Lesson Plans for America's 250th

In this lesson, students examine how the rule of law and the principle of limited government shape and constrain executive power in the United States. Through analysis of the Declaration of Independence, constitutional principles, and landmark Supreme Court cases, students investigate how presidential authority has been expanded, challenged, and restricted throughout American history. Students apply their understanding through legal reasoning, collaborative discussion, and a moot court activity focused on contemporary questions about executive power and constitutional limits

In this lesson, students will first explore three primary sources that help students think about what the founding generation thought about the idea and ideal of equality. Students engage in inquiry by using the text of the primary sources to generate an answer to the first compelling question. Students then use evidence and reasoning to support their claim. In the second part of the lesson, students investigate additional primary sources to see how the ideals of human equality in the Declaration of Independence have inspired change throughout American history.

In this lesson, students examine how the grievances in the Declaration of Independence demonstrate a broken social contract. Through a matching activity and analysis of draft documents from the Library of Congress, students identify patterns of unfairness and evolving argumentation. Using a Claim-Evidence-Reasoning framework, they practice identifying them as legal arguments and apply their understanding to modern contexts before completing a final written evaluation.

Students will explore the tension throughout United States history in expanding the elective franchise. This tension draws into question some of the Declaration of Independence’s founding principles: popular sovereignty, republicanism, and equality.

Students will investigate whether natural rights have been equally protected for all people in the United States throughout history. Through analysis of constitutional rights, Jim Crow laws, voting rights expansion, and civic discussion, students will examine how rights and freedoms have been protected, limited, and expanded over time.

Students will analyze how government power has been defined and limited over time through Influences on the Founding, various Founding Documents, and landmark Supreme Court cases.

In this lesson, students will investigate how Americans conceptualized the ‘Pursuit of Happiness’ at various points in history and how this relates to government action and their own individual civic virtue. Students watch a short video, examine excerpts from primary sources, and reflect on their own understanding of happiness through debate, dialogue, and writing. By the end of the lesson, students will evaluate whether it is more important to have a government of laws or a culture of individual civic virtue in order to promote the “pursuit of happiness.”

In this lesson, students will investigate the meaning of natural rights, their place in the Declaration of Independence, and the role of citizens in protecting these rights. Students will engage in small-group deliberation, utilize a myriad of resources, and ultimately engage in a student voice project. By the end of the lesson students will have seen several examples of fellow students engaging in active citizenship, and how they might exercise their own voice.

In this lesson students will examine the foreign policy advice of President George Washington and then evaluate the policies for four other US presidents to analyze if they followed his advice.