High
School of Economics & Finance
Participation in Government (H7) Curriculum & Lesson Plans
Textbook: Basic Principles of American Government, Sanford & Green, Amsco
Publications
Participation in Government is a one-semester course designed to give the student
a working knowledge of the mechanics of government and politics at all levels
with an emphasis on state and local government. Students are scheduled for the
course after completion of the American History I and II sequence. The course
is structured to build upon and enhance the knowledge gained in those courses.
It is structured to encourage the greatest amount of student/citizen input into
the governmental process. This will include student participation in local government
activities, such as attending meetings, communication with officials, guest
speakers, and other forms of participation. Topics include the nature, structure
and functioning of government in American society, the role of special interest
groups and individuals in government, the electoral process and the rights and
responsibilities of citizenship in a democratic society. It is anticipated that
the political process model suggested in the state syllabus will be followed
with modifications.
Students will be assigned a major research project in this course. The project
will involve a presentation component and peer evaluation. Though the project
can be group or cooperative in structure, the individual components should be
readily identifiable.
Some of the units and lessons shown are designed to be used over multiple class
periods.
UNIT I: The nature of democracy
Lesson 1 - Democratic Voices in a Changing Society
Objective: The student should be able to understand the relationship between
government, politics, and power in the United States democracy and the roles
that people can play to affect policy and action.
Competencies: 1. Appraise the impact of government on the average citizen’s
life. 2. Discuss how citizens may have an impact on government by voting in
elections and by participating in party activities and interest groups. Also
discuss how citizens influence government through public opinion and through
direct action, such as protests and demonstrations. 3. Define and explore the
relationship between government, politics, democracy and power. 4. Discuss the
difference between our system of representative democracy and a direct democracy.
Examine how concepts of majority rule and equality fit within our system of
democracy. 5. Explain how people in a representative democracy can gain power
to effect change. 6. Explain the role of media in providing timely information
for people in a democracy.
Lesson 2 - The Living Constitution
Objective: The student should understand that the United States Constitution
is a living document as it is interpreted and changed to reflect the conditions
of the times throughout history.
Competencies: 1. Examine the origins and political foundation of the United
States’ Declaration of Independence and Constitution. 2. Evaluate the
flaws of the Articles of Confederation as a system of government and discuss
the specific problems related to changing the system. 3. Describe the controversies
and compromises that emerged in the writing of the Constitution and identify
the opposing viewpoints on the ratification of the Constitution. 4. Describe
the key components of our political system and how they relate to each other:
federalism, separation of powers, checks and balances, judicial review. 5. Explain
how the Supreme Court in the case of Marbury v. Madison established the power
of judicial review. 6. Evaluate the argument that the framers of the Constitution
were men of great wealth and power who had a vested interest in limiting democratic
rights. 7. Discuss the importance of the Bill of Rights in today’s society.
Lesson 3 - Constitution in Crisis
Objective: The student should be able to explain the challenges the United States
Constitution has weathered during crisis situations.
Competencies: 1. Discuss the constitutional and historical origins of impeachment.
2. Describe the case of Brown v. Board of Education of Topeka, Kansas and its
impact on school segregation. 3. Evaluate the problems in implementing Supreme
Court decisions such as the Brown decision. 4. Explain the role the U. S. Constitution
played before and following the Civil War. 5. Explain the challenge that school
integration at Little Rock, Arkansas, in 1957, presented to the U.S. Constitution
and the nation. 6. Describe the constitutional crisis that arose when President
Kennedy was assassinated and how the Twenty-fifth Amendment resolved it.
Lesson 4 – Federalism
Objective: The student should be able to explain the balance of power question
that federalism created and list some of the conflicts that have occurred over
the last two hundred years.
Competencies: 1. Explain the meaning of the concept of federalism in the context
of the United States. Distinguish between unitary and federal systems of government.
2. Identify and evaluate the advantages and disadvantages of the system of federalism
in the United States. 3. Identify and distinguish among the different faces
that federalism has manifested over the course of our history: dual federalism,
cooperative federalism, creative federalism, new federalism, and regulatory
federalism. 4. Identify the powers and the limitations of the states under the
Constitution. 5. Define and distinguish between enumerated powers, implied powers,
inherent powers, and concurrent powers. 6. Analyze the impact of federalism
on governance in the United States. Identify the ways in which federalism affects
state spending and evaluate its impact on the states. 7. Explain the balance
of power question that federalism created, and list some of the conflicts that
have occurred over the last two hundred years.
Lesson 5 - Intergovernmental Relations
Objective: The student should be able to discuss the intergovernmental relations
necessary in solving problems, which cross government jurisdictions.
Competencies: 1. Describe the conflicting but interdependent relationship between
suburbs and cities as they attempt to solve national problems at the local level.
2. Identify recent population trends and their impact on the relationship between
national, state and local governments in regard to problems that involve cities
and suburbs.
Lesson 6 - Public Opinion and Political Socialization
Objective: The student should be able to identify the factors that influence
political socialization and explain the formation of issue positions based on
political socialization.
Competencies: 1. Define and distinguish among public opinion and political opinion.
2. Explain how people form their political views and discuss the role of family,
education, religion, gender, ethnicity, region, and the media in the formation
of political views. 3. Discuss group influence on public opinion. Be able to
define reference groups, primary groups, and secondary groups. 4. Identify and
explain the qualities of public opinion. Be conversant with the basic language
of opinion polling including terms such as population, random samples, quota
and cluster sampling, and exit polling. Understand why and how polls can be
wrong. Understand the impact that polls may have on politics. 5. Examine the
factors that explain political participation. 6. Explain the factors that influence
political socialization. 7. Examine the major political socialization influences
on young children, adolescents and adults.
EXAM #1
UNIT II: Participation and elections
Lesson 7 - Participation in Democracy
Objective: The student should be able to explain the wide variety of political
participation in our United States democracy and how you might take political
action.
Competencies: 1. Identify recent trends in voter turnout in the United States.
2. Evaluate the impact of low voter turnout on democratic governance. 3. Identify
the socioeconomic factors that affect voter turnout and voter attitudes and
preferences. 4. Discuss why such a large portion of the population has become
non-voters. Why do certain voters tend to support political parties? 5. Discuss
and evaluate the sociological and psychological factors that influence the individuals
voting decisions. 6. Describe the legislative action by citizens called an ""initiative.""
7. Explain the importance of political participation in a democracy.
Lesson 8 - Mass Media and Government
Objective: The student should be able to discuss the interdependent relationship
between media and government in the United States’ democracy and explain
the responsibility of the reader/viewer in discerning the truth.
Competencies: 1. Describe the evolution of the U.S. media from print to television
media and evaluate the impact that each has had on elections, voters and political
leadership. 2. Examine the tension between freedom of the press and the constitutional
guarantee of a fair trial. Evaluate recent cases that highlighted this issue,
particularly in regard to pretrial publicity and cameras in the courts. 3. Examine
the debates concerning media bias and government manipulation of information
and the press, particularly in foreign policy events. 4. Describe the changes
in how the media cover wartime activities, and discuss how government and media
have manipulated war news. 5. Discuss the important relationship between the
press and the president, including citing the use of trial balloons, spins,
and backgrounders.
Lesson 9 - Interest Groups
Objective: The student should be able to identify the major types of interest
groups, describe how they function, illustrate their techniques for influencing
the branches of government and explain the pros and cons of campaign finance
reform.
Competencies: 1. Explain and critique elite theory and pluralist theory of democracy.
2. List and describe the major types of interest groups. 3. Explain how interest
groups operate. Identify and critique their strategies. 4. Define and identify
examples of public interest groups and single-issue interest groups. 5. Define
and identify example of Political Action Committees (PACs). Evaluate their strategies
for influencing public policy.
Lesson 10 - Political Parties
Objective: The student should be able to describe the primary responsibilities
of political parties at all levels, how individuals can get involved in party
activities, and the role of third parties.
Competencies: 1. Define political parties and explain the functions that they
perform. 2. Explain the impact of the historical roots of our present political
parties and explain the differences in their regional and philosophical roots.
3. Explain why we have a competitive two-party system and why third parties
have not been able to successfully compete with the two major parties. 4. Explain
why political party identification has waned and why political parties perceive
that some of their role in politics is being taken over by other institutions.
5. Examine the commonly accepted descriptions of party identifiers for the Democratic
and Republican Party. Describe the two parties’ philosophies towards government
and their positions on major policy issues.
Lesson 11 - Media and Elections
Objective: The student should be able to explain the role media have played
in the U.S. political campaigns throughout history and to discuss how a discerning
voter can make an intelligent choice.
Competencies: 1. Discuss complaints about television as a source of information,
news, and entertainment. Evaluate television’s impact on public opinion.
2. Discuss how television news, news magazines, and cable systems have revolutionized
public access to information, particularly concerning international events and
presidential campaigns. 3. Explain the role media have played in the U.S. political
campaigns throughout history. 4. Describe the role political consultants play
in today’s campaigns.
Lesson 12 - Presidential Elections
Objective: The student should be able to discuss the importance of nominating
and electing a United States president and to describe the major components
and strategies of each election, including media, polling, and fund raising.
Competencies: 1. Describe the organization of modern campaigns and discuss the
major goals and strategies of presidential campaigns. 2. Examine the role of
television in presidential campaigns. Discuss the impact of presidential debates
from the 1960s to the present. 3. Describe the role of Madison Avenue techniques
and the role of professional campaign managers. 4. Examine recent trends in
the cost of presidential campaigns. Describe recent attempts to regulate campaign
finance. Evaluate the roles of federal campaign funding, PACs, and soft money
in presidential campaigns. 5. Describe and evaluate the Electoral College system.
Lesson 13 - Congressional Elections
Objective: The student should be able to explain the importance of congressional
elections and to describe the major aspects of congressional campaigning including
funding, media exposure, and use of volunteers.
Competencies: 1. Discuss the general differences between voter trends for congressional
elections in midterm elections and presidential elections. 2. Define the terms
coalitions and coattails. Give examples of each in recent elections. 3. Examine
the typical state legal requirements for registering to vote. Evaluate how these
requirements may affect voter turnout in the United States. 4. Distinguish between
party-column ballots and office-column ballots. Describe and evaluate recent
attempts to make voting easier for citizens. 5. Define reapportionment. Discuss
the Supreme Court cases Baker v. Carr, Reynolds v. Sims, and Wesberry v. Sanders
in relation to the question of equal representation.
EXAM #2
UNIT III: Congress and the President
Lesson 14 – Congress
Objective: The student should be able to describe the organization of the U.S.
Congress, its leadership structure, and committee system.
Competencies: 1. Distinguish between the trustee role and instructed delegate
roles of representation and describe how members balance these roles. 2. Describe
the committee system and formal leadership of the House and the Senate. 3. Compare
the makeup of Congress with the United States population as a whole. 4. Explain
the leadership structure of Congress and the operation of congressional committees.
5. Describe the varied roles a member of Congress must play.
Lesson 15 - Legislative Process
Objective: The student sill be able to list the factors that influence the types
of bill introduced in Congress, outline the major steps a bill must pass in
becoming law, and describe the political process in which individuals and groups
can affect the outcome.
Competencies: 1. Describe the major differences between the House and the Senate.
2. Define the terms unanimous consent and filibuster and describe how they make
the process of legislation in the Senate different from the House. 3. Give an
overview of the basic steps involved in making a bill become a law. 4. Describe
recent attempts to reform campaign finance.
Lesson 16 - Congress and the President
Objective: The student will be able to examine the strategy and powers that
are unique to the president and to Congress as they interact with each other
addressing the nation’s business.
Competencies: 1. Discuss ways that uses of presidential power create conflict
with Congress. Illustrate the conflict with recent examples. 2. Explain possible
philosophical conflicts between a president of one political party and a congressional
majority of another party. 3. Describe the frequent conflict between the president
and Congress over the deployment of military troops.
Lesson 17 - The Presidency
Objective: The student should be able to analyze the effect of how presidential
management style influences the structure and power of the office and discuss
how the relationship between the president, vice president, cabinet and White
House staff can affect policy.
Competencies: 1. Describe the constitutional powers of the U.S. presidency and
the congressional checks on the presidency, and discuss the resulting paradox
of power. 2. Discuss the events that have increased or decreased presidential
power in this century. 3. Identify and discuss the seven key roles the president
plays. 4. State the constitutional provisions for impeachment and presidential
succession, and describe how these procedures have been used in the past. 5.
Discuss how presidential character and style affect the president’s performance
in office. 6. Describe the qualities that help to determine who is a great president
historically. 7. Explain how a president’s personality and management
style may affect his successes in policy.
Lesson 18 – Bureaucracy
Objective: The student will be able to explain the role that a bureaucracy plays
in the political process, describe the checks and balance system within the
federal bureaucracy, and identify the difficulties in reforming and reducing
the size of the bureaucracy.
Competencies: 1. Explain the role of bureaucrats, particularly in light of their
wide discretionary powers, in shaping public policy. 2. Analyze the ability
of the president to control the bureaucracy. 3. Identify the differences among
the three major executive branch agencies: cabinet departments, executive agencies
and independent regulatory commissions. Identify examples of each. 4. Discuss
the origins of the "spoils system," the fight for civil service reform
in the 1880s, and more recent efforts to make the bureaucrats more competent
and efficient workers.
Lesson 19 - Domestic Policy
Objective: The student should be able to explain the factors and influences
that shape domestic policy and the policy’s impact on people in the United
States.
Competencies: 1. Identify and describe the main theories of economic policy.
Be able to distinguish between fiscal and monetary policy. Illustrate with contemporary
and historical examples. 2. Describe the key goals of government regulation
of business and labor. Illustrate with historical and contemporary examples
of government regulation.
Lesson 20 - Foreign Policy
Objective: The student should be able to describe the roles of the president,
his or her advisors, and Congress in influencing the decision making of foreign
policy and explain the power of organized citizen groups in affecting it.
Competencies: 1. Identify and discuss the key issues of contemporary foreign
policy and the competing viewpoints on these issues. Discuss the issues relevant
to the following periods of U.S. foreign policy: isolationism, the Cold War
and containment, Vietnam, détente, post Vietnam, post Cold War. 2. Describe
and evaluate the president’s powers and constraints in conducting foreign
policy. 3. Describe the development and demise of the Cold War.
EXAM #3
UNIT IV: The Courts and Civil Liberties
Lesson 21 - Global Politics
Objective: The student should be able to describe the basic structure of the
United Nations as a forum for problem solving, peacekeeping, and global communications
and the interconnectedness of United States foreign policy in a global community.
Competencies: 1. Describe the UN’s role in past and contemporary international
issues. Evaluate its successes and losses. Evaluate the United States relationship
with the UN in the past few years. 2. Trace the history of international efforts
at arms control and disarmament. Identify and describe the history and components
of key treaties. 3. Explain the struggle between human rights and economic objectives
in the global community when cultural differences between countries conflict.
Lesson 22 - Federal Courts
Objective: The student should be able to explain the U.S. Supreme Court as an
institution delineated by politics, the personalities and philosophies of individual
judges and how the Court affects the concerns and attitudes of the times.
Competencies: 1. Explain judicial review and trace its development through Marbury
v. Madison. Evaluate the opposing viewpoints of judicial review. 2. Describe
the process of presidential nomination of Supreme Court justices. Explain the
relationship of politics and ideology in the nomination process and evaluate
the ability of the president to predict the behavior of his or her nominees.
3. Describe the internal processes of the Supreme Court. 4. Describe the composition
of the current U.S. Supreme Court and the members’ philosophical differences
that may contribute to and reflect wider political changes taking place in the
United States.
Lesson 23 - Criminal Justice
Objective: The student should be able to evaluate the effectiveness of the current
justice system and identify possible alternative solutions.
Competencies: 1. Define the following terms and explain their relation to the
U.S. judicial system: common law, natural law, stare decisis, precedent, statutory
law, civil case, criminal case and administrative law. 2. Trace the development
of the Supreme Court’s rulings on the constitutionality of the death penalty.
Describe recent trends about the death penalty. Evaluate the effectiveness of
the death penalty as a deterrent to crime. 3. Explain the continuing controversy
over the use of capital punishment in the United States.
Lesson 24 - Due Process of Law
Objective: The student should be able to explain the role the Bill of Rights
plays in guaranteeing due process of law to those accused of a crime as they
go through the judicial system.
Competencies: 1. Define due process and distinguish between substantive due
process and procedural due process. Describe the Supreme Court’s use of
these concepts. 2. Define the term selective incorporation and trace the incorporation
of key components in the Bill of Rights. 3. Explain the role of the Bill of
Rights.
Lesson 25 - First Amendment Freedoms
Objective: The student should be able to describe the value of the First Amendment
freedoms for democracy and explain the impact of advancing technology on the
lives of today’s citizens.
Competencies: 1. Trace the development of the Supreme Court’s interpretation
of the First Amendment protection of free speech. Discuss the success or failure
of the Court in achieving an appropriate balance between liberty and order.
2. Describe briefly the Supreme Court’s ruling on freedom of the press.
When can the press be limited? 3. Discuss how Supreme Court decisions have dealt
with the issue of separation of church and state. Discuss how the free exercise
clause and establishment clause can conflict with each other. 4. Describe the
value of the First Amendment freedoms for democracy, focusing on freedom of
the press and free speech.
Lesson 26 - The Struggle for Equal Rights
Objective: The student should be able to discuss the struggle to extend "unalienable
rights to people of color, women, disabled people, and homosexuals.
Competencies: 1. Describe the controversies surrounding undocumented aliens
and their children living in the United States, including the political fall-out
the issue has generated in the politics of the 1990s. 2. Discuss the changing
roles of women in society and identify the key political issues. Evaluate the
efforts to enhance equality for women – the successes and failures. 3.
Trace the progress of the civil rights movement over time. Identify the movements’
key actors and strategies. Evaluate its effect on racism in the United States
and its role in contemporary politics. 4. Discuss the meaning of affirmative
action and the Supreme Court cases that have ruled on it. Evaluate the effectiveness
of affirmative action programs and evaluate whether the need for these programs
remains today.
EXAM #4
