Use these questions or activities to help gauge students’ familiarity with and spark their interest in the context of the work, giving them an entry point into the text itself.

Short Answer

1. What factors or choices do you believe lead to a successful nation? Explain your answers thoroughly and cite examples when possible.

Teaching Suggestion: Consider allowing students to share ideas with a partner before engaging in a quickwrite in response to the prompt. You might want to give students at least 5 minutes to develop their answers. Then, discuss the prompt as a class. Alternatively, you might invite students to take turns writing one idea on the whiteboard or use an app like Poll Everywhere to have students share ideas digitally.

If students are hesitant to share answers, consider using the invitation “Share one thing you or your partner came up with during your discussion.” This often helps students feel more comfortable sharing ideas.

• “How Can You Measure What Makes a Country Great?” from the BBC discusses modern standards for a nation’s success.
• “The World’s Most Innovative Countries” (2019) from Forbes ranks the top 12 countries for innovation.

2. Consider what you know about why the colonists fought against Britain to become their own country.