Civics in a Digital Republic: A Transformative Curriculum

Culminating Activity: Emerging Democracies

Beliefs Concerning Societal Conditions and Governmental Responsibilities 185 Beliefs Concerning Societal Conditions and Governmental Responsibilities D.CA Culminating Activity EMERGING DEMOCRACIES SUMMARY The culminating activity will ask the students to generate knowledge of emerging democracies by gathering and combining data, drawing conclusions through identifying patterns, and sharing the data with the public. • Students will demonstrate thorough knowledge of the structure and meaning of a democracy, awareness of non-democratic nations and the process through which nations shift their political structure. • Students will share information to create a spread sheet correlating their knowledge. • Students will share their data either through a class presentation or through a class wiki what is shared with the digital world. D. KNOWLEDGE SUMMARY This lesson is the first part of the culminating unit titled Beliefs Concerning Societal Conditions and Governmental Responsibilities. It will prepare the students to extend knowledge of democracies to understand the emerging democracies around the world. The students will review knowledge of the American democracy and consider how trends of democracy can be applied to different situations. Culminating Activity EMERGING DEMOCRACIES continued 186 Beliefs Concerning Societal Conditions and Governmental Responsibilities • Knowledge of Democracies: Emerging and Present • Students will build knowledge of emerging democracies in preparation for Action and Dispositions of Democracies. PROCEDURE • At this point in the lesson, the students should be making active choices in their studies. The teacher will review what the students know about the following topics: • The Declaration of Independence • The Articles of Confederation • The Bill of Rights • The Constitution of the United States • Federalism • Anti-federalism • Each of these should be defined,dated and explained.The students should answer the question: how does your topic influence the lives of citizens today? They should identify key players in the development of each topic. The teacher and students should decide on the methodology that is most effective for their classroom, but it is recommended that the students be required to gather the data and share it with each other. • Working in groups, the students should research their topic and prepare a fifteen minute presentation on it including the relevance for today. This presentation should take the form of a digital document or presentation such as a “prezi” (See Toolbox for additional presentation possibilities). The length of this lesson will depend upon the class and teacher, but as it is only the preparatory lesson, it should not be too long. • The students should have strong working definitions of the following terms: Democracy, Republic, Constitution, Regime, Totalitarianism, Oligarchy , and Monarchy. • The next knowledge task is to gather a list of emerging democracies. This could be done through newspapers, the Internet or other sources of Culminating Activity EMERGING DEMOCRACIES continued Beliefs Concerning Societal Conditions and Governmental Responsibilities 187 media. This list will change over time, but the teacher should use guidelines to address what countries are experiencing political upheaval and where narratives of democracy are found. Students should identify specific countries while teachers provide oversight. Differentiated Instruction • These lessons are constructed so that teachers are able to address various learning needs in their classrooms. • We encourage teachers to present material digitally, orally, graphically and textually. By using a variety of presentation styles, it is hoped that all students will learn. Time Allotment • Five class periods. One hour per class. MATERIALS & RESOURCES Instructional Materials • Wikispaces (http://www.wikispaces.com) Resources • One computer per student • Curriculum Toolbox STANDARDS & ASSESSMENT Next Generation Content Standards and Objectives for Social Studies in West Virginia • SS.12.C.1 Students will become vigilant, informed citizens who actively participate in the preservation and improvement of American govern- Culminating Activity EMERGING DEMOCRACIES continued 188 Beliefs Concerning Societal Conditions and Governmental Responsibilities ment through community service and service-learning (examples include individual service projects, patriotic events, mock trials, group initiatives , community volunteerism). • SS.12.C.2 Students will explore social contracts, the establishment of rule of law, and evaluate how limited government and rule of law protect individual rights. • SS.12.C.3 Students will demonstrate that the purpose of American government is the protection of personal, political, and economic rights of citizens as evidenced by the Declaration of Independence, the Constitution , Constitutional Amendments, and the ideas of those involved in the establishment of American government. • SS.12.C.4 Students will consider factors that subvert liberty which include lack of education, voter apathy, disenfranchisement, civil inequalities , economic issues, loss of public trust, and misuse of government power to collaborate...