It is important to educate future voters about the issues, processes, and impacts of voting in elections. These resources include links to lesson plans, videos, games, and printables to assist teachers K—12 to promote civic participation and voting.
Material Type: Lesson, Lesson Plan, Module, Teaching/Learning Strategy, Unit of Study
What will Washington be like 100 years from now? This is the teacher guide companion to The State We're In: Washington (Grade 3-5 Edition) Chapter 10. The resource is designed to engage students with a launch activity, focused notes, and a focused inquiry..
Material Type: Lesson
While the arrival of explorers and the beginning of the fur trade were going on in the American Northwest, a new nation was being born in the east. This is the teacher guide companion to The State We're In: Washington (Grade 3-5 Edition) Chapter 3. The resource is designed to engage students with a launch activity, focused notes, and a focused inquiry.
Material Type: Lesson Plan
For a middle school/junior high civics or social studies class, this PowerPoint lesson could be helpful in introducing the U.S. Constitution to the students.
Material Type: Lecture Notes, Lesson
This inquiry by Melissa M. Kunert, Evergreen Public Schools, is based on the C3 Framework inquiry arc. This inquiry provides an opportunity for students to analyze the constitution as it pertains to life today. Becoming a responsible citizen in society is an important role that also requires education about how our constitution was first written and that changes can always be made in our world
Material Type: Lesson, Lesson Plan, Teaching/Learning Strategy, Unit of Study
In addition to teaching about Thomas Jefferson, this lesson covers background on the War of Independence and the Declaration of Independence. We recommend that you teach the unit on George Washington before introducing this lesson. The readings and pictures should help the students understand the new vocabulary. As with the other history lessons, the goal for the students is to comprehend and answer the Civics Test items correctly, not memorize details about Thomas Jefferson’s life and the War of Independence. Covers civics test items 8, 9, 61, 62, 69, 64, 71, 96, 97, 99, 100.
Material Type: Lesson Plan
Developed by the World Affairs Council of Seattle, this teaching and learning module provides a series of lessons that engage students in exploring the United Nations Sustainable Development Goals. With 17 goals in total, this ambitious framework targets local and global issues ranging from ensuring quality education for all to mitigating climate change.You will find the student-specific instructions provide appropriate translations to assist teachers and students of heritage languages. Overall, these lessons will support students in developing the knowledge, skills, and dispositions that will prepare them for college, career, and civic life.
Material Type: Lesson, Lesson Plan, Module, Unit of Study
"Future Ready: Civics - The Good Citizen" provides an overview of civic responsibilities and the roles of a good American citizen. It emphasizes the importance of civic participation, media literacy, and logical inference. The material highlights citizen participation in maintaining order, providing services, and protecting freedoms at all levels of government. It encourages various methods of community involvement and showcases successful projects. The material addresses barriers to participation and introduces vocabulary related to civic engagement, bias, propaganda, political parties, and elections. It explains the concept of logical inferences, detecting bias, and evaluating propaganda. It also covers elections, the Electoral College, and the right to vote, promoting civic engagement and informed decision-making.
Material Type: Homework/Assignment, Lesson, Module, Reading, Unit of Study
In this lesson from the World Affairs Council of Seattle - Global Classroom Program, students learn about United Nations Sustainable Development Goal #16: Peace, Justice, and Strong Institutions. Students will engage in a series of individual and collaborative learning activities that prompt them to reflect on the concepts, peace, and justice, and how they are important to creating stable and inclusive societies. Students will work in small groups to assess how societies can enhance civic engagement, representative decision-making, and protect individual and collective freedoms. Students will discuss how to leverage partnerships and cultivate relationships that result in community building. In addition, students will identify and describe the characteristics associated with the rule of law and examine specific case studies that highlight the progress and challenges nations face on this issue. Finally, students will evaluate the role of citizens and government leaders in effectively addressing social and political issues, including action steps that can be taken to support peaceful and inclusive communities.
Material Type: Lesson, Lesson Plan, Module, Unit of Study
The unit will teach elements of civics and democracy through the lens of the Presidential election. Students will be asked to research, read, and write about various aspects of civics and democracy, using a wide array of multimedia resources that will include (but not be limited to) literature, music, visual arts, and technology. The goal of the unit is to help students understand the importance of voting and participation while building their knowledge of the election system. The unit will encourage your students to think about government in a new way and connect this remarkable election to their day to day lives. While this unit will be taught during the first marking period, the unit will work at any point throughout the next few years. It is a Social Studies based unit designed for middle school students, primarily in the sixth grade, but can be modified and adapted to fit high school curriculum, grades nine through twelve.
Material Type: Lesson Plan, Unit of Study
In this module, students will investigate the topic of civil disobedience. The objective is to consider the facts, scenarios, and philosophies discussed in order to make an informed judgment on the issue. Upon completion of this module they will be able to answer the following question: Does civil disobedience qualify as part of a person's civic responsibility?
Material Type: Module
This lesson explains the concept of amendments and the background of the Bill of Rights in relation to the Constitution. We recommend teaching the lesson on Benjamin Franklin and the U.S. Constitution prior to this one. This lesson covers details about the First Amendment and voting rights. Covers civics test items 4, 5, 6, 7, 10, 48, 50, 51, 54, and 66.
Material Type: Lesson Plan
The classic American drama Twelve Angry Men can be used to frame discussion of the constitutional right and civic function of the trial by jury. The lesson explores the specific provisions associated with this right as well as the strengths and weaknesses of the system.
Material Type: Lesson Plan
This sequenced collection, curated by Seattle Public School educators, contains openly-licensed Digital Citizenship resources for K-5 educators.
Material Type: Lesson Plan
There are over 260 countries and territories across the world, each with its own type of government. A government is a group of people who officially and legally control a country or territory and make all the decisions about its taxes, laws, public services, and more. The word ‘govern’ comes from the Greek word kybernan which means “to control the direction of something.” From communist China with the largest population in the world to Vatican City with the smallest, each nation is uniquely directed or ruled by one person, a few people, or many.
Material Type: Homework/Assignment, Lesson
In planning this history lesson, determine if you want to cover this material in one or two class periods. The lesson focuses on Abraham Lincoln as a man and as a leader during the Civil War. The reading paragraphs have pictures and Word Banks to help students grasp the main ideas of the lesson. This lesson covers more advanced vocabulary than beginners will know, but it is not critical that the students produce every new word. The goal is to engage the students in the topic and help them learn the general knowledge included in the test items. For example, in the paragraph on the Lincoln Memorial, the students do not need to retain the information about the construction and historical use of the memorial. These details are introduced in order to demonstrate that even years after his death, Americans still honor Lincoln’s leadership in significant ways. Covers civics test items 60, 72, 74, 75, and 100.
Material Type: Lesson Plan
This lesson plan can is geared for social studies, but can also be used in other content areas. Trauma can result when a group of people are forced away from their schools, friends, businesses/work, neighborhoods/communities, then incarcerated without due process, under difficult conditions. Students explore how historical and traumatic events such as Japanese American incarceration affect communities for the long term and how communities have worked to heal. Note: This is not a ‘typical’ social studies lesson on Japanese American incarceration. It will involve working with material regarding trauma. Activities 1 and 2 cover life skills and can be offered in the classroom at any time. (It may be ideal to teach this toward the beginning of the school year) Activity 3 is a foundational piece on what intergenerational trauma is. Activities 4, 5 and 6 go deeper into this topic.
Material Type: Lesson, Lesson Plan, Module, Unit of Study
Do we vote in a conscious rational way or are there other factors at play? Do we vote out of self-interest and/or for the greater good? In the run-up to an election, you read the manifestos, watch the debates, follow the political news on social media. You weigh up the pros and cons of each candidate/party, think about what matters to you and who is best placed to make that happen. You then turn up on election day and vote accordingly. You are a rational being and therefore vote rationally. Simplistic no? Reading through the academic literature on this subject is as complex as human psychology. Many other factors come into play if and how a citizen decides to vote. There can be forms of altruism at play but also forms of egocentrism (the voter's illusion); a sense of duty; the belief that my vote makes a difference and that others are more likely to turn up and vote the way I vote. Research has also shown that turnout increases in highly contested seats. Conversations, civic duty, social pressure can also have an impact as well as genetics. Some highlights from research are featured in this resource, part of the political science collection.
Material Type: Lesson
Organized around the compelling question "How have Asian Americans and Pacific Islanders engaged civically and contributed to U.S. culture?" and grounded in inquiry-based teaching and learning, this lesson brings history, civics, and the arts together to learn about the experiences and perspectives of Asian Americans and Pacific Islanders (AAPI) in U.S. history. Primary sources, literature, and works of art created by AAPI individuals and related organizations provide an historical as well as contemporary context for concepts and issues including civic participation, immigration, and culture.
Material Type: Lesson Plan
This curriculum unit focuses on children as citizens, and how they can claim ownership of their citizenship. Overall the unit works its way through the rights that children have as citizens and how they can use them to their advantage. It starts with what it means to them to be citizens, two specific rights that they have, and finally how they will use those rights to better their lives. The two rights that we discuss in this unit are education and voting. Those rights are the focus of this unit because I believe that they are the most important to young children and that they will benefit them the most in the long term. Education will provide the foundation for all of their learning throughout their lives, and voting is something that education prepares them for and will later in life affect their community and potentially the nation. I also believe that having an understanding of how voting actually impacts this country could potentially interest them in being active politically in the future.
Material Type: Lesson Plan, Unit of Study
