TEACHING ACTIVITY -- THE U.S. CONSTITUION
A good activity for teaching constitutional concepts would encourage students to consider the conceptual implications of life without the benefit of constitutional protections. This could be accomplished through role-play scenarios in which students adopt the perspective of members of various specific classes of people but it can also be achieved through a simpler group discussion that addresses the value of constitutional protections and the practical implications of ignoring those concepts.
In the first configuration, some students could be assigned roles as citizens or police officers conducting criminal investigations while others play members of the general public or criminal court juries. In the simpler moderated group-discussion-based configuration, students could be presented with various social and ethical dilemmas and asked to consider various possible methodological approaches to administrating law and social justice in society. In that regard, it could be particularly useful to use consensus voting on matters such as religious values and minority rights issues to illustrate why democracy in its purest form is not necessarily the most equitable approach to ensuring social justice for all members of society (Edwards, Wallenberg, & Lineberry, 2008; Halbert & Ingulli, 2008).
The exercise illustrating the need for additional objective principals could be followed by a moderated group discussion designed to identify principles and values that are important enough to social justice that they must be exempt from being subjected to the classic application of a purely democratic process. For example, the exercise could illustrate how easily group consensus through a democratic vote could result in the deprivation of the rights of minorities while preventing any legal recourse (Edwards, Wallenberg, & Lineberry, 2008). The exercise would conclude with group consideration of specific objective principles and social values such as those protected by the U.S. Constitution.
Sources Cited
Edwards G.C., Wallenberg M.P., and Lineberry R.B. (2008). Government in America:
People, Politics, and Policy. New York: Longman.
Halbert, T., and Ingulli, E. (2008). Law & Ethics in the Business Environment.
Cincinnati, OH: West.
Santrock J (200 ). Educational Psychology 4th edition. McGraw Hill
