Suggested action for teachers

[tbyg52]

I'm embarrassed not to have thought of this before, but now that I've thought of it I'm going to do it, and I'm overcoming my embarrassment and posting my plans.

Background: I've always had a paperback copy of the Constitution in my room and I post all the quotes I think I can get away with, which has recently included the Bill of Rights, first and fourth highlighted.

Well, gee, I finally thought, how about the whole thing, larger and in a better format than the output of my laser printer?

So I'm going to order all of these:
http://www.allposters.com/-sp/The-Constitution-Posters_i1334409_.htm

Let's *all* do it! Wouldn't it be a great statement to have the governing documents of our country in every classroom? (Thinking back, I'm not sure they *weren't* when I was a kid.)

It's a sad commentary on the current state of affairs that this feels like a subversive post.

[unpossibles]

1. great idea

hopefully the 10 Amendments (and the rest, obviously) will be more popular than the 10 Commandments

[uppityperson]

2. if flag is mandatory, constitution/bill of rights is necessary

let them see exactly what it is.

[walldude]

7. Mandatory flag... HA! You see where Cheney had

flags taken away from little old lady protesters?

http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=view_all&address=364x1796988

[Dinger]

3. K & R!

I already have the flag, with MLK right next to it, and I have the DOI, but I'll get these too!

[LWolf]

4. I have the same laser-printed copies already available.

I'll ponder the poster. In my old district, it could have gone directly under the required classroom flag. My current district doesn't require a flag in the room. Since I no longer teach US history or civics or political science, it would no longer be content related. These days, everything we do is supposed to be directly related to content standards and benchmarks.

Except as a comparison to the governments and documents of the earlier civilizations we do study. I'm pondering.

[tbyg52]

5. I would submit...

...that the founding documents of our country are related to *any* topic. I also contend that forbidding their posting anywhere in a school would be un-American.

Of course, that contention doesn't do any good if the administration differs, but if anyone had an administration that differed and if said "anyone" pursued it through legal channels, I'd buy a ticket to that!

[LWolf]

6. I've never heard of a direct "forbidding."

In my previous district, while something on the wall might not be "forbidden," there were district required, standardized bulletin boards directly related to the mandated scripted curriculums. District people did "random room checks" to make sure that the bulletin boards were up, current, and following the district's standardized "pacing schedule" for the scripted curriculum. Once you'd spent all the hours creating all of the required stuff on the walls, there wasn't much left in the way of wall space for anything else. It could have easily fit under the flag, though, and wouldn't have been questioned.

I don't disagree with you about the constitution and its relation to any curriculum. The standardistos currently controlling public ed in many places do not necessarily agree, though. My previous district seemed pretty draconian with the random bulletin board checkers, planbook checkers, and "pacing schedule." Neighboring districts, however, had random checkers that would go into the room to see if the standard being taught was posted on the wall somewhere, and would do random student "checks," asking students what "standard" their current activity was working on. If the student couldn't recite the standard, or read it from the wall, the teacher was written up.

[aikoaiko]

8. Great, except that cursive is really difficult to read, IMHO. nt

[proud2BlibKansan]

9. Many of us have been doing this for years.

[tbyg52]

10. Sure, that's why...

...I said I was embarrassed that I just thought of it. (Actually, what I just thought of was making it more *prominent*, in light of current affairs....)

Yeah, I'm not crazy about the cursive either--I'd like to find something poster-sized but not necessarily a photocopy of the original.

[proud2BlibKansan]

11. I help my kids write their own constitution for our classroom every year

It's a geat way to teach them to understand the US constitution.