Teaching Strategies
Part One
Students will be introduced to the curriculum unit by being asked to reflect on their own connection to voting: assessing their prior knowledge or a lack of knowledge of voting and assessing their family's knowledge and participation with voting. They will be given an opportunity to survey their family members and to share data with the class the next day, first with a pair-share and then voluntarily share with the whole class. Since most of my students have family members from Mexico, I would also provide a brief context into the type of voting procedure in place in Mexico and some of the other countries like the Philippines and Vietnam, where our next largest group of students and their families are from. Through this family background knowledge on voting, students will be able to connect with what is written in the Constitution of their country of origin to their family's experience with voting.
Next, my students will be guided by the essential question of: is voting important? Why or why not? As first and second-generation immigrants, for many of my students, this will be the first time they will be voting in local, state, and federal elections. In my government class, they will already have learned about the Reconstruction and the Civil Rights Movement during their junior year. During this time, they will be given direct instruction to review the passage of the reconstruction amendment and subsequently the Jim Crow laws that emerged to suppress black voters.
Part Two
This next phase will be split into two parts; analyzing supreme court cases and analyzing current bills. Students will be given excerpts of Supreme Court cases that deal with the interpretation of the 15th Amendment. Without relying on the internet, students will work in pairs and/or small groups to arrange the cases in chronological order using clues within the case and the progression of voter suppression from each case. Once the students have familiarized themselves with the cases, we will engage in a fishbowl discussion examining how the court system was used to create a system of voter suppression that continued to impact voters today. Unlike a Socratic seminar where everyone participates, a fishbowl discussion consists of an inner circle and an outer circle. The students in the inner circle will be participating in the discussion. This gives the students who wish to speak the opportunity to do so, while those who do not wish to speak can opt out of participate in a class discussion, and instead will learn to listen. If those in the outer circle wish to participate, they need to tap out another student in the inner circle. Those students who experience extreme social anxiety but wish to contribute can write notes and pass it off to someone in the inner circle. Through this method, students are engaging in an authentic and organic discussions that foster a learning environment that meets everyone’s learning needs.
Students will research laws and policies such as voter I.D. laws, proof of citizenship requirements, voter registration policies and analyze how these regulations impede democratic participation. Students will then be divided into groups of their choosing, where each group will be given a recent law passed. They will research and then present their findings. After each group presentation, I will lead the class to discuss whether this law is a form of voter suppression and to what extent.
Part Three
Many of the recent laws that have been in headline news regarding voter suppression are geographically located in the South and Midwest. When my students think of voter suppression, they think it happens elsewhere and not in California. This next phase of the unit entails introducing several legislations that were passed in California over the last few years and have students engage in an open discussion about how these laws protect voters or suppress voters. One of that legislation is The California Education Code that was passed that would designate the last two weeks in April and September to be High School Voter Education Weeks.37 This is the time for high schoolers to connect with county elections officials, promote civic education and participation on campus, ultimately cultivating an environment that will result in lifelong voters and active citizens. In the 16 years I have taught in the East Side High School District, there has never been a High School Voter Education Week.
Through an internet scavenger hunt, students will discover their local elected officials. They need to know who the decision-makers of our district are and their background. Do these elected officials come from the community they are serving? My students are the next generation of people who will have the potential to have a powerful voice in elections. However, only if they get involved and make voting a habit. Next, they will examine local poll data in the most recent elections, both local and national elections. Students will see that Hispanics have the lowest turnout in elections amongst all the demographic groups compared to Asian Americans and African Americans. The 18-25 age group also ranks among the lowest turnout. Students will then compile a list of obstacles that might prevent young people, people of color, and low-income backgrounds from voting in their communities. Then they can discuss and suggest ways to overcome some of these barriers.
As a culminating assignment, we will implement the High School Voter Education Weeks, where students will put into action their suggestions for increasing voter participation during the last two weeks of April. Students will have the creative freedom to develop a project to increase voter registration within the student body and their immediate communities. These can take on the form of hosting voter registration drives on campus, creating pamphlets in their native languages to help dispel any myths and misconceptions of voting for their communities or record a podcast to disseminate information to targeted groups. At the High School Voter Education Weeks conclusion, students will write a reflective essay to reflect on the lessons learned from the curriculum unit.
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