Textbook Organization

Because our Modern World History textbook deals with History from the 16th century to the the 21rst century, its section on World War II is organized by region rather than by chronological order to more fully deal with and explain the causes of the war. This works for most of the chapter; however, it leads to confusion in a few areas. Pages 696 to 703 deal with the war in Europe; pages 703 to 707 deal with the war in Asia. However, the end of the war is only described on page 703, and isn't even mentioned on 707. Pages 707 to 712 deal with the home front and other issues, and after 712, the effects of the war are described.

I would have included the home front section in the section describing the war in Europe, and the parts of that section dealing with Japan in the section regarding the war in Asia. Then, I would have put the section about Asia before the section regarding Europe. One other area where the textbook gets a little jumbled is the dates. It mentions many dates in the text and puts a few of them in random timelines scattered throughout the book. I would have compiled a timeline of every date mentioned in the reading and put this timeline at the end of the chapter, and then, I would have compiled a timeline of the important dates, and put this at the beginning of the chapter. I would have entitled the chapter "World War II: History Repeating Itself?"