Your Role in a Student's Civic Involvement

The National Center for Education Statistics recently released its 2006 "Report Card," containing the Civics assessment results for the nation's primary and secondary schools. The study illuminates, through numerous startling statistics, the deficiencies in our country's Civic education programs. A few of the facts include:

• Only 24% of 4th graders, 22% of 8th graders, and 27% of 12th graders reach a proficient level of civic education
• Only 53% of Fourth graders were exposed to lessons covering "Rules and Laws of our Government" during the year. Even worse, only 41% were in classes where "How our Government works" was covered.  
• Download the full 2006 Civics Report Card here (PDF - 1115KB)

Add to these statistics the fact that less than 55% of Americans of all ages can identify the three branches of government (ABA Civic Education Study, 2005) and the Civic education problem in our country becomes readily apparent.

As an Educator you are vital to remedying this problem, and the CLIK is here to help. Below we provide a link to a comprehensive database of lesson plans that can be used to engage your students both in and out of the class room. Further, the links in the left toolbar lead to programs initiated and lead by Secretary Grayson and other civically minded organizations. Please explore these links to help the CLIK accomplish its goals!

The following link leads to a searchable database containing numerous civically based lesson plans. Categorized by subject and age group, the database is useful to all K-12 Civics educators throughout the state.

Search the Civics lesson plan database

We have also compiled a recommended reading list geared heavily towards elementary and middle school students, yet also including a few suggestions for more advanced material. The list is categorized by age to make it easily accessible.

Browse the full reading list (PDF - 46.5KB)

NEW! PBS Teachers have launched PBS VOTE 2008 (http://www.pbs.org/teachers/vote2008/). Educators can find civic lesson plans, interactives and other resources created for use by students and teachers at this new Web site. The materials contained on this site are geared toward elementary and secondary grade levels.  

The site provides links to feeds for election-related podcasts from public television and radio stations and producers as well as an array of social media tools educators can use to engage students in the election process.