Distribute a copy of the worksheet Support for Historical Events (attached below) to each student. Assign the four events listed on the activity sheet individually to each student or collectively to a group of students. Inform students that their task is to determine how the Chinese community might have viewed important events by considering general information about the time period as well as the perspectives developed in the previous activity. Encourage students to consider the clue-conclusion-question prompts and the criteria for an authentic perspective when determining the extent to which the Chinese community would likely have supported or opposed each of these events. You may prefer to select your own historical events to for student consider. In which case, use worksheet 3, Support for Historical Events II (attached below) and add in the desired events. Guide students in exploring applicable background information from texts, documents or online sources for each event.
Help students develop plausible responses by prompting them to reflect on the general issues examined in Identifying Perspectives. For example, what might be the economic implications for the Chinese community entering World War One? What might be the cultural impacts of China allying with Canada in World War Two? How might the Chinese community viewed these effects and, by extension, the event?
