Colonial Grievances and the Social Contract
Did the colonial grievances show that the social contract between the colonies and Great Britain was broken?
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.
Objectives:
The student will be able to:
- Recognize each grievance and understand its meaning.
- Analyze how specific grievances changed over time.
- Explain how grievances function as evidence in an argument.
- Connect grievances to principles of Social Contract (consent, rights, legitimacy)
- Construct a Claim, Evidence, Reasoning (CER) argument using primary sources.
- Apply the concept of Social Contract to modern examples of representation and governance.
Assessment:
By the conclusion of the lesson students will have:
- Complete multiple graphic organizers focusing on
- Matching grievances to translated examples
- Identifying grievances in historical examples.
- Various short answer questions.
- Claim, Evidence, Reasoning writing.
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