Home | How It Works | Stats Login | Register         Case: Politically or Racially-Aware I believe in democracy. As a high school social sciences teacher, I strongly believe in democratic education and political awareness. I want my students to be aware of what is going on around them locally, nationally, and internationally. I require my students to keep up with news. Everything they learn from newspapers, magazines, and television becomes substance to use in my lessons. Before the presidential elections, I asked my students to watch all the debates, try to see the different perspectives, and how those perspectives may lead to different courses of action and to different implications for people. As part of this effort, I gave students a "persuasive writing" assignment. I gave them a list of topics from the debates, such as abortion, healthcare, affirmative action, and foreign policy. Students were to take a position on one of these issues and write a persuasive essay. When it was time for students to share their writings in class, things got out of hand. Every single topic we discussed along with the essays turned into a discussion of race. My Black and White students took opposite perspectives on every issue and during the discussions, they were not civil. I felt like my efforts for democratic education were not producing anything good. Should I change my activities? How come the political awareness I wanted develop in my students actually turned out to be racial awareness? Some guidance please! Solution: (Rates are posted for this solution!) One solution would be to make ground rules for discussions and debates that go on in the classroom. At the beginning of the year, the first two weeks of school, the students came up with the ground rules on discussions and debates for the class that every student agreed to follow. I did not come up with any of the rules the students did. They came up with rules, like: No talking or interrupting while someone else is talking. No getting angry about what is said. Speak in a normal tone even if you are upset about the topic. Be respectful at all times. Pay attention when someone is talking. Participate. Be kind and NO CURSING. These are just a few of the rules my students came up with to follow during class. It has worked for me for three years now, but there will always be one or two that can't seem to understand the concept of the rules.