Five Years Later (A Think)

There are moments in life you simply do not forget. I was driving from my new apartment in Farmington, Michigan to clean out my old apartment in East Lansing, when my mother told me that a plane had hit the World Trade Center. Wait she said, "Oh my God. Another one just crashed." Fortunately for me, I didn't know anybody or even know anybody who knew anybody who was killed. Many people were not as fortunate. Many lives, that did not end, changed forever on 9/11/2001. Newspapers, television, radio, and Internet publications are remembering the tragedies of five years ago, today. The Washington Post has an extensive sections devoted to 9/11 and its aftermath.

I decided to look at things a little differently. I wanted to see how the newspapers in one of America's enemy nations, Iran, was reporting on 9/11. The Tehran Times runs an article entitled The Aftermath of 9/11. The article states: " All nations sympathized with the victims of the unprecedented terrorist acts. However, this sense of sympathy didn’t last long." It goes on to criticize President Bush and the United States goverment for the way that it responded after the attacks. It's interesting that I could easily imagine an American commentator writing a similar article.

Lesson Ideas:
1. Remember that many students in elementary school won't really remember 9/11. Simply tell them that a group of people didn't like some things that the United States was doing and so decided to kill thousands of people. Ask students if they think that it's ever appropriate to hurt somebody because you don't like what they are doing? Encourage them to explain their answers.
2. Ask students to write a letter to Osama Bin Laden in which they express their views on what Al Qaeda did five years ago. These letters can be posted on the Internet.
3. In the years since 9/11 there has been much talk as to what an appropriate memorial to the victims of the atrocities should look like. Tell students to imagine that they are architects who have been asked to design a memorial. Invite them to either describe an appropriate memorial in words (writing) or to sketch an image. Encourage them to explain why they believe this image would be appropriate.
4. In the days after 9/11 there was much talk as to the meaning of a hero. Ask students to define the word hero. As a class compile these definitions of hero and post them on a wall. You might even want to do this as an entire school. You could title the wall "Heros of 9/11 Five Years Later." It might be interesting to ask students to investigate what heros of 9/11 are doing today. How many fire fighters who survived the day are still working in the fire department? What about paramedics? Students can conduct research through the approrpiate agencies' websites. (There is a famous image of firemen holding up a flag on the site of the World Trade Center rubble. What became of this flag? What have these firemen done since 9/11?) Students can prepare multi-media presentations.
5. Put President Bush's foreign policy on trial after 9/11? Was the United States right to attack Afghanistan? Was the U.S. right to attack Iraq? If students don't think that the U.S. was right to attack Iraq ask them to explain what an ideal relationship between the U.S. and Saddam Hussein's Iraq might have been like, assuming that Hussein did not change his policies. Encourage class discussion.
6. Ask students to explain what people should do five years later on the anniversary of 9/11 to remember 9/11?

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