CBC Archives

Have a class discussion about how humans react to change. Encourage students to consider changes in their lives, how those changes made them feel, and what may have caused those particular changes to their lives. You may wish to hold a class discussion about this, or have students respond in their journal, particularly if major life changes are a sensitive area for any of your students.

Then turn the discussion toward the way that people might react if their country joined another as a province. What might be different between being a country and being a province? Which political arrangement might people prefer?

Explain that joining Confederation had a huge impact on the lives of the people in Newfoundland.

Direct students to the topic Has Confederation Been Good for Newfoundland? on the CBC Radio and Television Archives Web site. Divide the class into four groups. Assign each group two of the Clips #1 through #10. Have each group watch and listen to its clips several times. Each group should list and describe the human behaviours (actions, reactions, choices, and decisions) discussed and shown in the clip.

Students will then practise a role-play to describe the reactions of several of the people highlighted in their clips.

Hold a town-hall forum or a mock-talk show in which you play the role of the moderator, and students from each of the groups share their role-play together. Focus questions on people’s reactions leading up to, during, and following the vote of 1949, their opinions of Joey Smallwood, their feelings on April 1, and so on, and have students respond in their role.

Students can reflect in their journal how they think they might have felt when facing the question of their country joining Canada.