Classroom Trial: Who was to blame for World War One? (there is also a completed version for stimulus material in the teacher area).
Each person in the class will be given a number (1-6). Each student’s task is as follows:
1. To frame TWO prosecution questions against ONE particular country, in this order:
Examples (in this case, against France):
Is it not fair to argue that you had humiliated Germany in the Moroccan Crisis?
Is it not true that your alliance with Russia forced Germany to develop the Schlieffen Plan?
2. For each question, have evidence to back up your point.
3. In the lesson itself, each group of students forming questions against the same country should be provided with the questions shown below, with the option to use these instead of their own questions if they wish. Each group will decide on its best two questions.
4. The questions will then be written into this table (ideally, have a version of it in Word open on the teacher’s projection screen). Then, each group will be told which country they will defend, and frame / present responses to the questions formulated by someone else.
5. The debate should then take place. The voting procedure at the end of the debate will be (a) Raise both hands for the country MOST to blame in your view (b) Raise one hand for the country SECOND MOST responsible. The scores for each country will be added up to provide a class verdict.

This forms part of the newly updated ActiveHistory scheme of work on The Origins of World War One.