Reading Worksheet · Grades 6–8
Japanese Ambition Worksheet
A printable reading comprehension worksheet for grades 6-8 on Japanese Ambition. Students read a one-page passage on why Japan pursued territorial expansion in the 1930s and how that expansion led to the attack on Pearl Harbor, then answer four multiple-choice questions, six true-or-false statements, and six fill-ins. A complete answer key is included.
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Subject
Reading
Grades
Grades 6–8
Skill Focus
Japanese Ambition, informational text
Lesson Length
40 minutes
Learning Objective
Students will explain the geographic and political causes behind Japan’s expansion in the years leading up to World War II.
Lesson Overview
About this worksheet
This worksheet is built around a WHY, not just a WHAT: Japan’s mountainous terrain left too little farmland to feed its population and too few raw materials to fuel its industries, and that shortage is the thread connecting the 1931 Mukden Incident, the Tripartite Pact of 1940, and the 1941 attack on Pearl Harbor.
The trade embargo is worth pausing on, and it is worth getting the order right, because the escalation is the point. Japan’s move into northern French Indo-China in 1940 drew an American embargo on scrap iron and steel; it was the move into the southern half in July 1941 that brought the asset freeze and the oil cutoff. Roosevelt offered to restore trade if Japan pulled back, and Japan’s leaders refused, judging that giving in to American demands would be a humiliating public defeat.
This pairs naturally with the site’s existing Pearl Harbor and World War II worksheets, as well as the Erwin Rommel worksheet, for a fuller picture of the war’s opening years on two fronts.
Page 2 asks sixteen questions in three forms; page 3 is a complete answer key.
How to Use This Lesson
Read the passage on page 1.
Answer the four multiple-choice questions in Section A.
Mark each Section B statement TRUE or FALSE, and be ready to say why.
Write the missing word or phrase in each Section C sentence.
Use the answer key on page 3 for self-check or grading.
Discuss how a shortage of farmland and raw materials became a driving force in Japan’s foreign policy.
Ask students who actually made these decisions. The passage is careful to say Japan’s leaders chose expansion, not that the Japanese people did, and that distinction is worth drawing out.
Printable Resource
A classroom-ready PDF with everything in one printable resource.
Free Member Resource · Printable PDF · 3 pages · Answer Key
Japanese Ambition Worksheet
A printable reading comprehension worksheet for grades 6-8 on Japanese Ambition. Students read a one-page passage on why Japan pursued territorial expansion in the 1930s and how that expansion led to the attack on Pearl Harbor, then answer four multiple-choice questions, six true-or-false statements, and six fill-ins. A complete answer key is included.
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