In Mr. Bhuva’s sophomore history class, students will be starting a unit on WWI with a Harkness discussion to figure out who is to blame for WWI, based on all of these contradictory primary source texts. Students will use two primary sources to evaluate in their discussion. One will be the “Blank Cheque,” a telegram from 1914 front he Imperial Chancellor, Von Bethemann-Hollweg, to the German Ambassador at Vienna. They will also read a letter entitled “Austria Hungary’s Ultimatum to Serbia” from the following month to evaluate the twin perspectives on the rising tensions in the run-up to the war. Students will also view a timeline of events leading up to the declaration of war in August 1914. By evaluating a wide variety of primary sources, history teachers allow students to view historical events through different lenses, rather than simply reading a summary in a textbook.
