Losing Hearts and Minds: The Vietnam Conflict Fought at Home

Introduction

This unit was developed to be an analysis of anti-war sentiment and primary source material during the Vietnam War period. The aim was for students to be introduced to the idea of protest and how it can impact upon those on the home front but also upon returned servicemen and those that are stil in the field. Students were particularly encouraged to focus upon primary source material, especially images, that depicted what was happening in Vietnam during this period and in some cases just prior to this period. This was primarily to allow students to understand and engage in how Asia and Vietnam were seen during this time and make links with how we see it today. This unit was taught to a small mixed ability class of approximately 18 students as part of the combined Year 9/10 compulsory SOSE course. 2010 is the first year that this course has being taught. The Vietnam War unit was developed to come at the end of the course following units based upon geographical skills, immigration, Indigenous Australians and Australian identity.

Students
Orignally three focus students were identified however, as the teaching of the unit progressed it became clear that an additional student was needed. As a result the final product contained four focus students. The two students that had the most interesting or profound change stories were students 1 and 4.

Student 1 (E)
Student 1 is a 15/16 year old female with strong academic ability. I have taught this student in past SOSE courses and she is a hard worker who regularly provides insightful analysis in both discussion and written work. She attempts to express her ideas in a concise and informative manner and always puts in 110%. I had hoped that this project would give student 1 the opportunity to challenge herself beyond her current level. Unfortunately, student 1 found the primary source analysis difficult and as a result often had trouble thinking beyond the surface level of material provided to her. Despite this, student 1 did produce some good quality work.

Student 4 (R)
R was able to demonstrate the most profound change within the class. R is a 15/16 year old male. He was a late addition as a focus student due to his extreemly interesting responses to the attitudinal change questions. He is of middling academic ability and his attitude in class is quiet and reserved however, he are easily distracted by his own pursuits particularly when it comes to drawing on his books and the sheets provided to him. He began the unit by responding to the initial source material in an interesting way. Students were provided with images that in some cases showed some quite disturbing events from the war and the years before it. R chose to respond to these images by not only commenting upon the questions provided but also by annotating some of the images with his thoughts (Image 1, Image 2, Image 4, Image 6). These thoughts, in addition to his answers to the questions, are somewhat inappropriate and unempathetic. However, it was interesting to see how the student responded to the images and questions when they were revisited at the end of the unit. Whilst not everything was perfectly factual he had taken on board some of the more empathetic ideas of the unit and his responses demonstrate the most significant attitudinal change in the group (Image 1, Image 2, Image 4, Image 6). In addition to this his final PEC paragraph describing what impact he thought the anti-war movement had, despite being slightly inaccurate historically, indicated a far more empathetic and thought out attitude than that demonstrated at the beginning of the unit.

In addition to these focus students a few other students produced some particularly detailed or interesting responses which have also been included. Please see the students individual pages for details of their specific changes.

Reflection
The main achievement of this learning element was its highly engaging nature. The impact of the strong, interesting images from the very beginning and our continued focus upon, and reference to, them allowed students a focal point for the ideas and concepts looked at throughout the unit. They also allowed the students to avoid learning that bombarded them with text. The depth of discussion that they generated allowed students to understand the impact that the media and protest as a form of expression had upon Australian and American societies during this period. However, in saying this there were also some issues caused by a lack of specific historical information which caused some confusion in regard to the time frame of some events. Despite this, given the four week time frame that the unit was taught in the depth of empathy and understanding about Asia and its impact upon Australia and our relationship with the world that was reached was quite satisfying. It was interesting to see the students horrified reactions to some of the things that happened before, during and after the conflict. They were also quite keen to do extra research. For example, one student focused her oral presentation upon the impact of agent orange upon the Vietnamese and returned Australian servicemen after being inspired by the napalm girl. This was great to see as it allowed some of the content not specifically focussed upon to be covered by the kids, not because they were told to but, simply because they really wanted to know. At the beginning of the unit students knew next to nothing about Vietnam. The concept of Asia to young Australians is often Japan because of their technologies and China due to the Olympics. To focus upon Vietnam was great because they were keen to hear about the links with Australia and the other Asian countries that they already did know about.

Future Directions
Students were not really given the opportunity to delve into the events and issues that surrounded a quite complex conflict. As a result future directions could centre around a more detailed study of the politics, policies and events that were prevalent in Vietnam, the United States and Australia during the turbulent 1960's and 70's. This would not only allow students to gain a more solid understanding of the period but also allow them develop knowledge, skills and understandings regarding the diverse countries of our own neighbourhood. Thus increasing their Asia literacy skills and assisting them to make sense of the world they are living in.