a correct mental picture of the war itself.
- Which war? diagnostic: students sort 1914–18, 1939–45, Hitler, Kaiser Germany, Austria-Hungary, Ottoman Empire, Axis, Allies, trenches, tanks and Holocaust into WW1 / WW2 / both / unsure.
- Repair the blur: establish that WW1 Germany was the German Empire, not Nazi Germany; Hitler / Nazis / Holocaust / Axis belong to WW2. The word Allies appears in both wars, but the coalitions differ.
- 1914 was modern: use image-rich evidence of telephones, newspapers, electric trams, cars, cinemas, factories, railways, steamships and aeroplanes. Ask: what feels recognisably modern? what still feels distant?
- World before Europe: use a world map to show multiple theatres, oceans, empires, dominions, colonies, troops and resources. Students complete: “It became a world war because…”
- Repeat Today’s WALT: students should now be able to explain which war this is, when it happened and why “world” matters before moving into the Europe map.
Student resource: Before the causes — what war are we actually studying? →
Lesson 2 · Who is fighting whom? Build the map
- Teach the broad sides: Allied Powers and Central Powers. Explicitly say Axis is WW2 language.
- Core early Allied side: British Empire, France, Russian Empire, Serbia, Belgium. Layer in Japan, Italy, Romania and the USA later with dates rather than pretending the coalition was fixed from day one.
- Central Powers: German Empire and Austria-Hungary at the opening; Ottoman Empire joins later in 1914; Bulgaria joins in 1915.
- Reference map first: find Britain, France, Germany, Austria-Hungary, Russia, Serbia, Belgium, Ottoman Empire and Italy.
- Teach Austria-Hungary: a multi-national empire, not a country that exists today. Do the same basic conceptual work for the Russian and Ottoman empires.
- Colour-in map: students use the second blank map to colour the sides, build a key and label the key states.
- Check visibly: project an answer map. Students correct their own work in a different pen / pencil.
- Teams change: add date/status annotations for Italy and the Ottoman Empire. Distinguish pre-war alliances from eventual wartime sides.
- Zoom into the Balkans: only once the wider map is familiar.
- Retrieval: students locate Germany, Austria-Hungary, Serbia and Russia from their own completed map without copying from the board.
Student resource: Europe 1914 two-map task →
Lesson 3 · From geography to causation
- Now ask: How could a crisis between Austria-Hungary and Serbia spread?
- Alliance prediction: students draw a possible cascade from their own coloured map before formal explanation.
- Introduce MAIN as a memory scaffold, not a complete causal explanation.
- Misconception repair: fact-check the false naval-disarmament sentence from the original WIP.
- Use imperialism to ask why a European crisis could become global and nationalism to ask how identity can unite and divide.
- Teach Sarajevo / July Crisis as trigger plus decisions.
- 100 responsibility points: students allocate points across militarism, alliances, imperialism, nationalism, assassination / July Crisis and government choices.
- After evidence, reallocate. Require: I used to think… now I think… because…
Micro-learning moves
- Diagnostic misconception before content.
- World scale → Europe → Balkans.
- Reference map → colour map → correction → retrieval.
- Prediction before explanation.
- Revision as evidence of learning.
- Numeracy through 100-point weighting.
Kaiako guardrails
- Do not assume students distinguish WW1 and WW2. Surface the confusion explicitly and repair it.
- Do not use Axis for WW1.
- Do not make the first visual language all trenches / sepia / mud; that reinforces “ancient old war” thinking.
- Do not ask students to reason about Austria-Hungary / Serbia before they can locate and describe them.
- Do not teach the sides as perfectly fixed throughout 1914–18.
- “MAIN caused WW1” is too tidy.
- “Alliances automatically dragged everyone in” is too deterministic.
- “Great” in Great War is historically interesting, not teacher endorsement of glory.
Deck build target
Do not optimise for slide count. Week 1 now requires enough space for: title/inquiry · Unit WALT · WW1/WW2 diagnostic · date distinction · 1914-is-modern image sequence · Today’s WALT · world-war map · Allied Powers · Central Powers · labelled Europe map · Austria-Hungary / empire explanation · key-state retrieval · blank-map colouring instructions · protected colouring time · answer-map correction · changing-sides/date nuance · Balkans zoom · geographic retrieval · alliance-spread prediction · MAIN · militarism fact-check · imperialism · nationalism · trigger chain · 100-point weighting · revision / exit.