In a previous lesson, students explored the politics, culture, economics, and social trends in Germany during the years of the Weimar Republic (1919 to 1933), and they analyzed the strength of democracy in Germany during those years. In this lesson, students will continue the unit’s historical case study by reexamining politics in the Weimar Republic and tracing the development of the National Socialist German Workers’ (Nazi) Party throughout the 1920s and early 1930s.
Students will review events that they learned about in the previous lesson and see how the popularity of the Nazis changed during times of stability and times of crisis. They will also analyze the Nazi Party platform and, in an extension about the 1932 election, compare it to the platforms of the Social Democratic and Communist Parties. By tracing the progression of the Nazis from an unpopular fringe group to the most powerful political party in Germany, students will extend and deepen their thinking from the previous lesson about the choices that individuals can make to strengthen democracy and those that can weaken it.
This lesson includes multiple, rich extension activities if you would like to devote two days to a closer examination of the rise of the Nazi Party.
