Resources for teaching, learning, growing and to give {nonpartisan} Constitutional information to help everyday citizens craft better civil and civic arguments through education
If you have ever heard of or considered National Board Certification, I urge you to read the latest blog post from the Standard written by yours truly entitled Push Past the Boundaries.
I cannot overstate how much this process changed me. It let me become the teacher I have always wanted to be by opening doors, both professionally and personally. I have my Master’s, which helped my pedagogy, but this took it to another level.
I highly encourage anyone to look at this process and challenge yourself to become the teacher you’ve always wanted to be.
“He shall from time to time give to the Congress Information of the State of the Union, and recommend to their Consideration such Measures as he shall judge necessary and expedient…”
Well, this State of the Union address has been mired by the government shutdown and a disinvite to the chambers by the Speaker, so at this point I wonder when and if it will happen. Regardless of this, I wanted to think of an extra assignment that students could participate in that would require them to apply their knowledge.
In my younger teacher days, I have been guilty of giving a bingo card with just words, which in it’s own right it fun, but I wanted something this year that would require them to show what they know, not just check off a box when they hear the word. I also want to keep this as scientific as possible, and less political.
In the past, my students have used Twitter and our class hashtag. So this year, I’ve decided to plan a SOTU Twitter party. You can also do this in class without technology as you watch a SOTU speech. Since the current year is up in the air, teachers can use older speeches and paper BINGO cards.
Objective:
Students will watch the State of the Union (current or past) and find examples of the main concepts of the unit to show understanding of current application of the concepts from Unit One: Foundations of Democracy. {This can also be done with basically all other units from AP Government}
Concepts: (You can use more or less depending on where you are in your units. I teach semester classes so we just finished Unit One) Students can fill out their own BINGO sheets.
Participatory democracy
Pluralist democracy
Elitism
Federalism
Popular sovereignty
Check and balances
Separation of powers
Limited government
Enumerated powers
Implied powers
Inherent powers
Reserved powers
Fiscal federalism
Mandates (funded or unfunded)
Grants
Two examples of each
Examples from Brutus I
Examples from Federalist 10
Examples from Federalist 51
On the back, reflect on observations from the speech. Where there times some people stood and some did not? Who was there and who was notably absent? What was the tone of the speech? What is important to the President and how do you know that?
During the SOTU address, students will check off boxes as they write down the example of the concept mentioned. For the Twitter Party, students will use our class hashtag and #SOTU. We will do a live tweet so as soon as they hit a BINGO, they can claim it! (for extra points) This gives students opportunities to participate in a positive social media experience. I will set guidelines for our class hashtag, as I learned my lesson last semester.
Tweets will look like this: Checks and Balances, the President mentioned his veto power over the federal budget because he ultimately approves or vetos laws Congress makes. #sotu #apschley19
*You can do this in class as they watch or with a live SOTU. The possibilities for engagement are endless!
As an assignment, I will give it the week because not every student can watch the speech live. I’d like to have a whole class discussion once this is done to ensure students see different examples from
LBJ Library
My hopes for this is it allows students to take a non-partisan look at the speech and be scientific about their observations. If you have a particularly political area you teach in, taking an old speech may help. This is the first evening televised speech by LBJ or you can have students choose their own. The main point here is to find examples that illustrate the concepts.
*** Update February 5***
Since we were able to go over the roles of the Presidency, I updated the assignment to reflect. This can be used in class with any assignment and changed to not include social media.
How do your students interact with the State of the Union speech? What has worked for you in the past?
We end our semester in AP Government with Civil Rights and Civil Liberties. Since this case was argued November 28, the media is fresh and there is a lot of information out there. It’s in the news, it’s on podcasts, it’s part of our everyday lives.
This is how the last week and a half goes:
Preface: I’ve given them case and assignment before to allow them to look it over and decide what they will want to do or what they will be successful at. I’ve developed these roles because I know students show their knowledge in different ways. It’s an ever developing project as I get feedback from my students.
Day 1/2: Listening to oral arguments and discussing what we hear. I started to write down the cases as they were mentioned, do a bit of research to see if they were worth a look by the students, and list them on the board. (I also get for graduation robes so the students can have robes and be a bit more official)
Related cases:
McDonald v. Chicago(HELLO required Supreme Court case)
Bennis v. Michigan
von Hofe v. United States
US v. Bajakajian
Austin v. US
Kokesh v. SEC
US v. Halper
Van Oster v. Kansas
Vocabulary to Know:
in rem
in personam
civil forfeiture
stare decisis
Day 3 (Block Day) Full practice exam– not related, but I want one last exam before they leave so I can see where they are at and personalize review assignments for the spring AP test.
Day 4,5: Research case, amicus briefs (example from SCOTUSblog), related cases, etc. I like to do a few days in class so they have each other and me, the content “expert”. There is also a podcast from First Mondays called “8,000 pounds of shark fins”. (Even though the actual case is called United States v. Approximately 64,695 Pounds of Shark Fins. Yes, that is real. There is also a John Oliver clip, however I don’t show it in class because… well, we all know John Oliver…
Day 6: Finalize papers and turn in. Run through what to expect with Moot Court. I look through all papers that night to ensure quality before the moot court date.
Day 7: Moot Court (It’s our final exam day and we have 90 minutes)
I will update as we move forward, but wanted to give an overview of what I’ll be doing the next few weeks!
Update:
Man, this was fun! I even had a student come up with their own media company to live tweet the case.
As much as I trust my students, there was an issue of misuse of technology and a student tweeting something with inappropriate language tied to our class hashtag. I had it immediately removed, but it taught me a valuable lesson. Next time, I will review appropriate use of technology as it relates to using class hashtags and have a set punishment for. It is the unfortunate byproduct of using social media in a classroom. Lesson learned.
Because I had my 8th graders do this as well, they came up with the idea to write a newspaper as they watched! {Twitter wasn’t an option}
One class got off topic and the Justices were asking irrelevant questions. I need to be better at preparing them as to what to ask.
The Justices in a few classes were on a mission to be tough. Next semester, I will be more specific with what they need to do. I caught one class and reminded the Justices that they are to let the lawyers answer their questions and to not try to trick them.
All classes were unanimous in their decisions and had so much fun!
I had decided to really challenge my 8th graders (who are in an accelerated program) and have them read the entirety of the Letter from a Birmingham Jail. We were in the midst of our Civil Rights unit (I taught them pre-APUSH), and we had already read, annotated and discussed What the Black Man Wants by Frederick Douglass. This set the stage for the bigger discussion on all of the documents culminating with Letter from a Birmingham Jail.
Now, I know this year that I will not have the luxury of time with my seniors, so I am shortening the sequence but I want the outcome to be the same.
I started this with the Letter to Martin Luther King from A Group of Clergymen. This is an easier document that students can read at home. I do this to set the stage for Dr. King’s letter. I don’t think that the document should be a stand alone. The letter to King, published in a newspaper, is a quick read and I require students to write down what the clergy are asking of Dr. King. This letter basically says, “Don’t tell me how to clean up your backyard.” King wasn’t from Birmingham, and the clergy didn’t feel like and outsider should be able to come in and tell them how to deal with their racial issues. A note that it was also written on Good Friday.
King’s response? It’s OUR backyard. He starts off with “My dear FELLOW clergymen” to off the bat show that it’s an “us” mentality. This document is long, but let me tell you, I gave the 8th graders 4 days to digest it and they knocked it out of the park. I wish I could say I had an amazing lesson plan, but I didn’t. I let it all happen organically and with 8th grade accelerated students, it was magic.
For my seniors, I gave them the assignment on a Friday for homework, and gave them Tuesday after our Civil Rights notes to work on it.
Prompt: Discuss key points that Dr. King discusses in response to the Letter to Dr. King. Explain how this has translated into modern day civil rights.
The purpose of the Socratic seminar was to gain a deeper understanding of the documents.
I broke the students up into two groups. Each got 20 minutes to discuss and since we did this on a block day, I gave an additional 20 minutes to discuss as a whole. Students had so many incredible comments. There were discussion about this being a redress of grievances, as MLK discusses Jefferson and the Declaration a few times. Discussions of Standing Rock, Black Lives Matter, LBGTQ+, Flint, and Kaepernick showed students ability to connect the themes to current events.
Questions arose: Was MLK’s optimism born out of necessity? Does the world lack empathy?
Students reflected on the document after the discussion: Discuss the legacy of the Letter From A Birmingham Jail.
I appreciate the time struggle of the semester crunch, as I only have a few more weeks. However, as with every other document, I attempted to get students to understand the whole document’s themes and connecting it with other parts of political history. And it as assigned mostly at home.
How has your interaction with this document played out in your class? What have you found to be successful?
It’s the day before Thanksgiving and our school is hosting a blood drive. This means sparse classes and excited students. Yesterday, I assigned them a Supreme Court case from the list I made so they could prepare for Supreme Court Dating next week. {My students loved the Bureaucratic Speed Dating we did and last year appreciated the Supreme Court speed dating because they were able to get a lot of info from it!} With the new cases, I want them to have a firm understanding of the case. It’s an easy assignment, it’s fun, and it’s awesome to see what they create! Hand Turkeys assignment.
To really get the cases, we will draw them, talk about them (Supreme Court speed dating), and write about them. I loved the way these turned out!
Today, I was reminded why it’s so vital that we teach what we do. The day was going along as I assessed the media unit, and assigned the Supreme Court Speed Dating cases to students because some will be gone tomorrow before the Thanksgiving break. 3rd hour, students came in heated and angry from another class because of a conversation on birthright citizenship. There were tears, there was anger.
I allowed students to tell me what happened with leaving out names, because that information is neither hear nor there. *This is where I tell you to know your class. We called a family meeting because I know my class, and I know what we can/cannot do. Based on the political ideologies we did at the beginning of the year, this will be a good conversation.
We keep this up all year to remind us that we all have different ideologies. We need to keep it Constitutional.
I listened to the frustrations and boiled it down to the student was upset because the opposition didn’t have as much knowledge (because they haven’t taken Government yet) and therefore, wasn’t making Constitutional arguments.
Immediately, students started to look at the 14th amendment and make their arguments to me. I gently pushed back, trying to explain the other side. And then I had a moment of genius. I asked the class, “Is this something you want to further explore? I have articles and a podcast we can listen to tonight and discuss tomorrow.” That, my friends, was a moment I am proud of because there was emphatic yeses. I put the following links on my Planbook for the students:
The Constitution Center is all in with the new redesign and I love that they have both sides presented in a civil manner. In the current political climate, it’s not often we see respectful, educated disagreements. It’s very important to me that we model this is many ways in our class.
Yes, the College Board standards are important and it’s my job to prepare them for the AP test in May. Yes, I only have a semester to teach. Sometimes, going off the lessons is important and valuable. And when you’re unsure, there’s a mountain of available resources just waiting for your students and you to help dissect the information.
I absolutely love podcasts! I can listen while I’m driving or out for a walk. I love having my students listen to them as well. I often assign them outside of class, but sometimes we will listen to them if they are short and meaningful. It’s also helpful for my auditory learners or for students that just need a bit of extra information to really “get it”. The green are ones I listen to in class or assign for extra knowledge on a subject! The red are for my own personal knowledge and growth.
Here are my favorite podcasts for AP Government!
Constitutional– I use this one in class and for my personal knowledge.
We the People– I have to admit, I love Jeffrey Rosen. And when he followed me on Twitter one day, I about died. THIS is a podcast I have my students listen to because it presents both sides from a scholarly view point. It has been especially amazing for the redesign. I highly recommend this!
The Daily– I listen to this daily. Each day on my way to work. Like clockwork.
Teaching American History– with titles such as “How to Read Federalist #10” , many AP teachers jump for joy. Let’s be honest, we all need to brush up on some of our document knowledge. This is a great resource for teachers who don’t want to be caught unaware!
PBS News Hour- quick, easy, informative, and part of my Alexa morning routine.
Ain’t No Free Lunch– I met Danielle at my Street Law summer and really loved listening to her talk. Her and her friend, Taikein look at current/past issues. I appreciate hearing different points of view because it makes me a better teacher and better citizen. Plus, I am working on expanding my resources so that all students feel represented. And my students love the back and forth.
Slow Burn– Nixon’s Watergate. Clinton’s impeachment. So enthralling and something I listen to so I can strengthen my history knowledge.
Up First– The news from NPR in 10 minutes. I recommend to students who want to listen to the news and keep up. They can listen to it on the way to school or work.
The Wilderness– I started to listen to Pod Save America awhile ago on the recommendation of a friend, but soon found it to be not up my alley. I decided to give this a try because of it’s look at what happened to the Democratic Party in the 2016 and what they need to change. It’s like an autopsy and it’s refreshingly honest. This is a podcast I listen to for my own personal knowledge. From the website: “The Wilderness is a documentary from Crooked Media and Two-Up about the history and future of the Democratic Party. Pod Save America’s Jon Favreau tells the story of a party finding its way out of the political wilderness through conversations with strategists, historians, policy experts, organizers, and voters. In fifteen chapters, the series explores issues like inequality, race, immigration, sexism, foreign policy, media strategy, and how Democrats can build a winning majority that lasts.”
Tell me, what are your favorite podcasts and how do you use them?
