This spring, PBS LearningMedia spotlights the U.S. Constitution!
Enhance your next lesson with PBS LearningMedia’s brand new collection of FREE, curriculum-targeted resources from the series, Constitution USA (Grades 9-12). Use these resources to instigate classroom discussion around key concepts like Federalism, equality, and separation of powers – and to help your students to better-understand the impact of the Constitution in their own lives. Click here to access to the new collection.
The framers of the Constitution were cautious about centralizing power and, as a result, adopted the philosophy of ‘divide and conquer’. At the national level, they created three different branches of government to administer three different types of power: The legislative branch made the laws through a Congress of two houses, the Senate and the House of Representatives. The executive branch enforced the laws through a president, vice president, and numerous executive departments such as Treasury and State. And the judicial branch interpreted the laws through a Supreme Court and other lower courts. Use this special collection from PBS LearningMedia to expand on these concepts with your high school students and to reinforce key concepts in your next history, government, or social studies class. Featured resources include:
An Enduring Document
Yale professor Akhil Amar talks with Peter Sagal about why our Constitution has endured as long as it has. He believes this is because of its ability to be amended.
The U.S. President
Historian Rick Beeman shares some insight behind the creation of the office of U.S. President and explains why the role’s duties are hardly touched upon at all in the Constitution.