September 17 is Constitution Day! We have created different writing prompts along with the writing space for students. These writing prompts can be used as individual assignments, at writing stations, or even for group discussions!
Constitution Day Writing Prompts – Middle and High School
Three writing prompts for Constitution Day are provided for middle school and high school. The prompts can be used as a formal essay, at writing stations, or as a “discuss and write.”
Constitution Day Word Search
Here’s a fun activity for all ages with vocabulary that is tied to Constitution Day! Answers are provided as well!
Bill of Rights Booklet – Elementary and Middle Schools
Want your students to have their own Bill of Rights booklet? This booklet has the verbiage from the Bill of Rights and a space for students to be able to paraphrase what each amendment means.
Bill of Rights Booklet – Lower Elementary
This Bill of Rights Booklet is targeted for younger elementary students. Each amendment has an overview of how the amendment protects the citizens.
The Bill of Rights in Modern Times
In this lesson, students will learn about the individual rights that are included in the Bill of Rights and current issues relating to them. Students will use C-SPAN Classroom’s Constitution Clips to explore what each of these rights mean and determine how these rights apply to current events in America. This lesson works well with classes with one-to-one devices or in flipped classrooms.
Constitution Clips
C-SPAN’s Constitution Clips makes the U.S. Constitution come alive by providing teachers and students with video clips from C-SPAN’s Video Library of the Constitution in action.
Commemorating Constitution Day
EDSITEment’s guide for teachers includes lesson plans for K-12 civics education that include analyzing art and primary sources, compelling questions, web-based interactives, and Spanish language resources.
The Constitutional Convention of 1787
In this unit, students will examine the roles that key American founders played in creating the Constitution, and the challenges they faced in the process. They will learn why many Americans in the 1780s believed that reforms to the Articles of Confederation were necessary, and the steps taken to authorize the 1787 Convention in Philadelphia. They will become familiar with the main issues that divided delegates at the Convention, particularly the questions of representation in Congress and the office of the presidency. Finally, they will see how a spirit of compromise, in the end, was necessary for the Convention to fulfill its task of improving the American political system.
The Role of the Judiciary
In this lesson, students learn about the judicial system, aka the judiciary. First, students read and discuss an article on the role, structure, and principles of the judiciary. Next, they participate in a Civil Conversation on the reading. In this structured discussion method, under the guidance of a facilitator (the teacher), participants are encouraged to engage intellectually with challenging materials.