Website Spotlight: The Great War and the Shaping of the 20th Century

Website URL: http://www.pbs.org/greatwar/

Introductory Note:

Welcome to one in a series of posts which spotlight quality websites that I use with my U.S. History survey course students at Azusa Pacific University to enrich the regular material in our learning modules.

In this post, I limit myself to those specific aspects of the website which I find fit particularly well within our face-to-face class sessions (each student is required to bring a laptop to class) or as the basis for the students' regularly-assigned written reactions.

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I ask the students to work through the following links:

I. Trenches

The Trenches: Symbol of Stalemate
http://www.pbs.org/greatwar/chapters/ch1_trench.html

The Trenches: What they were really like
http://www.pbs.org/greatwar/historian/hist_fussell_03_trenches.html

American Troops in the Trenches [David Kennedy]
http://www.pbs.org/greatwar/historian/hist_kennedy_03_troops.html

II. Maps 
Check out the animation built into the maps
http://www.pbs.org/greatwar/maps/

Europe in 1914
http://www.pbs.org/greatwar/maps/index.html

Outbreak of War
http://www.pbs.org/greatwar/maps/maps_outbreak.html

Gallipoli
http://www.pbs.org/greatwar/maps/maps_gallipoli.html

The Western Front in 1918
http://www.pbs.org/greatwar/maps/maps_western.html

III. Effects of the Great War

"Then and now: the Shaping of the 21st Century"
http://www.pbs.org/greatwar/thenandnow/

The Great War Today [Jay Winter]
http://www.pbs.org/greatwar/historian/hist_winter_23_today.html

The Lusitania [Jay Winter]
http://www.pbs.org/greatwar/historian/hist_winter_12_lusitania.html

Gallipoli: A Turkish Perspective
http://www.pbs.org/greatwar/historian/hist_tuncoku_01_gallipoli.html

Gallipoli: An Australian Perspective
http://www.pbs.org/greatwar/historian/hist_wilson_04_gallipoli.html

Gallipoli: An Intelligence Screw-up
http://www.pbs.org/greatwar/historian/hist_winter_07_gallipoli.html

Voices of the War: Gallipoli and Armenian Genocide
http://www.pbs.org/greatwar/chapters/ch2_voices2.html

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Concluding Note:

I hope you will use this blog post in conjunction with both the modules on my Learning Professor wiki and the numerous other posts in my Website Spotlight series.

1. The website spotlighted in this post fits within the following U.S. History survey course module on the wiki:
http://thelearningprofessor.wikispaces.com/World+War+I

2. The other blog posts in my Website Spotlight series--chronologically displayed by U.S. History survey course module-- can be found on this wiki page:
http://thelearningprofessor.wikispaces.com/WEBSITE+SPOTLIGHT