1. Lesson Plan
1.1. Instructional Objectives
1.1.1. Students will analyze why our voter turnout rate is so low when compared to other countries.
1.1.2. Students will question why citizens choose to vote or not to vote.
1.2. Assessment
1.2.1. Formative informal assessments via small/large group discussions on why people choose to vote or not.
1.2.2. Formative formal assessment via guided notes that include questions at several levels of thinking that go into more detail on why people do or don't vote.
1.3. Teacher Activities
1.3.1. Conduct a Power Point lecture that includes leading several mini discussions throughout.
1.4. Student Activities
1.4.1. Follow along the Power Point, fill in and complete guided notes assignment, and participate in small and large group discussion.
2. Reading Lesson on Low Voter Turnout
2.1. Objectives
2.1.1. Students will analyze why our voter turnout rate is so low when compared to other countries.
2.1.2. Students will question why citizens choose to vote or not to vote.
2.2. Assessment
2.2.1. Formative assessment via a graphic organizer that asks students to summarize the major topics of the article.
2.2.2. Summative assessment will be the PowerPoint slide(s) on a specific cause of low voter turnout that the group will present to the class.
2.3. Student Activities
2.3.1. Think, write, pair share discussion at beginning of class on why they think voter turnout is so low.
2.3.2. Graphic organizer that asks students to summarize the major topics of the article.
2.3.3. PowerPoint slide(s) on a specific cause of low voter turnout that the group will present to the class.
2.3.4. End of class discussion that summarizes why turnout is so low.
2.4. Teacher Activities
2.4.1. Walking around room to see if students are participating in the opening discussion before leading the class discussion on the topic.
2.4.2. Splitting students up into groups and explaining the PowerPoint slides assignment. Teacher will monitor students and answer any questions.
2.4.3. The teacher will facilitate the presentations on low voter turnout and clarify any confusion.
2.4.4. The teacher will have the students engage in another small group discussion where they will summarize what was learned today. This will be monitored.
3. Primary Source Lesson on Campaign Commericials
3.1. Students will be able to analyze campaign commercials from political campaigns throughout modern history while citing two examples from each that are 100% accurate. Students will be able to articulate in small and large group discussions the factors that lead to political advertisements being created the way that they often are while also discussing the effects of them.
3.1.1. Campaign Commercials Analysis
3.1.1.1. Student Activities-
3.1.1.1.1. Engage in pair share discussion on campaign commercials and ads, watch commercials (Eisenhower, Nixon, Obama, and Trump), fill out primary source analysis worksheet, participate in whole class discussion on each ad, and then participate in exit ticket assignment where they write why some ads work while some don't.
3.1.1.2. Teacher Activities-
3.1.1.2.1. The teacher will monitor the small group discussion on campaign ads before engaging in a whole class discussion on the topic, give a historical intro to the commercials before playing them, explain the worksheet, monitor students as they do the worksheet, lead a class discussion on the ads, and then explain the exit ticket assignment.
4. Socratic Seminar on Voter Turnout Discussion Lesson
4.1. Objectives
4.1.1. Students will be able to articulate in small and large group discussions the factors that have led to our voter turnout rate being so low, the pros and cons of our two party system, and what changes should we make or not make to our voting laws.
4.1.2. Students will be able to interpret and analyze texts in writing about voter turnout while citing evidence verbally that is 100% accurate.
4.2. Assessment
4.2.1. This seminar is the summative assessment on the unit for voting and elections. The teacher will track the number of comments made by each student and if they cited an outside source or not.
4.2.2. The informal formative assessment will be the intro activity where students will discuss any points they want to make in the seminar and/or clarify any confusion they may have.
4.3. Teacher Activites
4.3.1. This is the summative assessment and as such, the teacher will ideally give as little instruction as possible. That being said, the teacher will still be providing some guidance during the seminar. After the intro partner instruction, the teacher will have every student go around the circle to give a brief opening statement on whatever element they want to talk about with regards to the topics. Once every student has said his part, the discussion will be open ended where any student can raise their hand to participate. If the topics are a little off topic or if one topic is going on for too long, the teacher will step in to change the topic.
4.3.2. The teacher will focus on the following higher level questions for the seminar that students have answered in writing before the seminar: which institutional barriers most affect voter turnout, Is our two party system good or bad for our democracy, should we adopt any other voting methods or systems to change voter turnout such as online voting, top two primaries, open primaries, proportional voting, etc., and should we allow people under age 18 and/or ex-felons to vote? Each seminar will be 20 minutes before the roles switch. The inner circle and outer circle will switch. The teacher will tell outer circle students to pass two post it notes to their partner in the inner circle about possible points to make.
4.4. Student Activities
4.4.1. The seminar will start with all students in the inner circle listening to the instructions described earlier, giving brief opening statement each, raising their hands at least twice to make a quality addition to the topic, and citing evidence from text at least once. Students in the outer circle will give two post it notes to the inner circle people about points to make. The focus questions for the seminar that the teacher and/or the students will ask are: which institutional barriers most affect voter turnout, Is our two party system good or bad for our democracy, should we adopt any other voting methods or systems to change voter turnout such as online voting, top two primaries, open primaries, proportional voting, etc., and should we allow people under age 18 and/or ex-felons to vote? Each seminar will be 20 minutes before the roles switch.