Group Constitution:
Cooperative Learning
Activity
Class:
19th Century American History-Proficiency Review
Block Schedule
Objectives:
- Students
will analyze why government is important.
- Students
will understand why the United States has a Constitution and what that
Constitution does for American citizens.
- Students
will apply what they have learned about the Constitution to make a
Constitution for their group.
Materials:
- American
Journeys textbook
- makers
and construction paper
- Discussion
questions
Activities:
- Have
students take ten minutes to answer the following discussion questions:
Why do we have government and what does the United States Constitution do
for the American people? (See attachment)
- Have a
classroom discussion about the government and what they do for
citizens. Make sure that students
write down information that is discussed.
Also, make sure that students are seeing that the government
provides military protection both at home and abroad and supplies social
services.
- After
class discussion, put students into groups of four. In their groups, students should create
a list of items that they feel should be covered in a constitution. The list needs to have at least ten
items. Groups should have 15
minutes to complete.
- Discuss
as a class items that groups have their lists. Each group member should be taking notes on the
discussion. Once all groups have
shared their ideas, each group needs to discuss what is most important to
them and write their own constitution.
They should write their final draft on a piece of construction
paper using markers.
- Once
group have completed their constitutions and have had them checked by the
teacher, they should turn to page 230 in their history textbooks. They should put a check mark next to
each item in their constitution that appears in the United States
Constitution.
Homework:
Student Reflection on the Group Constitution
Discussion Questions: Group Constitution
- Why do we have government?
________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________
- What does the United States Constitution do for
American citizens?
________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________
Student Reflection on the Group Constitution
Directions: Write a full-page response to the following
questions on a separate sheet of paper.
Reflect on your group’s constitution and discuss if you feel
it included enough items. Also, reflect on your group’s progress. Do you think that your group did a good
job? Why? Did your group work well together? Why or why not? Was your
group on task or did you only do what was necessary to finish the
assignment? Did all members of the
group participate in group discussions?
Why or why not?