Lesson video

Hi, welcome back to KS3 history with me I'm Ms Dawson today is our second and final lesson of our inquiry into when the turning point was in the Second World War.

If you've already done lessons one to five, well done you're in the right place.

If you haven't, you need to go back and do those lessons before returning to this one.

Today, we are going to be looking at the end of the war in Europe and the Pacific.

So what I'm going to do now is move my head out of the way of the screen so you can copy down today's title, pause the video in order to do this.

Once you've done it, resume the video and we'll get going.

If today's lesson, you are going to need some paper, a pen, a ruler, a pencil and your turning point table that you've been working on for the previous five lessons, you're going to need that in order to answer today's inquiry, you also need to make sure that you are sat somewhere nice and calm and quiet, free from distractions so you can get on with your work.

If you need to at this stage, putyour video on pause, find the correct equipment and get yourself set up somewhere.

If you've already done that well done, I'd like us to start by taking a look at this photograph this has taken on VE Day.

What do we think is happening? So some of the things we might notice, we might take a look at that iconic bus that might give us an indication as to where we are.

We might want to look at the number of people, what they're doing that might give us some indication of what's going on.

I'd like us to very quickly write up an answer, showing what this image is showing and what that suggests, you might want to use the caption to help you, because that's giving us a big clue into what we're looking at here.

putyour video on pause, spend two minutes, writing up an answer and then resume the video when you'd like to look at my model, I'll figure, well done welcome back.

Well done if you worked out that these were people celebrating the end of the war in London, I'm going to read my answer to you and you can check it against yours.

Remember they might not look the same and that's not a problem.

This image shows a large crowd of people celebrating in London.

This suggests that the Western allies had defeated Germany.

So as I said, this is VE day or Victory in Europe Day, and this is people celebrating and Piccadilly Circus in London.

So you can also take a look at this image, we've looked already at an image of Victory in Europe Day being celebrated in London.

This is another example of it being celebrated in Toronto in Canada.

And we can see that they're having parties in the street parades there are flags, everybody looks really excited and I think it's really interesting for us to know that this was going on across the entire world on this day.

And it was a really, really widely celebrated event.

So VE Day, our basic details are, it's celebrated on 8th of May, 1945.

It was celebrated all around the world.

So it's not just in London where people had big parties in the street to celebrate the war had gone on for six years and it had mobilised a huge amount of the entire world.

So we celebrated everywhere, however, despite this Winston Churchill warned that we were only able to have a brief period of rejoicing.

Why might that have been, why might we only have been able to rejoice over this briefly? So one of the reasons why Winston Churchill said that we would only be able to celebrate briefly is because there was a continued war in the Pacific VE Day stands for Victory in Europe.

But as of yet, there was still a war happening against Japan and the United States had experienced a lot of success.

They'd been using a strategy called island hopping and if you look at this picture, you can see from the right-hand side, that the allies where we can see the United States was continuing to move forward.

What they were doing was using their ships and the air force to take one island at a time and get closer and closer to Japan, to the point where in 1945, they had taken the Island of Okinawa, which was the sort of last stop next to mainland mainland Japan.

So from there, their next stage would be to attack the mainland of Japan.

So as I said, they had advanced much closer to mainland Japan from 1941 all the way up to 1945.

However, the important thing for us to note here is that even though the United States probably would have been able to mount an invasion of Japan, it would have been really expensive and it would have claimed many more lives.

By this point in the war, Europe was already starting to see peace.

Germany had surrendered.

There had been huge amounts of lives lost in the war in the Pacific and the Japanese did not want to surrender.

So the Americans were wondering how they would defeat Japan without having to actually invade it because they've already exhausted so many resources.

This is a map of mainland Japan.

So by the end of 1945, or by the time the Germans had surrendered, America had occupied an island that was just next to this mainland Japan.

And they were ready if necessary to invade it, but they didn't really want to.

This was because the Japanese would have fought until the very last, it would have exhausted supplies and money and were known for a policy of absolutely never surrendering.

So America needed to work out how they were going to do that.

And they had a new weapon, which they decided to use instead of invading the Island of Japan.

On the 6th and 9th of August, 1945, America dropped an atomic bomb on Hiroshima and Nagasaki.

Those two places that have been indicated on the map, this caused Japan to surrender on the 15th of August.

And this is what is known as Victory in Japan Day.

So it's important that we note that the war in Europe ended before the war in the Pacific and that America used a different tactic of dropping a very powerful and deadly bomb on the Japanese in order to force them to surrender.

So on the 8th of May, 1945 Victory in Europe Day was celebrated and on the 15th of August Victory over Japan Day was celebrated.

Before we look at the events or the in VJ Days, we're just going to recap our key events of the war so far.

It's a lot has happened in six years and we need to be really clear on that so that we can decide when our turning points are.

So what was declared in September of 1939 Britain and France declared war on Germany, France surrendered in June of 1940, the battle of Britain took place 1940, just very shortly after the French surrender, the United States entered the war in December of 1941 following Japan's attack on Pearl Harbour.

The Battle of Stalingrad took place from August, 1942 to February, 1943 so very long and bloody attack, huge loss of life there, D-Day landings in June of 1944 and then Victory in Europe Day on the 8th of May, 1945 and Victory over Japan Day on the 15th of August, 1945.

That's our key basic chronology of the Second World War.

Things we must know once we walk away from this inquiry, I'm going to test you on these in a second.

How well do you think you know them? Okay, so this will be our final test on sequencing.

It is important that you know, the order in which these events happened.

So you can use a pencil.

If you're worried about getting it wrong first time, that's not a problem at all.

What I want you to do is pause the video and to copy these events out in the correct order.

Once you're happy, you've done that resume the video and we'll check the answers.

No cheating off you go.

Well done welcome back.

Remember if you didn't get one of them, right that's not a problem at all you can just use this time to correct them.

Well done if you've got this one right, the first event was Britain and France declaring war on Germany.

The second event was a battle of Britain very well done if you've got that right.

Third event, the United States entering the war.

Fourth event, the battle of Stalingrad.

Fifth event D-Day landings.

Sixth event was the surrender of Germany.

Seventh event was the use of the atomic bomb.

And then the final event was Japan surrendering.

It's important for us to know the in between Germany and Japan, surrendering Americans dropped the bomb on Japan.

Great job if you've got all of these right, don't panic, you're taught if you didn't pause the video and correct them, if you need to, if not, let's move on.

So now we're ready to answer our comprehension questions.

I'll read them to you and then I'll direct you to the worksheet, question one when did Germany surrender to the allies? Question two how did people celebrate VE Day? Question three why did Churchill say that Britain could only briefly rejoice? Question four what tactics had the allies used in order to try and get Japan to surrender before July of 1945? Question five what secret weapon had America developed by July of 1945? Question six what damage was caused by the atomic bomb? And our challenge question.

Why did the allies use the atomic bomb if it was going to cause a death of thousands of innocent civilians? And there are sentence starters there to help you answer that question.

Remember, we've gone over some of these already, but you're not expected to know the answers without reading the worksheet first, because that's where all the answers are.

Try and use full sentences get yourself into good habits and use historical details to back up your answers.

Once you're happy, you can resume the video and look at the answers with me.

Go ahead, then putyour video on pause.

Look at the worksheet and answer the questions.

Well then welcome back.

Let's go through the answers and see how you did.

Question one when did Germany surrender to the allies? The acceptable answer is 7th of May, 1945.

The good answer is the allies accepted Germany's unconditional surrender on 7th of May, 1945.

Really well done if you used full sentences.

Reminder here, the date of the surrender is the day before what has celebrated as Victory in Europe Day.

So make sure that you've got that right.

Question two how did people celebrate VE Day? The acceptable answer is parties in the street.

A good answer is all across the world people celebrated VE Day on the 8th of May, 1945.

There were parties in the street, including a huge one in Piccadilly Circus, which was attended by 50,000 people.

Well done if you use specific historical details like dates and like the number 50,000, if you need to add any detail to your answer, you can pause the video and do so.

Remember all answers do not have to look exactly the same.

Question three why did Churchill say that Britain could only briefly rejoice? The acceptable answer is that Japan had not surrendered.

A good answer which makes use of full sentences is, Winston Churchill gave a speech where he said that Britain could only rejoice briefly.

He was referring to the fact that Japan had not surrendered yet.

This meant that the war in the Pacific was still happening.

Good job if you use full sentences, if you need to, you can pause the video and add some details to your answer.

Question four what tactics had the allies used in order to try and get Japan to surrender before July of 1945? The acceptable answer is a Naval blockade.

A good answer with a full sentence is before July of 1945, the allies had tried to force the Japanese to surrender by using a Naval blockade.

Remember your answer and mine might not look exactly the same.

You may have also written something about Island attacking, which would also be correct.

So be generous with yourself and give yourself a tick if you've written anything which answers this question.

Great job let's move on.

Question five what secret weapon had America developed by July of 1945? The acceptable answer is the atomic bomb.

A good answer with more developed detail is by July of 1945, America had developed the atomic bomb this was a weapon, more powerful than any bomb that had previously existed.

Great job if you have used it full sentences, let's have a look at question six.

Question six what damage was caused by the atomic bomb? The acceptable answer is it killed thousands of civilians.

A good answer with more specific detail and full sentences is, the atomic bomb instantly kills 70,000 civilians at Hiroshima and 40,000 at Nagasaki.

Thousands more would die in the following months and years of radiation poisoning.

Really good job, if you use specific statistics in order to strengthen your answer, and here's our challenge question, why did the allies use the atomic bomb if it was going to cause the deaths of thousands of innocent civilians? The acceptable answer is to force Japan to surrender.

A good answer is the allies use the atomic bomb because they had been unable to force the Japanese to surrender.

Evidence to support this, is that even after the Japanese Navy and Air Force were practically destroyed and the Americans had captured Okinawa, the Japanese refuse to surrender, the allies were not prepared to spend more money in lives in the conflict.

This meant that although they knew it would kill thousands of innocent people, they chose to use the atomic bomb in August of 1945 to force the Japanese to surrender.

Really well done if you develop this with full sentences and historical detail.

So really good job, we have reached the end of the Second World War and it's time for us to think about our inquiry now, how do you decide what a turning point is? These are our key events that we have looked at throughout the course of this inquiry.

And what I would like us to do is to think about how we decide when the turning point is, because at the beginning of the war in 1940, it really looked like Germany was going to win.

At some point, their fortunes changed.

The tide turned, when was that? Now this is all about you using your own historical thinking and opinion.

There is no set right answer to this in order to do this, we're going to answer what, we will use, what we call counterfactual history, which means when we think about what could have happened, that might have changed it.

So in front of you, what I would like you to do is to pick one of these events.

Only one that you think if it did not happen, the Nazis would have won the war.

So is there something here that we could take out? And if we take out, it changes the way that the war would have been won.

And that helps us decide when the turning point is, have a think about it, I'd like you to have a practise with using this counterfactual reasoning on the right-hand side, there are two sentence starters, and we're going to answer this question in more detail in a moment.

So if you prefer not to write it down, you don't have to, you could even say it to your screen just to practise using historical detail in an argument.

So you're going to say, I believe that if X, so pick a historical event had not happened, the Nazis may have won the war.

And then you're going to give me a reason you think this so you can pick any of those events.

If you can back it up with your own reasoning that suggests that if that had not happened, the Germans may have won the war.

So you can either write it down two sentences, or you can just say it to your screen, pause the video and do one of those things now.

Well done welcome back.

Hopefully you're starting to get into your head an idea about when the turning point of the Second World War was, and you've got this turning point table to help you.

You've been filling this in for the past five lessons and you have decided for each one at each event who it looks like was in the lead, who was winning the walk at each point.

So what I'd like you to do now is to look back over those notes and to try and pick out one event.

Does one event stand out to you as being the thing that changed the course of the war? 'Cause if it does, that's your turning point.

You can pause the video if you need to, to make a decision on that now and resume the video when you think you've got it.

Welcome back remember I haven't filled any turning point table for you as a model because you need to answer this question with your own opinion.

It will give you some confidence as a historian to come up with an opinion that was made by you.

So let's answer our extension question now, what was the turning point of the Second World War? And there is no real correct answer to this it's all about how you back it up.

There are sentence starters there to help you.

You may note that if you really want to challenge yourself, you could compare more than one event and explain why one was more important than another, but that's quite advanced you don't have to do that.

So sentence starters is on the left and key was on the right.

You can use those to help you answer this extension question and conclude your answer to this six lesson inquiry.

Go ahead, pause the video and complete the extension question in as much detail as possible.

You are probably going to want to use your turning point table and your notes from past lessons in order to do this, when you're happy, resume the video.

Off you go good luck.

Well, that takes us to the end of this inquiry.

Really great job.

You have just answered a very difficult question that historians have continued to debate since the end of the Second World War.

Hopefully now you feel confident enough that you could argue for what you think was the turning point in the Second World War.

Have a think about whether or not, if you know anyone else who's done this inquiry, and maybe you could compare and see if your answers are the same.

If they're not, you could discuss why you think something different.

That's what being a historian is all about.

I'm really impressed with your contribution to this inquiry and I hope that you enjoyed it really, really well done.

I will see you next time.

Take care, don't forget.

Once you've closed this window to go ahead and complete the exit quiz to test how much you've managed to pick up in today's lesson.

And finally, if you would like to, you're very free to ask your parent or carer to share your work with us so we can see what you've been up to.

You can do that by using Facebook, Instagram, or Twitter, asking your parent or carer to do so, tagging at Oak National and #LearnwithOak you can let us know what you think was a turning point of the Second World War.

I'd be really interested to know.

Thanks so much for your contributions and take care bye bye.