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!) When it comes to politics, many people "take a side" simply based on their cultures. They feel as if they must relate to a certain political party because that's what their family relates with, and they focus less on the issues at hand and more on the party name and branding. I think this activity would have been more effective if students were to focus more on the issues without seeing the political names. I think it would be cool if the teacher typed up quotes that were said in the political debate, yet left off who said them and just included the person's stance on the issues. This would encourage students to think about their opinions solely on the issues at hand, rather than the political association they feel they need to represent.