2. WELCOME!
Our goal: to provide info on U.S. culture
AND to help you create an effective plan to use in
your classroom.
Please ask questions! That’s why we’re here.
5. U.S. Constitution
“We the People of the United States, in Order to form a more perfect
Union, establish Justice, insure domestic Tranquility, provide for the
common defence, promote the general Welfare, and secure the
Blessings of Liberty to ourselves and our Posterity, do ordain and
establish this Constitution for the United States of America.”
– From the Preamble of the U.S. Constitution, signed on September 17, 1787
6. The First Amendment
“Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion,
or prohibiting the free exercise thereof; or abridging the freedom of
speech, or of the press; or the right of the people peaceably to
assemble, and to petition the Government for a redress of grievances.”
– From the Bill of Rights (the first ten Amendments to the U.S. Constitution
7. Freedom of Speech
• The U.S. government and its citizen take the right to Freedom of
Speech very seriously, but sometimes Freedom of Speech is
controversial, even today.
• Still, there are some restrictions: speech that is considered an
“incitement to crime, true threats, commercial speech, defamation
of character….” These are just a few examples and relate to cases
that have reached the U.S. Supreme Court.
• Discussion question for students: Is Freedom of Speech in your
community? In your school? Can you give an example of Free Speech
from your own experience?
9. Freedom of the Press
• Freedom of Press in the United States means the government is prohibited
from interfering in the publication or distribution of news, information, or
opinion.
• Like Freedom of Speech, there are some restrictions under the law, against
defamation or copyright infringement.
• In the United States, like many countries around the world, citizens rely on
the media to investigate what the government says or individual politicians
say. Sometimes this leads to conflict between the media and the
government, but both have an important role to play in a democratic society.
• Question for student discussion: Do you believe what you read newspapers
(hear on tv, radio, etc…)? Why or Why not? Do you think it is the media’s
responsibility to tell the truth?
10. Freedom of the Press
UNESCO’s World Press Freedom Day celebrated
each year on May 3
Statistics from 2012
• 121 journalists were killed
(nearly double from 2011)
• 38 journalists were kidnapped
• 879 journalists were arrested
• 1,993 journalists were physically
attacked or threatened
Tawakkol Karman, 2011 Laureate for the
Nobel Peace Prize delivering the keynote
speech during the World Press Freedom Day
2012 in Tunis, Tunisia
11. Internet Freedom
• Internet Freedom not covered in the First Amendment – a new area for
Freedom of Expression.
• U.S Congress issued a resolution in 2012, stating that “it is the consistent
and unequivocal policy of the United States to promote a global Internet
free from government control.”
• Countries have different laws about Internet freedom, some countries
do not allow their citizens to access the Internet without restriction.
• UNESCO is also focused on Internet freedom, particularly on setting
standards for laws and regulations in member states, as another
component of its overall efforts to promote Freedom of Expression.
12. Why does Freedom of Expression Matter?
• Young people all over the world are faced with
questions about free speech. Increased use of the
Internet for social interaction and activism will only
continue to increase.
• Language, like information and Internet access, is a
tool. Rules and laws governing freedom of expression
influence how we use these important tools.
• Can you think of any other reasons?
13. Plan Your Lesson Plan
1) What are your topics?
2) What kind of questions/conversations starters
will you ask?
3) What new vocabulary do you need?
4) What activities can you do with your students?
14. Discussion Questions
• Does Free Speech mean you can say whatever
you want? What if it hurts someone’s
feelings? Puts someone in danger?
• How is Freedom of Speech protected in
my/your/our country?
• Should everyone have access to the Internet?
Should Internet access be Free? Why or Why
not?
15. Vocabulary
FREEDOM LIBERTY
SPEECH FOUNDING FATHERS
PRESS UNALIENABLE RIGHTS
CITIZEN BILL OF RIGHTS
VALUE AMENDMENT
INTERNET JOURNALIST
SOCIAL MEDIA SELF-EXPRESSION
ACCESS CENSORSHIP
16. Activities
1) Activity #1 – Personal Identity Expression
• Brainstorm a list of adjectives that might describe a person.
Encourage students to write them on the board. Identify whether
each adjective is positive (+) or negative (-). * Remember! An
adjective could be both positive and negative depending on
context.
• Distribute a notecard-sized index card and magazines. Ask the
following question: “Which adjective(s) most describe you?”
• Have students cut out adjectives from magazines that describe
themselves.
18. Activities
2) Activity #2 – Free Speech and Social Media
• Students trade their identity cards created in Activity 1
with another person in the class. Students write out a
‘faux’ Facebook message posting based on the identity
they see from the cards.
• Ask students to read these postings to their classmates.
What would their comments be? How does it feel when
someone responds negatively to your post? How about
positively?
• Students discuss whether their comments on FB should
be more positive or negative in content and tone.
19.
20. Activities
3) Activity #3 – Citizen Journalism (For
Advanced Students)
• Pick a question or topic. Ask students to write a paragraph expressing
their opinion. If time allows, look for pictures in a magazine or online
that illustrates the topic. Combine all the pieces onto one-two page
“newspaper” and publish it, by printing copies for all the students.
• Investigate a topic. Separate students into small groups. Each group
will investigate an issue at their school or neighborhood and then write
a 1 paragraph news story. This story should include the most
important questions of journalism, “Who, What, Where, When and
Why?” Compile the news articles on onto one-two page
“newspaper” and publish it, by printing copies for all the students.
Have students read each others stories and ask questions.
Note: This Citizen Journalism activity can be used for many topics to practice –
not just Freedom of Expression!
“The Scene at the Signing of the Constitution, oil painting (reproduction) by Howard Chandler Christy, 1940’From archives.gov,Courtesy of the Architect of the Capitol, Washington, DCPresidential portraits (whitehouse.gov)A Brief History of the Bill of Rights and the First AmendmentThe first ten amendments to the Constitution of the United States became known as the Bill of Rights because they contained freedoms that Americans held to be their inalienable rights. So important were these rights that several states insisted on a promise of amendments guaranteeing individual rights before they would ratify the Constitution.The Bill of Rights, ratified in 1791, was the result of more than a century of experience with rights in America and many centuries before that in England. The major British precursors to the Bill of Rights are:The Magna Carta (1215).Petition of Right (1628).Bill of Rights (1689).Rights were crucial to America’s founding. Because their rights in England were threatened, many future Americans left their homeland to form new colonies in a strange land. And because their rights were threatened, the colonists declared independence from England and created a new nation to secure those rights.While the new state governments protected individual rights, the Articles of Confederation, the first constitution of the United States, did not. The weak national government under the Articles of Confederation created many problems. In 1787, these problems finally led to a convention to draft a new charter for the national government, the Constitution of the United States. Lack of a bill of rights became the main reason many people opposed the Constitution.When New Hampshire became the necessary ninth state to ratify it, the Constitution went into effect on June 21, 1788. Ratification was achieved only through the promise of amendments to protect individual rights. Congressional debates over the Bill of Rights drafted by James Madison, then a U.S. representative from Virginia, were, in Madison’s words, “extremely difficult and fatiguing.” Members of Congress challenged each other to duels at one passionate point in the debates. Congress submitted a bill of rights with 12 amendments to the states for ratification in September 1789. Two were not ratified: one changing the apportionment of Congress and the other forbidding congressional pay raises to take effect until after the next election. (This latter amendment was ratified in 1992 as the 27th Amendment to the Constitution.)On Dec. 15, 1791, Virginia ratified the 10 amendments. This satisfied the requirement of approval by three-fourths of the states, and the Bill of Rights became part of the law of the land.Originally the Bill of Rights only limited the national government and did not apply to the states. But after the fourteenth Amendment was ratified in 1868, the Supreme Court began applying the provisions of the Bill of Rights — one by one — to the states. In 1925, the Supreme Court ruled that no state or local government could deny its citizens free-speech and free-press rights protected by the First Amendment.Often considered the most important amendment in the Bill of Rights, the First Amendment protects rights essential to democratic government and those rights Americans hold most dear: freedom of religion, of speech, of the press, of assembly and of petition. Excerpts from The Bill of Rights: A User's Guide (Linda Monk, Close Up Foundation, 1991) included in this brief history of the First Amendment are reprinted with permission of the Close Up Foundation.
A Brief History of the Bill of Rights and the First AmendmentThe first ten amendments to the Constitution of the United States became known as the Bill of Rights because they contained freedoms that Americans held to be their inalienable rights. So important were these rights that several states insisted on a promise of amendments guaranteeing individual rights before they would ratify the Constitution.The Bill of Rights, ratified in 1791, was the result of more than a century of experience with rights in America and many centuries before that in England. The major British precursors to the Bill of Rights are:The Magna Carta (1215).Petition of Right (1628).Bill of Rights (1689).Rights were crucial to America’s founding. Because their rights in England were threatened, many future Americans left their homeland to form new colonies in a strange land. And because their rights were threatened, the colonists declared independence from England and created a new nation to secure those rights.While the new state governments protected individual rights, the Articles of Confederation, the first constitution of the United States, did not. The weak national government under the Articles of Confederation created many problems. In 1787, these problems finally led to a convention to draft a new charter for the national government, the Constitution of the United States. Lack of a bill of rights became the main reason many people opposed the Constitution.When New Hampshire became the necessary ninth state to ratify it, the Constitution went into effect on June 21, 1788. Ratification was achieved only through the promise of amendments to protect individual rights. Congressional debates over the Bill of Rights drafted by James Madison, then a U.S. representative from Virginia, were, in Madison’s words, “extremely difficult and fatiguing.” Members of Congress challenged each other to duels at one passionate point in the debates. Congress submitted a bill of rights with 12 amendments to the states for ratification in September 1789. Two were not ratified: one changing the apportionment of Congress and the other forbidding congressional pay raises to take effect until after the next election. (This latter amendment was ratified in 1992 as the 27th Amendment to the Constitution.)On Dec. 15, 1791, Virginia ratified the 10 amendments. This satisfied the requirement of approval by three-fourths of the states, and the Bill of Rights became part of the law of the land.Originally the Bill of Rights only limited the national government and did not apply to the states. But after the fourteenth Amendment was ratified in 1868, the Supreme Court began applying the provisions of the Bill of Rights — one by one — to the states. In 1925, the Supreme Court ruled that no state or local government could deny its citizens free-speech and free-press rights protected by the First Amendment.Often considered the most important amendment in the Bill of Rights, the First Amendment protects rights essential to democratic government and those rights Americans hold most dear: freedom of religion, of speech, of the press, of assembly and of petition. Excerpts from The Bill of Rights: A User's Guide (Linda Monk, Close Up Foundation, 1991) included in this brief history of the First Amendment are reprinted with permission of the Close Up Foundation.
A Brief History of the Bill of Rights and the First AmendmentThe first ten amendments to the Constitution of the United States became known as the Bill of Rights because they contained freedoms that Americans held to be their inalienable rights. So important were these rights that several states insisted on a promise of amendments guaranteeing individual rights before they would ratify the Constitution.The Bill of Rights, ratified in 1791, was the result of more than a century of experience with rights in America and many centuries before that in England. The major British precursors to the Bill of Rights are:The Magna Carta (1215).Petition of Right (1628).Bill of Rights (1689).Rights were crucial to America’s founding. Because their rights in England were threatened, many future Americans left their homeland to form new colonies in a strange land. And because their rights were threatened, the colonists declared independence from England and created a new nation to secure those rights.While the new state governments protected individual rights, the Articles of Confederation, the first constitution of the United States, did not. The weak national government under the Articles of Confederation created many problems. In 1787, these problems finally led to a convention to draft a new charter for the national government, the Constitution of the United States. Lack of a bill of rights became the main reason many people opposed the Constitution.When New Hampshire became the necessary ninth state to ratify it, the Constitution went into effect on June 21, 1788. Ratification was achieved only through the promise of amendments to protect individual rights. Congressional debates over the Bill of Rights drafted by James Madison, then a U.S. representative from Virginia, were, in Madison’s words, “extremely difficult and fatiguing.” Members of Congress challenged each other to duels at one passionate point in the debates. Congress submitted a bill of rights with 12 amendments to the states for ratification in September 1789. Two were not ratified: one changing the apportionment of Congress and the other forbidding congressional pay raises to take effect until after the next election. (This latter amendment was ratified in 1992 as the 27th Amendment to the Constitution.)On Dec. 15, 1791, Virginia ratified the 10 amendments. This satisfied the requirement of approval by three-fourths of the states, and the Bill of Rights became part of the law of the land.Originally the Bill of Rights only limited the national government and did not apply to the states. But after the fourteenth Amendment was ratified in 1868, the Supreme Court began applying the provisions of the Bill of Rights — one by one — to the states. In 1925, the Supreme Court ruled that no state or local government could deny its citizens free-speech and free-press rights protected by the First Amendment.Often considered the most important amendment in the Bill of Rights, the First Amendment protects rights essential to democratic government and those rights Americans hold most dear: freedom of religion, of speech, of the press, of assembly and of petition. Excerpts from The Bill of Rights: A User's Guide (Linda Monk, Close Up Foundation, 1991) included in this brief history of the First Amendment are reprinted with permission of the Close Up Foundation.
Illustration of the ACLU.org website; postage stamp graphic from wikimedia commons.
Anti-Proposition 8 protesters wave a rainbow flag in front of the U.S. Supreme Court in Washington, March 26, 2013. REUTERS/Jonathan Ernst
Cartoon from aclu.org websitePhoto from unesco.org website
UN Statistics from 2012121 journalists were killed (nearly double the previous year38 journalists were kidnapped879 journalists were arrested1,993 journalists were physically attacked or threatened
Image from shutterstock
Does Free Speech mean you can say whatever you want? What if it hurts someone’s feelings? Puts someone in danger?How is Freedom of Speech protected in my/your/our country?Should everyone have access to the Internet? Why or Why not?Should Internet access be Free,? Why or Why Not?
