Focus/Summary: This lesson will focus on the struggle that Mexican-Americans have
faced in gaining their rights in the workplace and on their part in fostering unionism in America.

Vital Theme and Narrative: Values, beliefs, political ideas, and institutions. Particular attention paid to "the tensions between the aspirations for freedom and security, for liberty and equality, for distinction and commonality, in human affairs".

History Habit of Mind: Understand the significance of the past to their own lives, both private and public, and to their society.

Objectives: The student will become aware of the effort and organization that it takes to pull a group of people together and fight for a common goal. By looking closely at the strategies used by Mexican-American union organizers students will better understand how they might organize themselves around a productive goal. Students
will decide on a common goal that follows the question "How can we the students at Willow Grove High School ...?" They will devise a strategy much like those used in their readings and form a plan to implement it.

Procedures or activities: The students will be broken up into groups of four or five students and asked to come up with an area in the world around them where they see injustice. They will then read excerpts from Chicano: The History of the Mexican-American Civil Rights Movement and chart the strategies used by union organizers. Next students will apply these methods to their own problem and come up with a plan to solve the issue they have chosen.

Sources: Rosales, Arturo. Chicano: The History of the Mexican-American Civil Rights Movement, Arte Publico Press, 1996.

Ideas for Assessment of Student Learning:
Class presentation of plan to solve chosen problem
Actual written report of plan