Democratic Participation<\/p>\n
What are ways in which we can participate in our\u00a0democracy? What reasons do people have for voting or\u00a0not voting?<\/p>\n
A healthy and vibrant democracy is based on an active\u00a0and engaged citizenry, where all citizens are ready, willing\u00a0and able to participate. Engagement includes staying\u00a0informed, debating issues, engaging with politicians and\u00a0participating in the voting process.<\/p>\n
DOWNLOAD BACKGROUNDER (PDF)<\/a><\/p>\n In this lesson, students will examine voter turnout\u00a0statistics over the last thirty years and consider the\u00a0significance of the trends and impact of varying rates among age groups. Students will discuss the concept of\u00a0political socialization and reflect on their own attitudes\u00a0towards democratic engagement. After reviewing\u00a0 the electoral participation research, students will\u00a0work in groups to design a marketing campaign to\u00a0promote democratic engagement among youth. In the\u00a0consolidation activity, students will debate different\u00a0proposals to increase voter turnout.<\/p>\n By the end of this lesson, students will be able to:<\/p>\n CPC3O<\/em>: A1, A2, B1, A1.4, A2.3, B1.1, B1.2<\/p>\n DOWNLOAD CURRICULUM LINKS (PDF)<\/a><\/p>\n Teacher Note: Slide Deck 12<\/a> can be used to support all\u00a0steps below.<\/em><\/p>\n 1. Explain the term voter turnout. Voter turnout is the\u00a0percentage of eligible electors (those able to vote) or\u00a0registered voters that cast ballots in an election. Voter turnout has steadily declined in Canada since\u00a0the 1990s. Voter turnout reached an all-time low of\u00a059 per cent in the 2008 federal election.<\/p>\n 3. Using a Think-Pair-Share strategy, have students discuss\u00a0the significance of the research and statistics by reflecting\u00a0on the following questions:<\/p>\n 4. In a closing discussion, ask students to speculate on\u00a0the voter turnout numbers in the 2015 federal election,\u00a0overall and for youth only. Afterwards, use Handout 12.1<\/a>\u00a0to disclose the official numbers and consider reasons for\u00a0the increase by posing questions to your students.<\/p>\n 1. Introduce or review the concept of \u2018political\u00a0socialization\u2019. Political socialization is an ongoing process\u00a0by which people form political beliefs and values, and\u00a0attitudes towards democratic engagement. Using a Turn\u00a0and Talk or Stop and Jot strategy, have students respond\u00a0to the following questions. Afterwards, review as a class.<\/p>\n Teacher Notes: <\/em><\/p>\n 2. Using Slide Deck 12B<\/a>,\u00a0review the research conducted by Elections Canada\u00a0regarding the factors and barriers influencing participation\u00a0among youth.<\/p>\n 3. Review the fact that low voter turnout is a challenge at\u00a0all levels of elections. Provincial and municipal elections\u00a0tend to be even lower than federal elections. In the last\u00a0two provincial elections, voter turnout was 48% in the\u00a02011 and 51% in 2014. While there may have been an\u00a0increase in voter turnout among young people in the 2015\u00a0federal election, the trend is fragile and needs attention.<\/p>\n 4. Divide students into groups and ask them to imagine\u00a0they are part of a marketing firm hired by Elections Ontario\u00a0to encourage participation and engagement in the 2018\u00a0provincial election. Students will design an advertising\u00a0campaign that incorporates social media, digital, print and\/\u00a0or audio visual elements. These products can be used to\u00a0promote participation in Student Vote and\/or democratic\u00a0engagement in the community.<\/p>\n Prior to beginning the work, co-create criteria as a class\u00a0for an effective advertising campaign targeted at youth.\u00a0Recall the concepts of political thinking when developing\u00a0the criteria:<\/p>\n 5. Have each group present their marketing campaign, as\u00a0well as the rationale behind it. Guiding questions:<\/p>\n 6. Post advertisements around the school or play the\u00a0videos in the lead-up to Student Vote Day and the\u00a0election. Submit your productions to CIVIX by email or\u00a0share them through Twitter, YouTube or Facebook.<\/p>\n Reflect on and discuss different ideas to increase voter\u00a0turnout or general youth democratic engagement through\u00a0a Four Corners Debate. Designate the four corners of\u00a0the classroom as \u201cStrongly Agree\u201d, \u201cSomewhat Agree\u201d,\u00a0\u201cSomewhat Disagree\u201d and \u201cStrongly Disagree\u201d. Select a\u00a0small object (e.g., tennis ball, bean bag) to be used as a\u00a0\u2018conch\u2019 to determine whose turn it is to speak.<\/p>\n Proposals to increase voter turnout:<\/p>\n Proposals to enhance democratic engagement among\u00a0youth:<\/p>\n After each statement is read aloud, students must move\u00a0to the corner of the room that corresponds most closely\u00a0with their own point of view and be prepared to justify\u00a0their selected perspective. Students can move around the\u00a0room if their opinion changes as a result of the discussion.<\/p>\n Sample get out the vote campaigns.<\/p>\n Videos:<\/strong> Ask students to propose one change or action to increase\u00a0voter turnout through a written paragraph. They must\u00a0make two arguments to support their proposal and end\u00a0with a call to action.<\/p>\n Title Democratic Participation Guiding Question What are ways in which we can participate in our\u00a0democracy? What reasons do people have for voting or\u00a0not voting? SUMMARY A healthy and vibrant democracy is based on an active\u00a0and engaged citizenry, where all citizens are ready, willing\u00a0and able to participate. Engagement includes staying\u00a0informed, debating issues, engaging with politicians and\u00a0participating […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":752,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[2],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-309","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-secondary-lessons"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/civix.ca\/resources\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/309","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/civix.ca\/resources\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/civix.ca\/resources\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/civix.ca\/resources\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/civix.ca\/resources\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=309"}],"version-history":[{"count":5,"href":"https:\/\/civix.ca\/resources\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/309\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":1153,"href":"https:\/\/civix.ca\/resources\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/309\/revisions\/1153"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/civix.ca\/resources\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/752"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/civix.ca\/resources\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=309"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/civix.ca\/resources\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=309"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/civix.ca\/resources\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=309"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}LEARNING GOALS<\/h3>\n
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SUCCESS CRITERIA<\/h3>\n
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CURRICULUM LINKS:<\/h3>\n
MINDS ON<\/h3>\n
\n2. Review voter turnout statistics at the federal level from\u00a01970 to 2011 (Slide Deck 12<\/a>).<\/p>\n\n
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ACTION<\/h3>\n
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CONSOLIDATION<\/h3>\n
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EXEMPLARS<\/h3>\n
\nElections Ontario \u201cRoad Trip<\/a>\u201d (0:30)
\nElections Canada ad: Health Care<\/a>, First Nations<\/a><\/p>\nASSESSMENT IDEAS<\/h3>\n
SUPPLEMENTARY TOOLS<\/h3>\n
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