Manifest Destiny

NEA Member, Eric Rodgers

In this lesson, students grapple with the idea of manifest destiny and after analyzing reasons in support of the idea as well as reasons against the idea, formulate an opinion about its validity.

Subjects: U.S. History

Grade Levels: 8-12

Objectives
Students will:

• define "manifest destiny";
• analyze reasons given in support of and against the idea through primary source quotes and art; and,
• compare and contrast the pros and cons of manifest destiny and formulate their own opinion on the subject.

Materials Needed

• the "Controversy of Manifest Destiny" worksheet
• an overhead transparency or computer projection of the artwork that depicts manifest destiny. Two good examples can be found on Wikipedia.com:
  • American progress
  • Westward the Course of Empire

Procedure

1. Write the following question on the board or overhead? "What is Destiny? Define it in your own words." Give students approximately five minutes to come up with an answer and write it on a scratch piece of paper.
    
2. Lead students through a discussion of the idea of "destiny." Once this idea is firmly grasped by the class, add a definition of the word "manifest" to the discussion. This simply means "clear or apparent." As students put the terms together, show them that America in the mid 1800?s believed we had a "clear destiny? to expand from sea to shining sea? it was the will of God."
    
3. Place students in cooperative learning groups of no more than 4 students. Pass out the "Controversy of Manifest Destiny" worksheet. Working in these groups, have students read through the two quotes in favor of the idea and the two quotes against the idea. For each they find the specific reasons given in either support or against and list them.
    
4. Pull the class back together for a large group discussion. (It would be best at this point to have an area on the board labeled "Manifest Destiny" with two sections underneath it "For? and Against." As the discussion goes on the teacher should write the reason the students found from the quotes.
    
5. Once all reasoning has been discussed the teacher then puts on an overhead or computer projector the artwork depicting manifest destiny. The class then discusses the ideas found within the artwork.
    

Assessment
At the end of the lesson the students should be assigned a homework assignment in which they write at least one paragraph in which they:

1. define manifest destiny,
2. compare/contrast reasons given in support and against the idea, and
3. share their opinion on the topic? was this a positive or negative idea for the United States? Why?