The Cuban Missile Crisis: Considering its Place in Cold War History
Printed Curriculum [$20]
Downloadable Curriculum [$16]
Classroom Set [$9.75ea] (10 min)
Third edition.
Overview
The Cuban Missile Crisis: Considering its Place in Cold War History probes the complex, often troubled, relationship between the United States and Cuba, and examines the crisis that brought the world to the brink of war. The Cuban Missile Crisis draws on groundbreaking research emerging from a series of international conferences. The sixth international conference took place in Havana in October 2002.
Readings
The unit analyzes the Cold War dynamics that led to the Cuban missile crisis and examines the decision-making process within the Kennedy administration at the height of the confrontation with the Soviet Union. The background reading surveys the evolution of U.S. involvement in the Caribbean and Central America from the early 19th century to the present and prepares students to consider thoughtfully the causes and ramifications of the Cuban missile crisis. A final reading examines what we have learned in recent years.
Framework of Policy Options
In this unit, students are placed in the role of President Kennedy's ExCom. Knowing only what members of ExCom knew at the time, students wrestle with the options considered at the time.
Suggested Five-Day Lesson Plan
The Teacher's Resource Book accompanying The Cuban Missile Crisis: Considering its Place in Cold War History contains a day-by-day lesson plan and student activities.
- An optional lesson introduces students to important milestones in our country's relationship with the Cuba and places it in the context of U.S. involvement Caribbean and Central America.
- Day One focuses on the tangled triangle of U.S. -Cuban-Soviet relations that led to the Cuban missile crisis.
- Day Two and Three draw students deeper into the missile crisis through a simulation set in October 1962 in which students assume the role of advocates of three options faced by the Kennedy administration.
- Day Four contains an exercise which explores the Cuban point of view of the missile crisis.
- An optional lesson examines the role of the letters exchanged between Nikita Khrushchev and John F. Kennedy during the crisis.
- Day Five asks students to examine U.S.-Cuban relations since the missile crisis.
Supplemental Materials
Supplemental Materials includes online resources to accompany the printed unit, lesson plans developed by teachers participating in a Teaching American History grant run by Choices, links to additional online resources from the Choices Program, links to resources on other sites, and a list of recommended print resources.Additional activities are also available in The Fog of War Teacher's Guide and online resources developed by the Choices Program and the Critical Oral History Project.