Selecting Classroom Activities for Discussing Policy, Politics, and Social Issues
What we want in an activity to help students understand the origins of their political beliefs differs from what we want in an activity where they deliberate over positions on an issue—we wrote this piece to make these distinctions concrete and directly actionable. Hopefully, it's also an opportunity to explore new and thoughtful classroom activities for civic skills building.
Class discussions on policy, politics, and social issues, including those related to the 2024 election, can support students in a range of ways. They can help students progress towards course learning objectives. They can also promote democratic engagement by fostering students’ confidence, motivation, and capacity to make informed decisions at the polls. Moreover, students may develop lifelong civic skills and mindsets through discussions of important issues of our time. Lastly, they can provide space for students to process election rhetoric, news, and results affecting them and their communities.
To successfully support these goals, thoughtful design and facilitation of these discussions is crucial. CRLT and the Ginsberg Center have developed a framework for structuring classroom discussions around the election, relevant for any topic where the stakes are high for students, whether academically, socially, or in terms of the real-life consequences of broader debates and policy decisions. A key component of this framework is selecting activities that are aligned with your discussion’s learning goals. A well-aligned activity provides clear guideposts for students, helping them navigate complex and potentially contentious issues with purpose and direction.
In this blog post, we consider five common learning goals for class discussions around policy, politics, and social issues. We highlight structures that facilitate each goal, as well as a few specific activities that offer practical options for your class discussions, including those leading up to and following election day.