German East Africa · 1905-1907

Maji Maji: the rising against German rule

In 1905 villagers in southern Tanzania pulled up the cotton they were forced to grow, and a rising spread across more than twenty peoples. Students learn why it began, how it was crushed and how Tanzania remembers it.

Teach it live New Open on the map
Length
50 minutes
Ages
13–16
On the map
3 steps, AD 1905
Live lesson
7 rounds, 3 on the map
Worksheet
Two A4 pages, with Classroom
You need
A projector; phones for live

Live lesson · new in Classroom

Teach it live. The class answers on their phones.

Put the board on the projector. Students join with a six-digit code, no account needed, and tap the map: where was the frontier, where did the grain come from. Their pins drop in together when you reveal, and the closest student takes the round.

€19 per month: every lesson live, every worksheet, cancel anytime. Rome at its height runs live for free.

A live lesson on the projector: the class's pins on the map around Alexandria, the closest students listed beside it A student's phone: the question and a map to tap
7 rounds
3 places to find on the map, quiz questions, a class vote and a one-line answer.
About 15 minutes
Run it as the map step, or to open the discussion. You move on with the space bar.
A report
Every answer, per student and per round, to read back or print after the lesson.
1

Introduction

5 min

Read aloud

In 1905 villagers in southern Tanzania pulled up the cotton they were forced to grow, and a rising spread across more than twenty peoples. Students learn why it began, how it was crushed and how Tanzania remembers it.

By the end of the lesson, students can

  • Locate German East Africa, the Matumbi hills, Mahenge and Dar es Salaam.
  • Explain the causes of the Maji Maji rising, including forced cotton growing and taxes.
  • Describe how the rising was defeated and why so many people died of famine.
2

Explore the map

15 min

Project the map, or let students follow on their own devices. Each step opens the map at the right year and place.

a

AD 1905

German East Africa

Open the map in 1905 and find German East Africa (today's mainland Tanzania). Which great lakes lie on its borders?

Open this view on the map
b

AD 1880

Before German rule

Now go back to 1880. Which African states and peoples does the map show in this region before German rule?

Open this view on the map
c

AD 1905

Where it began

Move to 1905 and zoom to the hills inland from the coast, north-west of Kilwa. The rising began here in July 1905, when villagers pulled up the cotton they were forced to grow.

Open this view on the map
3

Class discussion

15 min

Pick two or three. They run from what happened to why it mattered.

  1. Villagers were forced to grow cotton for export instead of food for themselves. Why would that make people angry?
  2. The prophet Kinjikitile gave fighters "maji", a water medicine said to protect them from bullets. Why might people believe in it, and how did it help them unite?
  3. More than twenty different peoples joined the rising. Why was that unusual, and why did it frighten the colonial government?
  4. The German army defeated the rising by burning crops and villages, causing famine. Why do historians count famine deaths as part of the war?
  5. In Tanzania today, Maji Maji is remembered as a first step towards independence. Why do nations remember risings that failed?
4

Game round

10 min

No ruler of this period is in Rule History. Play one round as Abraham Lincoln, the closest ruler in time, and then compare with the leaders of Maji Maji: how is a rising of farmers without a king different from a war led by a state?

Open Rule History
5

Worksheet

5 min

This worksheet comes with Classroom

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