THE HUNDRED YEARS' WAR ON "THE JERRY SPRINGER SHOW"

INTRODUCTION The Hundred Years War was a bloody, intense conflict. While it was not one hundred years of constant fighting, it was periodically revived for over a century. At the root of the conflict were economic disputes, political disputes, as well as a dispute over the succession of the French throne. The Hundred Years' War caused several changes in the political, social, and economic structures of France and England, and these changes would have rippling effects throughout the rest of French and English history. During this conflict, many lives were lost. Could it have been possible to have prevented the war, and prevented this loss of life? We shall find out!
TASK You are a member of the House of Plantagenet or House of Valois. You have been long in conflict with the other house, and your countries stand on the brink of war. Suddenly you get an invitation from across time and space, from over 650 years in the future. Someone named "Jerry Springer" has read about the war you're about to fight in the history books, and has offered his services as a mediator. He wants you to come and appear on his "talk show" on something called "television". You meet with the other house, and you agree to appear on this "talk show" to make one final attempt at resolving this conflict without going to war.

PROCESS
1. Use the following resources to gather information on each house. These are essential questions you should be asking yourself as you research: What was each house's stance with Flanders? With Scotland? What role did the English Channel play? How did the House of Valois handle the dynastic crisis? What claim did the House of Plantagenet have on the throne of England? What are privateers, and what role do they have in the conflict? How does Eleanor of Aquitane contribute to the land disputes? 2. Using your persuasion map and working in groups of four with members of your house, start outlining possible arguments you can use against the other House. Support your arguments with facts you have found. Make sure you've planned for the arguments the other house is going to make; don't just research your house's point of view because you need to be able to counter the arguments of the other house! 3. In your group of four, conference on your argument. You will offer constructive criticism to your group members, find the weak points in their arguments and help them strengthen their arguments. They will do the same for you. At the end of this conference, you should have a series of arguments you would feel comfortable standing up in front of the class and defending. 4. Now you're going to meet with the rest of your house, and discuss your arguments again. This time you will once more hammer out the weak points prepare counterarguments (which means trying to predict what the other house's arguments will be), and plan for questions from "Jerry" and the audience. Make sure you understand both sides well enough so that you can answer any questions that will pop up. When you come out of this meeting, your team should have a set of arguments they're going to use, a battle plan for any possible counter argument the other team will make (this requires detailed knowledge of the other side's views), and answers to any possible questions that could be asked by the audience. 5. I will provide costumes. It's not necessary to speak in Middle-Ages English (in fact lets not do that just to avoid confusion) but if your team wants to affect British or French accents, that would be fine. Whatever you need to do to get into character as a noble in the fourteenth century.Our class will hold our debate in front of another class, and it will be taped for YouTube. The Internet audience and the studio audience will decide who they find most persuasive by how loud they root (or in the Internet audience's case, how much they comment) for one side or the other. Good luck! Wikipedia article on the Hundred Years' War YouTube video of student sample Dr. Lynn H. Nelson's lecture on causes of Hundred Years War Ohio State University lecture on Hundred Years War

EVALUATION

You will be evaluated on two rubrics. The first rubric is for the presentation itself. You will be evaluated on enthusiasm, your show of respect for the other team, how well you handle questions from the audience and from "Jerry", participation, and how well you remain in character. The second rubric is for the quality of what you produce. You will be evaluated on how clearly you understand the material you're presenting, evidence of planning for rebuttals (countering the arguments of the other side), organization, and depth of information that you present in the debate.

Class Debate : House of Valois vs. House of Plantagenet on "Jerry Springer": Presentation

Andrea Simoneau

CATEGORY	4	3	2	1
Enthusiasm	Students are engaged fully, using facial expressions, voice inflections.	Students are mostly engaged, using voice inflections and facial expressions, but sometimes falter	Students are mildly engaged, still somewhat detached. They participate, but not as enthusiastically as they could.	Students are detached from the role, and its very obvious that the audience is seeing high school students simply going through the motions of the debate.
Respect for Other Team	All statements, body language, and responses were respectful and were in appropriate language.	Statements and responses were respectful and used appropriate language, but once or twice body language was not.	Most statements and responses were respectful and in appropriate language, but there was one sarcastic remark.	Statements, responses and/or body language were consistently not respectful.
Questions	Audience questions and questions from "Jerry" are handled with obvious forethought, and are answered thoroughly.	Audience questions and questions from "Jerry" have been planned for, but perhaps not answered as thoroughly as they could have been.	Audience questions and questions from "Jerry" were only minimally planned for, and answers are only partial.	Audience questions and questions from "Jerry" have obviously not been planned for, and answers are inarticulate and incomplete.
Participation	Every student participates, responds to at least two points raised by the other side and articulates two arguments from their side.	Most of the students participate, but a few students hang back, or only articulate two arguments and don't respond to questions or only respond to questions.	Some of the students participate, but some hang back and keep quiet, or those students don't articulate the required number of arguments or answer the required number of questions.	A few students participate, but most of the students hang back and don't answer questions or articulate arguments.
Character	All students remain in character all the time.	Most students remain in character all the time, or all students remain in character most of the time, only breaking a few times.	Some students remain in character all the time, and others do not, or some students break character more than a few times.	Hardly any students remain in character, or character is consistently broken by many students.

Class Debate : "The Jerry Springer Show" House of Valois vs House of Plantagenet

Ms. Simoneau

CATEGORY	4	3	2	1
Understanding of Topic	The team clearly understood the topic in-depth and presented their information forcefully and convincingly.	The team clearly undestood the topic in-depth and presented their information with ease.	The team seemed to understand the main points of the topic and presented those with ease.	The team did not show an adequate understanding of the topic.
Information	All information presented in the debate was clear, accurate and thorough.	Most information presented in the debate was clear, accurate and thorough.	Most information presented in the debate was clear and accurate, but was not usually thorough.	Information had several inaccuracies OR was usually not clear.
Organization	All arguments were clearly tied to an idea (premise) and organized in a tight, logical fashion.	Most arguments were clearly tied to an idea (premise) and organized in a tight, logical fashion.	All arguments were clearly tied to an idea (premise) but the organization was sometimes not clear or logical.	Arguments were not clearly tied to an idea (premise).
Rebuttal	All counter-arguments were accurate, relevant and strong.	Most counter-arguments were accurate, relevant, and strong.	Most counter-arguments were accurate and relevant, but several were weak.	Counter-arguments were not accurate and/or relevant

CONCLUSION
The Hundred Years War was a long and bloody conflict that was started in large part due to long-standing traditions. What did France and England do, if anything, to change their traditions? At what point should tradition be tempered with innovation to avoid conflict? What examples of traditions in policymaking can you find in current America?

Photos:

Jerry Springer:
Jerry Springer: Werts, Diane. "MADtv Returns This Weekend" September 2007. Newsday.com image retrieved November 10 2008. http://weblogs.newsday.com/entertainment/tv/blog/JerrySpringer.jpg

Plantagenet coat of arms: Ancestry.com "Gough." Image retrieved November 10, 2008.
http://freepages.genealogy.rootsweb.ancestry.com/~darleenz/plantagenet.htm

Valois coat of arms: Norton. "Norton Family of Sharpenhoe". Image retrieved November 10, 2008. http://www.nortonfamily.net/norton-history.htm