Animal Farm Lesson Plan

Show Trials of Stalin

Kind of Activity:

Classwide Discussion

Objective:

Students will be able to understand the historical context of the allegory in the novel.

Common Core Standards:

CCSS.ELA-LITERACY.RL.9-10.6; CCSS.ELA-LITERACY.SL.9-10.1

Structure:

Ask students to share what they learned in last night's homework about Stalin's show trials. In the 1930s, Stalin’s political opponents were put on trial: they pleaded “guilty” to incredible tales of treason and were subsequently killed. In this section, Orwell uses these factual trials to illustrate paranoia and tyranny. Napoleon puts the hens who rebelled against him (when he wants to take 400 eggs a week to sell), on...