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STRIFE: Life in Spanish St. Augustine
An interactive thinking game
Prepared by Jon Mapstone, Guilderland High School, Guilderland, New York

Intended Grade: 9th 10th and 11th

Subject Areas: Social Studies (European history, Latin American History, American History)

Correlation to National Standards:
Standard 1: How the transoceanic interlinking of all major regions of the world from 1450 to 1600 led
to global transformation.
Standard 2: How European society experienced political, economic, and cultural transformations in an
age of global intercommunication (1450-1750).
Standard 4: Economic, political, and cultural interrelations among peoples of Africa, Europe, and the
Americas (1500-1750).
Standard 6: Major global trends from 1450 to 1770.

Objective:
This game will help students appreciate the motives, establishment, organization, societal make-up of
a Spanish New World colony. It will then allow students to impact the colony with all manner of
outside pressures (both national and private), environmental conditions, and other factors which were
a constant threat to outposts on the edge of the Spanish empire.

Approximate Time Required: 20-30 minutes

Materials Required:
Set of STRIFE cards (printed out from below)
STRIFE-0-METER for each group

Instructions:
Teacher sets up background of St. Augustine as a Spanish holding. Emphasis on overview of
historical relevance of St. Augustine.

Small groups of students (2 or 3) start with a "healthy" St. Augustine. As they draw cards they must
change the STRIFE 0 METER to show the "health" status of the colony based on their reaction to
the good news or bad news contained on the card. Each group member should be able to explain
why the health of the colony changed for each card. Cards can be in chronological order or random.

At the end of the game one group member will present how their St. Augustine ended up.

Teacher will present the 'trump card' that St. Augustine survived through all of the problems due to its
importance as the nearest military outpost to the Gulf Stream that carried the twice annual fleets from
the New World back to Spain.






STRIKE 0- METER


You are in charge of the fate of the small Spanish colony of St. Augustine. As you turn over
the cards adjust the STRITE 0 MlETTER to show if things are getting better or worse for the
colony and the people of St. Augustine.


100


90
80
70
60
50
40
30


20
10
0


^Ec~Iw G isNG IS PERFE CT


MOSITTHfISARE GOOD Start iere)


RESIDENTS BEGIN TO COMPLAIN


FOOD IS LIMITED LIFE IS UNSAFE


WAJORTROVBLE FTVRE IDOVBT


DISAScER- ST A vgUSTIS E DESTROYED