All of the questions provided above can be brought to life by exploring them through the following activities:

Windmill Debate: Seat the students forming an inner circle of chairs facing out, and an outer circle facing in. The students facing each other take turns discussing an issue. Then you ask one circle to rotate one person to the right, and debate the next issue with the next person.

Some issues to debate are:

1. Is it better to be poor in the United States or in Cuba?
2. Is it possible for a communist state to succeed? Why, why not?
3. Should U.S. citizens be allowed to travel to Cuba?
4. Should Cubans be allowed to come freely to the United States?
5. Should the United States have a trade embargo with Cuba as long as the country rejects democratic freedoms?
6. Why is the United States so hostile to Cuba while it maintains friendly relations with other communist countries?
7. Why would you want to/not want to vacation in Cuba? Live in Cuba?

Cake walk or gallery walk: Tape sheets of chart paper to the wall, each sheet should have a different statement or opinion on an issue. Have students walk to the statement they agree with, and write reasons why below the statement. Or, have the students walk around the room and write the responses they want to share to all the statements/opinions. Possible statements are:

1. A socialist state keeps the people from being creative business people.
2. The system in the United States provides for the basic needs of each citizen.
3. Food rations help control over-consumption and greed.
4. State run medicine guarantees the best health care for all citizens.
5. Advertising, especially on billboards, pollutes people's minds, and alters rational decision-making.
6. The United States should not engage with Cuba until it changes its political system.

Musical Chairs: Create a “scenario for debate” by setting six chairs in the center of the room, all facing out. (As if you were about to play musical chairs). Place the remaining chairs in a larger circle around the inner circle, but these chairs face in toward the middle. The students who are sitting in the inner circle answer questions posed by the teacher, and the students sitting in the outer circle, facing in, listen to the answers. One of the chairs in the inner circle must remain empty at all times. Any student sitting in the outside circle who wants to speak will occupy the “empty” seat in the inner circle and as that “empty seat” is taken, a student sitting in the inner circle must self select to move to the outer circle, thereby leaving the perpetual “empty” seat in the inner circle.

This scenario should engage the entire class in a discussion, allow every student a role as a listener or a speaker, and give the conversation or debate a flow of speakers.

Where Do You Stand? Make an imaginary line across the room, one end of the wall is Strongly Agree, the other end is Strongly Disagree. Read a statement, and ask the students to vote with their feet, placing themselves along the continuum according to the degree of their opinion. Ask someone to explain his/her opinion, then ask for an explanation of an opposite opinion. Each new question is a new round, with students moving on the imaginary line.

Vision Game: After students have done some research on current Cuban-American relations, ask students to identify some of the critical issues that need to be addressed between the two countries (i.e. immigration, trade, lifting travel restrictions, reparations for property nationalized after the revolution, exchanging scholars, etc.)

Put all the suggestions on charts on the wall. Give students four red dot stickers and ask them to indicate which issues they feel are most important to build the relationship between America and Cuba. Then, give the students two blue dot stickers and ask them to indicate (on the same chart) which issues should be addressed immediately. Take a tally to determine the class priority. Discuss how you could work towards progress on these priorities. Have students research what groups are already working on the issues, and what these groups are doing (i.e. lobbying, ad campaigns, etc).