1. How effective were the Red Guards in carrying out the Cultural Revolution? LO: to understand the impact of Red Guard terror

2. The Red Guards In 1966, a group of middle school students in Beijing named themselves "Chairman Mao's Red Guards." Mao's support for them led to the name "Red Guard" being adopted by groups who were sanctioned by Mao and his supporters to "rebel against the system" all over China. The Red Guards became a fanatical, student-led movement that was responsible for the destruction of the ‘old’ and implementing the ‘new’. The movement became very violent and led to considerable loss of life, fear and damage of Chinese culture.

3. Why did so many young people join the Red Guards? PropagandaIdeological Commitment Personal self-interest How effective was this in engendering support for Mao? What evidence is there that young people actively supported the regime? What personal benefits might motivate a young person to join the Red Guards? This might be positive (i.e. gaining something) or negative (i.e. fear of what would happen). Use the hand out to find evidence to support each given reason. Present it as a table/mind map or note page. EXTENSION: Consider how each of the 3 reasons impact each other. Can you use this to come up with a judgement which takes all 3 into account?

4. Red Guards today What can we learn from their apologies about their motivations for joining?

5. The impact of ‘Red Terror’ LO: to understand how the red guards turned to terror & anarchy to attack the four olds

6. The ‘Four Olds’ Old thoughts Old habits Old customs Old religions ‘To rebel is good’

7. Red Terror While it was Mao who identified the four olds to be attacked, it was Lin Biao who encouraged the Red Guards to attack them. The categories were impossible to separate and kept deliberately vague so that they could be used to cover any element that suited Mao to be rid of. By labelling them as ‘old’ he hoped to incentivise the young to take over – making it clear that nothing in China’s past was worth preserving. Anything representing past values was denounced under the blanket of being ‘Confucius’ and fit for destruction.

8. Research task In pairs you will be responsible for researching one of the following topics. You will need to produce a PPT and a hand-out that will teach the rest of the class about your area of research. It needs to have detailed explanations as well as examples, individual stories and pictures. It must also examine the consequence of the actions.

9. Which was the main area of attack? Old thoughts Old habits Old customs Old religions