e-civics in the classroom

(Education Week) Video sharing, social networking, and online games may be the everyday toys of the Internet generation, but classrooms are putting them to use.

Just as the candidates have learned to use novel technology tools to reach young people during this year’s presidential campaign, teachers like Gamal Sherif are turning to electronic resources to capture students’ interest in the election.

At the same time, they want to:

1. help students decipher the barrage of related images and information
2. engage them in lessons about the democratic process today and...
3. engage them in lessons throughout American history.

“The technology is fun and helpful, but it’s also a tool you can use to get a better understanding of what the political and historical issues are,” said Mr. Sherif, who teaches history and science at the Science Leadership Academy, a public high school in Philadelphia.

To do so, he is tapping online video archives, values surveys, and discussion groups that help students in his U.S. history class examine the stances of the candidates on various issues, and to articulate the pros and cons of each.

“We are looking at the presidential elections not as passionate individuals, but as historians,” Mr. Sherif said. “The aim is to get a better understanding of the political process they are witnessing ... and to employ scholarly strategies to present information in a clear and organized manner.”

Both major parties’ historic tickets—a black man for president, a woman for vice president—as well as compelling economic and foreign-policy issues are converging with the campaigns’ use of text-messaging, online networking, and nontraditional media venues to draw young people into the contest.

Teachers have also seized on the opportunity to use the favored devices of today’s students in teaching traditional civics lessons along with the 21st-century skills experts say people will need to thrive in the information age.

“The idea is to teach kids as young as possible to be able to navigate this increasingly complicated media world by giving them some basic tools for analysis, ... whether they are using Facebook, Wikipedia, or a textbook,” said Cyndy Scheibe, an associate professor of psychology at Ithaca College in New York state and the executive director of Project Look Sharp, which provides resources on presidential campaigns over the past 200 years.

New technologies, she added, help students synthesize information from a variety of sources, analyze issues, and compare current events with the historical record.

During the first few weeks of the school year, 9th graders in Mr. Sherif’s class in Philadelphia have been doing just that. Armed with laptop computers, the students monitor and analyze video footage of the candidates on the campaign trail and in debates. Using text-mapping tools, they can scrutinize the rhetoric in candidates’ speeches and interviews, and document their positions on various issues.

Resources for 21st-Century Lessons on the Election

• The Living Room Candidate: Web site sponsored by the Museum for the Moving Image that provides clips of presidential-campaign commercials from 1952 through today, as well as background and historical information about campaign advertising.

• National Association for Media Literacy Education: The national membership organization promotes media-literacy efforts. It offers suggestions for teaching about the election.

• Glassbooth: An online quiz that analyzes a user’s position on social, political, and economic issues to see which candidate’s views he or she is most aligned with.

• Mouse: A New York City-based nonprofit organization that supports research, policy initiatives, classroom resources, and training programs for teachers and students that promote the use of technology to enhance instruction.

• Presidential Election Wiki: A wikispace, or collaborative Web site, that includes resources and Web links for teaching about the election process. The site is administered by Joyce Valenza, a library information specialist at Springfield Township High School in Pennsylvania.

• YouTube: The video-sharing Web site has a channel dedicated to the election hosted by YouTube that includes clips of the candidates on the campaign trail and in debate, as well as video commentary by both prominent and unknown pundits.

• Media Construction of Presidential Campaigns: Curriculum materials from Project Look Sharp, the media-literacy program at Ithaca College. It includes a detailed teacher’s guide and downloads for units covering media issues in presidential campaigns since 1800.

• Access, Analyze, Act—A Blueprint for 21st Century Civic Engagement: The Public Broadcasting Service’s resources include a teacher’s guide for developing lessons that tap social media to teach media-literacy, critical-thinking, communication, and technology skills. The site, created by the Media Education Lab at Temple University in Philadelphia, also includes podcasts and interactive simulations on campaign issues.

• Factcheck.org: The searchable Web site from the Annenberg Public Policy Center at the University of Pennsylvania monitors the factual accuracy of statements, advertisements, interviews, and debates related to the presidential campaign.

• Get My Vote: A Web site sponsored by National Public Radio that allows citizens to write, record, or videotape their views about issues they deem important to the election.

• The Internet Archive: The site contains historical collections in digital format. It includes video, audio, and print documents, as well as software and Web page archives.

• eLECTIONS: An online, multimedia game offered by Cable in the Classroom in which players are candidates and choose their party affiliation and positions on key issues, then analyze polling maps and choose campaign strategies.