Worksheet part of the roleplay-based unit by RJ Tarr at www.activehistory.co.uk

Lenin’s Russia – Roleplay Unit

Task 1: Research and Preparation – HOMEWORK ASSIGNMENT

a. Different members of the class should be in role as the following members of the Politburo. If there are more people in the class than Politburo members, then the remainder should be ‘advisors’ for different politburo members.

Zinoviev | Kamenev | Lenin | Trotsky | Bukharin | Stalin | Dzerzhinsky | Sverdlov | Kollantai

(the teacher shall take the role of Kalinin, the impartial chairman).

b. Produce a mask that you will wear during the roleplay. TIP: A face image, scaled to fit just inside a sheet of A4, will be the right size for a full-face mask.

c. Conduct your own research about your character to complete the orange cells in the following two tables.

Name of your character
Age in 1917
Position in the party
Personality and skills
Relationship with Lenin and the other politburo members named above (highlight friendships and enmities)
TABLE 2: CHRONOLOGICAL ANALYSIS
*YOU SHOULD USE THIS AS THE BASIS OF YOUR NOTE-TAKING THROUGHOUT THE REST OF THIS UNIT*
*YOU SHOULD USE HOMEWORK TIME TO DEVELOP EACH ROW OF NOTES USING YOUR TEXTBOOKS AND ANY OTHER SOURCES AVAILABLE TO YOU*
A. The Situation / What Lenin did
1. What was the problem? (developed from previous table and individual homework research) / 2. What was your character’s position on how to solve this issue? / 3. Successes for Lenin
(e.g. ideologically? Pragmatically?) / 4. Failures for Lenin
(e.g. ideologically? Pragmatically?)
1917 / Initial Problems[1]
1917 / Constituent Assembly
1918 / Brest-Litovsk
1918 / War Communism
1918 / Red Terror
1919-20 / Civil War
1921 / Revolts
1921 / NEP (“New Economic Policy”)
1922 / National Minorities
1922 / Lenin’s Testament

Task 2: Roleplay

• You will now start going through the roleplay materials step by step. Complete this table in as much detail as you can as you go along. This will take several lessons!

• At the end of each lesson you will be provided with video clips relevant to each event with which to develop your notes.

[1] Complete this row using your notes from the previous worksheet covering the 1917 Decrees and the 1918 Constitution.