This handout can be used as part of our Preparing for Environmental Pathways lesson or as an independent activity in your classroom. Students will watch the video linked within and answer questions to deepen their understanding of the climate crisis.
Elections and Voting: An Overview
Students will explore the Constitutional amendments that deal with elections, the qualifications for voting, and protections offered to voters. Jeffrey Rosen, president and CEO of the National Constitution Center, explains the Fifteenth, Nineteenth, Twenty-fourth, and Twenty-sixth amendments, the history of voting in America, Supreme Court cases, and measures that ensure voters can vote without discrimination based on property ownership, race, sex, and age. Created by National Constitution Center.
How Did the Cold War Stay Cold?
During the Cold War, the United States and the Soviet Union amassed tens of thousands of nuclear weapons—enough firepower to annihilate each other many times over. In this video, learn how rivalries between the world’s superpowers, the United States and the Soviet Union, avoided turning into nuclear war.
How Did the United States Become a Global Power?
With the world’s largest economy, hundreds of overseas military bases, and leadership positions in various international institutions, the United States is an undeniable global power. But this was not always the case. In this multimedia resource, learn how domestic expansion and three wars—the Spanish-American War, World War I, and World War II—transformed the United States’ standing in the world.
What Kinds of Governments Exist?
How governments interpret, prioritize, and grapple with pillars of modern society—for instance, security, freedom, and prosperity—determines the kinds of policies they enact. In this multimedia resource, explore the differences between democracies and autocracies, communism and capitalism, and right and left leaning ideologies.
What Is the National Security Council?
The National Security Council is a group of top advisors tasked with providing guidance on foreign policy matters and implementing the president’s decisions. Learn how the president’s advisors protect U.S. national security and help with foreign policy decision-making and coordination across the executive branch.
What Roles Do Congress and the Executive Branch Play in U.S. Foreign Policy?
This Council on Foreign Relations Education resource helps students understand what the Constitution says about foreign policy. Students explore how the powers of Congress and the president protect and advance the country’s interests abroad. Through infographics, charts, and case studies, students will learn how the balance of power between these branches of government might look different in theory and practice.
Learn How to Volunteer at Your Local Election Center
Who are poll workers? And what do they do? Learn how you can take part in the democratic process as a poll worker!
Lesson Plan: Political Parties: Two is Company, Three’s a Crowd
Students explore the two-party system and why it’s been so difficult for third parties to make it. The class then break into groups to study three U.S. elections with major third party candidates: the 1912, 1992, and 2000 elections.
Laws, Norms, and Democratic Backsliding
Democracies around the world are under siege—not by foreign invaders but by domestic leaders who are weakening their countries’ institutions that protect political freedoms and civil liberties. That trend is known as democratic backsliding. This multimedia resource explores the principles that underpin democracy and the countries in which they are under threat.