Voting Responsibly


Civics Citizen Participation and Government Voting Responsibly
Students review some of the rights and responsibilities of U.S. citizens, particularly the right to vote. Then they learn how to assess a political candidate by evaluating their positions on issues and leadership qualities. Finally, they consider the issues and leadership qualities they would look for most in a political candidate.

This learning experience is designed for device-enabled classrooms. The teacher guides the lesson, and students use embedded resources, social media skills, and critical thinking skills to actively participate. To get access to a free version of the complete lesson, sign up for an exploros account.

1:1 Devices
Teacher Pack

The Pack contains associated resources for the learning experience, typically in the form of articles and videos. There is a teacher Pack (with only teacher information) and a student Pack (which contains only student information). As a teacher, you can toggle between both to see everything.

Here are the teacher pack items for Voting Responsibly:

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Overview

In this experience, students learn how to assess political candidates by evaluating their positions on issues and their leadership qualities. Then students explain how they would approach learning about a candidate. Finally, they evaluate a political TV ad as propaganda and determine how it is trying to persuade the voter.

Objectives

  • Explain how to evaluate candidates for political office.
  • Analyze political ads as propaganda.


Countries ask their citizens to help the country run by taking up certain responsibilities. One of the most important of these responsibilities is to vote in elections at all levels—local, state, and national. In this experience, you will learn how to be responsible when you vote.

Objectives

  • Explain how to evaluate candidates for political office.
  • Analyze political ads as propaganda.


portraits

William Henry Harrison and Martin Van Buren


Which of these two men would you vote for in a presidential election?

A) William Henry Harrison
B) Martin Van Buren

Explain how you picked the candidate to vote for.

Post your answer

The image on the left is William Henry Harrison, who was the 9th President of the United States. The image on the right is Martin Van Buren, who was the 8th President of the United States. He lost his re-election bid to Harrison.


Hopefully you had some trouble answering this question! Unless you know a lot about U.S. history, you probably don’t know much about William Henry Harrison or Martin Van Buren.

 

Voting based on someone’s image—be it a black-and-white photo, a Facebook profile, a Twitter feed, or a video—is not a reliable way to know what a person thinks about important issues. In this experience, you will conduct a more thorough investigation of political candidates.


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