Obergefell v. Hodges & Everything You Need To Teach About it

I guess the first question is whether Jim Obergefell will become a one word name such as Roe, Citizens United (well that's two), Tinker, et al.   If the Supreme Court decides in Obergefell v. Hodges that the 14th amendment's equal protection does indeed extend marriage to gay people, then the answer is probably yes.  The WashPost video above is excellent in its overview of the case.

If you are teaching standard government, then you might want to take some time on the case as it has so much to offer.  If you are an AP teacher, then you could quickly review such items as

• precedent
• amicus curiae (all over this page)
• Rule of four
• majority opinion/minority opinion/concurring opinion
• oral arguments (here some actual ones from today's presentation) or here is the entire argument
• 14th amendment
• full faith and credit clause
• Supreme, circuit and district courts
• plaintiff, defendant, litigants
• writ of certiorari 
• Interest groups
• brief
• am I missing others?

You can also find lots more from Scotus Blog's page and from the page on the US Supreme Court. 

Cram for the Exam

Dan Larsen and Andrew Conneen, who teach at Stevenson High School outside of Chicago, each year do a CSPAN review for AP US Government students.  This year's class will be May 9th from 9:15 to 10 pm.  Your students can call in and ask questions while watching CSPAN online or on the television. 

‪#‎hsgovchat‬ Review for AP Exam

‪#‎hsgovchat‬ starts at 9pm EST next Sunday for the AP Government exam. Tell your students to join in if they have questions.  They also can look at the feed afterwards if they can't make it during the review.   Here is what was reviewed last night. 

Super PACs Coordination w Campaigns

This and this article argue that super PACs have now become an integral part of presidential campaigns, pointing out, for example, that since Jeb Bush is not yet an official candidate, he can personally raise money for his PAC, Right to Rise.  While a lawsuit is being prepared to challenge the closeness of super PACs and campaigns, the NYTimes claims that the distinctions have been all but lost.  Many are being run by former staffers and handling more and more of the main tasks (ads, for example).  Above is a video from Bush's Right to Rise super PAC.

Citizens United v. FEC allowed the existence of super PACs.  All this is being done so that candidates can get around the $2700 limit on individual donations. 

Snow Day Reprise

In ten years of being a chair, tomorrow will be the second day I have missed a county wide meeting (so I can work with my AP Comp kids to better prepare for the AP exam).  I was going to present on how to teach students on a snow day.  But using my favorite technique, I can flip the presentation using the video above.  The video explains how you can use Blackboard Collaborate which is something we have in Fairfax County.  But there are other alternatives as you can see below.

1. You could Google Plus Hangout live stream where you could send a link to your students and they could watch a live lecture (here's how).    You could then use Today's Meet to send a link to students and you could see their live questions.   You would be able to do this by splitting your screen. 
2. If the day is cancelled tomorrow we will spend much of the period answering questions on review problem sets and then I will assign a few more so that we can have our quiz on Wed and our test on Friday without missing a beat.  
3. But you don't always have to meet your students.  For example last year  I decided not to have an online session and instead made the video above as both an introduction and a continuation of our material.  Then my government kids watched this video to look up these court cases.  
4. I communicate with the kids by using Remind, Blackboard and even using my grade book which has all of the kids' emails.  For the Remind message I used a shortened tinyurl (tinyurl.com/fcpscoldday) which linked to my normal homework e-sheet. so I didn't have to text the kids multiple times with the assignments.  
5. So if you have a motivated bunch and you can't afford to miss a day of school you might want to try some of the techniques. 

The bottom line is that we had 12 snow days in my county and a number more late starts and my kids still got in all their work and are where we should have been should we not have missed school.

I should point out that this is one of the many techniques I go over in my book Deeper Learning Through Technology: Using the Cloud To Individualize Instruction.

AP Government Review Resources

So, like you I have been a bit overwhelmed this (and next week) with four AP exams coming up for my students and one state exam last week (thankfully the last one is not until June) and so have not posted this amazing resource from Billy Shulman who was one of the people who submitted entries (and won!) to get my new book Deeper Learning Through Technology.

Billy's one stop shopping review has jeopardy games, videos, Quizlet and practice questions all on one neat Google Drive document.  Thanks Billy. 

The Trouble w the Electoral College

This video explains both the electoral college and why candidates avoid certain states.

Cram for the Exam

One of the great things about going to the AP grading each year is that you get to meet a lot of people who can really help your classes.  I have had the pleasure of getting to know Dan Larsen rather well. He and Andrew Conneen have created CitizenU whose aim it is to make a US government course sans textbook.  Here are a series of short "cram for the (AP) exam" reviews you might want to share with your students.  

Vermin Supreme for President

So this is nothing else other than good clean fun.  New Hampshire has fairly easy rules to get on their ballet to run for president.  As a result your students might enjoy one of the Democrats, Vermin Supreme. 

How to Study for a Test

When I was growing up I was expected to "always do my best."  I translated this to studying for my midterm exams several weeks in advance over the winter break, always doing it two or three times prior to a normal exam and even arguing post test for every single point.  Thus when I started teaching I assumed my students would make their own study guides, and truly study.  But alas I have learned over the years that studying, for more than not means,

• doing nothing at all and hoping for the best
• reading one's notes and
• for only a precious few, actually doing what my daughters are doing right now by quizzing each and helping each other make sure they have actually learned the material.

Two days ago I met a student in an AP US class who said she suffered from test anxiety.  She admitted that she never did more than review her notes to which I asked if she wasn't fulfilling her prophesy in that she was taking the easy way out by reading, but not studying and then blaming her low scores on the imagined anxiety.  I asked her if she had every varied her approach to prepare and the answer was, "Well sometimes I don't study."

This year I have made a conscious effort to discuss what is meant by studying - even modeling it repeatedly with my non AP classes.  But here is a list of 22 different ideas to think and perhaps even share some of them with your students such as

• quizzing one's self (I love Quizlet)
• studying for multiple days
• studying in different parts of the house
• using different memory devices such as songs and story telling
• writing it out
• taking breaks and more

The video above echoes many of the points above, but also how to reduce anxiety in a test.  

Win a Free Copy of My Book

So I want to give one of you a free book.  The person who can find me the best review (for US/world history, US/comparative government or economics) will get a free copy of my book.  The catch is that the resource has to be online and more sites are better than one.  My book, Deeper Learning Through Technology, is all about the personalization of your teaching so that each of your students can have more one on one time with you - the teacher.  It also looks at how you can find a professional learning community online so you can go beyond your classroom as well as using many online tools and how to flip your classroom.    Send me a note at kenhalla@gmail.com

Crash Course Government

If you are a flipper, you might want to check out Crash Course's government series which is now up to eleven videos and is adding a new one every ten days.  

LovGov Has Government Class Resources All in One Place

I troll the Internet constantly and like to think I have a handle on all things that are digital.  But, alas, I am far from all knowing.  Take LovGov which is done by Jennifer Hitchcock who teaches at the other end of my county (admittedly we are 188,000 students strong) and has created a tremendous website that is part blog and part multiple resources broken down by each section of government. Even more evident on the site is Jennifer's love for teaching government.

As I move my post book classes next year, her site will be one I will be frequenting to put the finishing touches (do we ever finish?!) on my course.  I should also point out that Jennifer is one of the co-administrators of the Facebook AP Government page.  

AP Comparative Government Test Prep

We start our last country - Iran - on Tuesday, but my students have already completed review guides for each of the other countries.  Beyond that, some items we are are using to prepare for the AP exam are below:

• Rebecca Small's "Conceptual Terms" which my students all have learned and will review
• Scribd's AP Comparisons.  This is a great site if you want a quick review of major topics such as type of government, corruption, elections, ethnic conflict, social cleavages, and more.  If you look at the right side of the page you will see summaries for each country.  Russia, Iran, China (but not updated for Xi), Nigeria (Mexico and GB not there and EU is really weak)
• Andrew Conneen's students' overview of each country (this is really good, but now two years old so Russia has some changes as does Iran). 
• My YouTube playlist for each country 
• Ethel Woods' overview of each country (again be warned that this is a few years old)
• Hauss's multiple choice questions from his previous edition
• Quizlet also has some great flashcards.  The best way to search them is to write "AP Comparative Name of country" into the Quizlet search engine.  The top search items is usually quite good. 
• 125 multiple choice questions from released exam and other sources.

James Madison Fellowship

There is a tremendous scholarship by the name of the James Madison Fellowship scholarship which funds teachers up to $24,000 for a master's degree.  The group selects up to one person per state each year.   So if you are looking for help, you might want to check it out.  One of my department colleagues, Doug Zywiol, just won the grant from Virginia.  

My Newspaper Editorial

I have been seeing a lot of negative editorials recently on technology use in the classroom and, not being a shy person, I wrote one and with the help of the Smarter Schools Project it was published today in the Richmond Times Dispatch.  As with many states, Virginia (where I live) has been grappling, in our legislature (as has our Congress), to protect students, often at the cost of using technology.  While it is a fine balance, my thoughts are printed here in full.  About the only thing missing is that I wish a start-up would develop to vet our burgeoning ed tech needs.   

Iran's Government

Today we are starting our last country in AP Comparative - perhaps my favorite - Iran.   To help my students I have this site from Harvard that gives you everything you need to know about the Iranian government.   For those of you who want more depth, this is a great site.  If you want a visual, this one from the NYTimes is a great one, even though the people in the positions are now outdated. 

RealClearPolitics

RealClearPolitics gives you all you could want to discuss with your students about government. Basically it aggregates stories from many many sources and will allow you to give a real world application for some of what you are teaching. 

Great Britain's Upcoming Election

There will be a general election for Parliament in Great Britain on May 7th.   To that end 538Blog has a new page on the elections and are going to forecast the results, much as the site has done for US presidential elections.  This article is a great primer on GB as well as the issues behind the May election.  The article discusses devolution, the three major parties, the EU and politics beyond England.

538 also has a great glossary of British politics, most terms of which need to be known for the AP comparative exam.   Here, also, is a political history of GB since 1945 - again all fair game. 

Iran - US Deal & Covering Iran in Class

With the US-Iranian nuclear deal now complete (graphic) as I will tell my students, it will not be on the AP exam since that was in the can last April.  On the other hand there are plenty of related items that will make either the US or the comparative exam.  For example:

• What is the legislature in Iran: 
• Who is the president of Iran: 
• Who is the Supreme Leader of Iran:  
• What is the role between the two above
• Why is the economy in Iran a driver in the nuclear deal?
• What is the Green Revolution and how might it have been connected to the deal?
• What US position initiates treaties?
• What US cabinet position has been negotiating with Iran
• What US body normally makes treaties? 
• What # of senators must agree to a treaty?
• Since the deal with Iran is not a treaty, what is the name of a presidential agreement that circumvents Congress?

AP US Government Review

Next week we finish AP Comparative and then pursue our review of US and comp in earnest.  Below are some of the items we use to study for the exam.

• Comprehensive review sheet.  I no longer know where I found this, but it goes to the AP Comparative students.  They only do the parts they do not know as it is too long to do otherwise.  Mostly it is a way for them to remember items we may not have thought about during our comparative journey.
• Frank Franz and Randy Smith's review of the released multiple choice exam questions which really is a good study guide as well. 
• One hundred question review.  I got this from a Rebecca Small in-service years ago and break it up into four days.  The problem we have had is that kids have only used a few words or a line to answer the questions.  This year we broke up an old AP exam into four parts and let the students use their answers on it.  Magically the students were much more thorough in their answers! 
• Barron's AP Government review guide.  I feel the summaries and the multiple choice questions (the essays are not in line with the real free response ones).  All year my students have done mc questions and been using the summaries as a review guide.  You also could use Quizlet questions, but know that you should vet them to pick the best ones. 
• Time permitting we also give them some old AP free response questions. 
• Finally we briefly go through my AP exam test tips.
• If you prefer review videos, up top is part one of seven (the rest of which you can find here).  Here is another set.  If you want a shorter review, there is a fourteen minute below.

Mr. Betts' Bill of Rights

My wife once learned the periodic table through verse and while it would be hard for me, I see how well my own daughters learn from singing.  Mr. Betts has figured this out with a series of videos like the one above - which is on the Bill of Rights sung to the Proclaimers.