I’ve always believed that one of the roles of educators is to help their students become well-informed, curious, and active citizens. The election lesson ideas and resources from PBS LearningMedia can make it easier to bring current events into your classroom. On their Election Central website you’ll find lots of great tools to use this school year!
7 Election Lesson Ideas and Resources for Teachers from PBS LearningMedia
- News videos: PBS LearningMedia’s Election Central has videos for students and teachers to explore. These selections come from PBS Newshour and are geared towards students in middle school and high school.
- Lesson plans: The collection of lesson plans on this website include a range of topics related to the election. Teachers will find election lesson plans on social media’s influence on voters and an exploration of how to host a debate.
- Election process: In this section of the site you’ll find resources to help students understand the election process. These videos can be used by teachers to introduce campaign strategies and the nomination process.
- Debate prep: This area of PBS Learning Media’s website includes lesson plans and resources to bring debating into your classroom. The lesson overviews are geared towards older students but have plenty of information you could tailor to upper elementary school classrooms.
- Election history: If you want your students to learn more about elections in the past you can introduce them to the stories from American history.
- Inaugural addresses: Primary source documents can connect to explorations of elections from today and in the past. There are inaugural addresses from Nixon to Roosevelt on this site.
- President videos: This collection of 60-second videos are perfect for short introductions to different historical features. Students can watch videos on John Tyler, Millard Fillmore and more!
How are you bringing current events and the election into your classroom? Share your experiences in the comments below!
cross posted at classtechtips.com
Monica Burns is a fifth grade teacher in a 1:1 iPad classroom. Visit her website at classtechtips.com for creative education technology tips and technology lesson plans aligned to the Common Core Standards.
