Historically, elections can create social tension in the United States. With the increasing division in political rhetoric, it has become harder and harder for teachers to discuss political history in the making without hearing complaints from students or parents.
For that reason, many teachers have said they’re planning on avoiding the upcoming 2024 election entirely in the classroom, despite the obvious historical significance of the event. That’s an understandable response given the political climate. Still, as a former teacher, I see the election as a once-every-four-years opportunity to teach students essential durable skills such as critical thinking, research and digital literacy.
Here are four ways teachers can avoid opinion and encourage civil debate and inspire social responsibility in their students.
1. Don’t let one voice drown out the others
Modern politics often favors the loudest person over the person with the most reasoned, factual and well-presented argument. In political discussion in the classroom, quieter or more introverted students can feel overpowered by their peers or may not have the opportunity to speak at all.
When I was a social studies teacher, I mitigated this problem by holding Socratic debates. I asked my students to research a set topic and be prepared to participate in discussion during the following class period. Researching a topic kept students focused on policy and less on politicians in the discussion.
On the day of the class debate, I placed firm limits on speaking by distributing three poker chips to each student. Each of those chips represented a single speaking opportunity to provide a well-reasoned response to a posed question or previous student comment. Students knew that their response was graded based on the parameters provided prior to the debate. When they used up all of their chips, they were no longer allowed to speak up.
This way, students learned valuable research skills. During the debate, the structure gave each student an equal opportunity to speak without letting any individual voice dominate the conversation—or letting any voices go unheard. Because the rules were even and fair for each student, nobody felt like they were being unfairly silenced.
2. Model and support civil debate
Regardless of the state of actual political debates, elections are a valuable opportunity for educators to teach civil debate based on research and facts.
Socratic debates, like the one I described above, favor critical thinking over emotional outbursts. When each student had an equal opportunity to speak, the more complete and well-reasoned arguments tended to shine over the hasty and flawed ones blurted out in the heat of the moment.
I also noticed that the extroverted students would run through their chips quickly, leaving the quieter students more time to collect their thoughts and get the last word. Perhaps most importantly, this format removed my own opinion from the equation entirely.
In this format, the teacher is a moderator and facilitator, not a speaker. A skilled moderator keeps the conversation focused not on who can state their opinion the loudest, but how to structure an argument, use rhetoric to present it effectively and adhere to the rules of a proper debate.
3. Promote civic understanding and responsibility
No matter the year, the candidates or the rhetoric, one of the most enduring and positive messages that (almost) everyone can agree on is that engaging in the political process is a matter of civic responsibility. Showing students the importance of the political process may mean assigning them to research political parties, dig into a candidate’s record or find background information on a particular issue of their choice—another opportunity to teach research skills that they’ll use for the rest of their lives.
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I focused lessons on voting as a civic responsibility and our school held mock elections supported by the student government to make the act of voting a significant event that students could participate in. We also supported all students who were of voting age to register to vote in order to aid that process. As with the debate, I focused on why and how to vote, without showing bias or stepping into any sort of discussions about who or what to vote for.
4. Contrast bias and objectivity
This one is tricky because everyone has biases—including teachers. Speaking or writing from an entirely objective viewpoint is challenging for anyone, and many people who carry those biases don’t realize they have them.
Listening to others’ opinions throughout debates and mock elections, many of my students realized that they were carrying their own biases. Having a student simply recognize a bias and then contrast it with an objective viewpoint is a major durable skill teaching moment. Simply seeing the difference is the point—not changing anyone’s minds.
To underscore this point, I assigned students to create an entirely unbiased news story with a list of prescribed facts. They were able to see the challenges that writers and editors face when they are covering controversial topics and working to be truly objective, the language they used to connect their given facts to the story and what facts they included or excluded added their own bias to the story. This assignment helped them see their own biases in a different light and taught them an important lesson in media literacy: especially when it comes to political coverage, always consider the source.
I understand some teachers’ hesitation to bring the election into their classroom at all, but I believe the rich educational opportunities are worth the risk and effort. My parting advice is this: You can cover hard things, but it requires laying the groundwork, setting clear parameters and respecting the context of your school, city and state.
