 Students were asked to end up writing a paragraph about their criticism of FDR's speech in their particular section. Finally, as a group, they presented that to the class while the class, meanwhile, was taking notes on a capture sheet where they were to detail which arguments each of the critics were standing up and making. A lot of the students write about FDR not doing enough. This student took the role of Norman Thomas, writes, what progress is this legislation making? There are still people in the streets and workers are working too hard to not making nearly enough money. The money we'll spend on this new deal program, Mr. President, is money that won't be going to the American people. Mr. President, you would do good to be more like Robin Hood, steal from the rich and give to the poor. Maybe the reason that nothing is happening in this country is because you are constantly out of the office and out in your woods. And, of course, he's going to spend time in Hyde Park or at Warm Springs. Interesting that students alluded to that. The relief needed far exceeds that which is being provided. FDR needs a nationalized industry and work hard to break down all of the remaining monopolies. The federal government must work with the state and local governments to do this. And then they need to take the wealth and share it equally with all workers. And, again, great. I'm happy that the student is seeing what Norman Thomas is interested in and that idea of nationalizing industry that Norman Thomas has and trying to get rid of any monopolies. Well, the new deal is moving in the right direction. We must go further to ensure that the depression is lifted. Despite government action, the crisis persists. It's clear that the truly aid of people FDR must do far more. The gap between rich and poor has expanded in recent decades and this has caused many of our problems. To fix the crisis, the government must act for the common man and punish the rich for their actions. Our president must refuse to bow to Republican influence and expand the power of government so that all people not just for rich can prosper. Charles Coughlin, of course, uses a lot of charged language in his rhetoric and the student, too, is capturing some of that. And finally, for homework, students were asked to write an essay response dealing with both the new deal criticisms and dealing with the supports that FDR is giving in his speech. I was really hoping that students took away some knowledge of the criticisms that FDR was receiving. They knew that Republicans were largely against new deal legislation. But they weren't as familiar with some of the more left-wing criticism, the socialist criticism, the communist criticism, the American Liberty League criticism of FDR. It's nice to try to turn over student learning to them and allow them to run with things. And I think that one of the things that I really liked about the lesson was that students were asked to be creative and to play the role of a critic and get up on stage in front of the class and pretend to be that critic to really engage in not only thinking of history as this stagnant thing, but make it interesting and make it fun. And I think that students were able to do that through working in groups and playing the role of one of these critics.