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
This course contains five projects that are organized around the following question: “What is the proper role of government in a democracy?” Each project involves political simulations through which students take on roles that help contextualize the content required by the new College Board course framework. Founders' Intent Elections Supreme Court Congress Government in Action Openly licensed PDF unit plans of all the above units are available at this Sprocket Lucas Education Research Platform (scroll to bottom of web page). Alternately, educators may sign up for free access to the online AP U.S. Government and Politics course that includes additional instructional supports: https://sprocket.lucasedresearch.org/users/sprocket_access
Material Type: Full Course
In Washington, a stand-alone high school civics course is required by a new state law. A statewide sub-committee of OSPI's Social Studies Cadre and Walter Parker, Professor of Social Studies Education, University of Washington, drafted this list of resources in hopes that it will be useful to schools needing to create such a course or update an existing course. It is a work-in-progress.
Material Type: Teaching/Learning Strategy
The State We’re In: Washington is a digital and printed educational publication written by Jill Severn for the League of Women Voters of Washington Education Fund. Part of a larger Civic Education Project, this instructional resource establishes the link between public participation and effective government. Colorful graphs, historical photos and thought-provoking illustrations help to describe the basics of government, and the connection between a governing authority and culture and economy. Young readers and adults alike will gain a robust sense of past and present tribal governance and their relationship to state and local government in Washington.Teacher guides to accompany this resource as well as translated versions are included.
Material Type: Reading, Textbook
These Teacher Guides were created by Washington educators to accompany the League of Women Voters of Washington's book The State We're In: Washington - Your guide to state, tribal and local government.Each chapter guide is aligned with Washington Social Studies Learning Standards and includes a launch activity, focused notes, text-dependent questions, and an inquiry lesson developed using the C3 Framework.
Material Type: Lesson, Lesson Plan
This edition of The State We’re In: Washington is a civics/history textbook designed for elementary grades 3-5. It’s many colorful images, descriptive pictures and graphics not only enhance the text but demonstrate the ethnic and geographic diversity of our state. The book was produced by the League of Women Voters of Washington Education Fund and authored by Jill Severn.
Material Type: Textbook
These Teacher Guides were developed by Washington educators to accompany the League of Women Voters of Washington's book The State We're In: Washington (Grade 3-5 Edition). Each chapter guide is aligned with Washington Social Studies Learning Standards and includes a launch activity, focused notes, text-dependent questions, and an inquiry lesson developed using the C3 Framework.
Material Type: Lesson, Lesson Plan, Unit of Study
Latino History in Washington is a companion to the League of Women Voters of Washington's civic education books: The State We’re In: Washington, which are designed for grades 3 -12.This civics/history document was written by Jill Severn and produced and published by the League of Women Voters of Washington Education Fund.
Material Type: Reading, Textbook
Spanish translation of The State We're In: Latino History in Washington.La historia de los latinos en Washington se incluye como complemento de los libros de educación cívica de la League: El estado en que vivimos: Washington, diseñado para niños de entre tercero y doceavo grado.Este documento de educación cívica/historia fue escrito por Jill Severn y producido y publicado por el Fondo de Educación de la Liga de Mujeres Votantes de Washington.
Material Type: Reading
An integrated language arts and social studies unit designed to develop student’s literacy skills while giving them an understanding of the general purpose of government, the structure and processes of Washington’s state government, and the rights and responsibilities of citizenship. The unit culminates with an optional mock legislature simulation that has students write and argue for a bill.
Material Type: Unit of Study
This is a Teacher's Guide for The State We're In Washington: Your guide to state, tribal and local government. These quides are developed by members of the Washington State Social Studies Cadre. Chapter 2 of the State We're In: Washington explores the design of today's democracy. The resources here may be implemented separately or together to guide students toward a deeper understanding of the content therein and to develop important social studies skills.
Material Type: Lesson, Unit of Study
This inquiry by Joshua Parker, North Thurston Public Schools, is based on the C3 Framework's inquiry arc. The inquiry takes students through a consideration of what the duties of citizenship are. Students consider current controversies about behavior during the national anthem, historical reasons behind revolutionary and loyalist perspectives during the revolutionary era, and by applying learning to answer how loyalty and opposition play a part in actions of engaged citizens.
Material Type: Lesson, Lesson Plan, Unit of Study
This inquiry by Cynthia Yurosko, Evergreen Public Schools, is based on the C3 Framework inquiry arc. The inquiry provides students with the opportunity to analyze, through the evaluation of words, how conflicts between the U.S. government and Native American tribes arose. Students will be asked to investigate federal reports, speeches, and news reports to discern U.S. leaders’ perspectives and compare these biases to the words of Native American leaders Chief Red Eagle and Chief Tecumseh.
Material Type: Lesson, Lesson Plan, Unit of Study
This 3-room video tour of the U.S. Capitol, featuring the Crypt, Rotunda, and National Statuary Hall.
Material Type: Activity/Lab, Lesson
In 1862, Congress passed and President Lincoln signed the Pacific Railroad Bill, which granted public land and funds to build a transcontinental railroad. The Central Pacific Railroad would lay tracks from California heading east, and the Union Pacific Railroad would lay tracks from the Missouri River west. The photograph taken in Placer County, "Grading the Central Pacific Railroad," shows some of the construction. Work on the railroad was physically difficult and at times dangerous, and attracting workers was a challenge. The majority of the Central Pacific's laborers were Chinese. A Chinese worker is shown in the image "Heading (top cut) of East Portal, Tunnel No. 8." Both railroad companies actively recruited Chinese laborers because they were regarded as hard workers and were willing to accept a lower wage than white workers, mostly Irish immigrants. As construction progressed, the Central Pacific and the Union Pacific competed to see which could lay the most track each day. A photograph of a sign near Promontory Park, Utah, commemorates the day that Central Pacific crews laid an unprecedented 10 miles of track. The meeting of the two sets of tracks ? the "gold spike" ceremony ? took place on May 10, 1869. Several photographs and drawings depict this historic moment. Now the country was connected as never before: a journey between San Francisco and New York that previously took up to six months now took only days. The photograph "High Bridge in Loop," from Views from a Trip to California, shows a train passing quickly through a mountain pass. The transcontinental railroad allowed people to travel more, farther, and in pleasant conditions, as reflected in the photograph "Commissary Car, 'Elkhorn Club.'" The photograph "Knights of Pythias at the Santa Fe Railway Station, Anaheim" shows an example of the popularity of trains. Even as the transcontinental railroad brought the new country together, it brought change to the world of Native Americans. The tracks ran through a number of tribal territories, bringing into conflict cultures that held very different views of the land and how it might be used and lived on. The painting The First Train, by Herbert Schuyler, depicts three Indians pointing past their encampment at a train in the far distance. The railroad also brought an increasing number of European Americans west. One consequence of this influx was the depletion of the buffalo herds, a major food source for Plains Indians. European Americans would often shoot buffalo for sport from the train; by 1880, the buffalo were mostly gone and Plains Indians had been gathered onto reservations. Millions of acres of open grassland were being settled by the people moving west. Eventually, much of this land became the farmland that fed a growing nation. The transcontinental railroad opened up the West to the rest of the country, even if they never made the trip themselves. A Currier & Ives hand-colored lithograph depicts a train running along the Truckee River in Northern California. The San Francisco publishing firm of Lawrence & Houseworth hired photographers and published photographic tourist catalogs containing views of the West, which they sold commercially. The railroad took hold in popular culture, as shown by sheet music for the song "New Express Galop [sic]." There was even a railroad board game illustrating "Railroads Between New York and San Francisco, California, with Scenes on the Way."
Material Type: Diagram/Illustration, Lesson Plan, Primary Source, Reading, Teaching/Learning Strategy
The Washington Office of Superintendent of Public Instruction has teamed with the Civic Learning Council and the National Constitution Center to provide this professional development opportunity on resources and tools for helping students engage in discussions of controversial issues. Download the video file here: https://www.dropbox.com/s/jefvmk5tv6t0zoa/OSPI_CLC_CIVICS-BridgeTheDivide-FINAL.mp4?dl=0
Material Type: Teaching/Learning Strategy
The nation’s founders believed Congress to be the fundamental institution of the federal government, since it is the body that most closely represents the people. The framers of the United States Constitution began by creating Congress. Then they established the other two branches of government—the executive branch and the judicial branches.The Constitution gives each branch distinct powers, but it makes sure that the three are in competition. Each branch has its own ways to check and balance the powers of the other two. The separation and balance of powers has contributed to the government’s enduring vitality, providing order and stability while allowing flexibility for adaptation and change.
Material Type: Reading
In this activity students will analyze the Oaths of Senators for the Impeachment Trial of William Jefferson Clinton and identify how the document demonstrates content contained within Article I, sections 1-7 of the Constitution in action. This activity is designed to prepare students for the Constitution-in-Action Lab at the National Archives in Washington, DC. It is a part of a package of activities associated with the lab experience.
Material Type: Activity/Lab
Freedom for some meant slavery for others. The cruel irony of this nation’s founding and its “Temple of Liberty”—the U.S. Capitol—is that both were made possible by the enslavement of African Americans. The labor of enslaved and free blacks helped build the Capitol. An enslaved African American man helped to cast the Statue of Freedom, which was placed atop the Dome during the Civil War. Since the end of the Civil War, African Americans have struggled to move out of the shadows and into the Temple of Liberty as full participants. This the online version of a traveling exhibit by the U.S. Capitol Historical Society that depicts the journey of African Americans from slavery to freedom and political representation in the U.S. Capitol. The exhibit opened February 2006 in Baltimore, Maryland at the Reginald F. Lewis Museum of Maryland African American History and Culture.
Material Type: Interactive
Of the three branches of our government, many believe that the most important is the one directly elected by "We the People": the legislative branch, represented by the two houses of the U.S. Congress at the Capitol building. Join a group of middle schoolers on a tour of Washington, D.C. as they learn about the Constitution and what it means to be "We the People." The "We the People" videos are produced in collaboration with the U.S. Capitol Historical Society.
Material Type: Lesson
