This document provides examples of connections that a teacher has included in instructional PowerPoints to show students the importance of the content being taught and how it relates to their everyday lives. It includes examples relating to American values, democracy, government, history, and economics that are meant to engage students by linking the classroom material to real world issues and experiences.

1. Examples of Connections
In the following slides, I have taken examples of connections to our
current world that I have included in my instructional PowerPoints.
These fit in Section 2b. of the Danielson Domains because they show the
students the importance of the content they are being taught as it relates
to their everyday lives.

2. P.O.D. Examples

3. Think-Pair-Share
• What do you value? What does our society value?

4. American Values
• Truth
• Justice
• Equality
• Diversity
• Patriotism
• Individual Rights
• Popular Sovereignty
• Common Good

5. Question
• What words do you associate with democracy? Are they similar to
your values? America’s values?

6. The Purposes of Government
• Making Economic Decisions- pass laws that determine and control
the economic environment of the nation
• Could be as simple as providing national currency, or as complex as
controlling every individual’s economic decisions
• Use economic power to distribute benefits and public services
• Stimulate economic growth and stability through controlling
inflation, encouraging trade, and regulating the development of
natural resources
• What economic decisions does the U.S. government make for you?

7. Characteristics of Democracy
• Majority Rule with Minority Rights
• People usually accept decisions made by the
majority of voters in a free election
• Laws are enacted if voted on by the majority
of lawmakers
• How could (or has) the majority rule effect the
stability of our nation?
• Minority rights are still protected under the
Constitution
• In theory, but not always in practice

8. Characteristics of Democracy
• During times of stress, such as wars, it is difficult to maintain
minority rights
• The majority would rather protect themselves
• Can you think of any historical examples of this happening?

9. What Makes an Election Free and Open?
• Everyone’s vote carries the same weight
• All candidates have the right to express their views freely, giving
voters access to competing ideas
• Citizens are free to help candidates or support issues
• Legal requirements of voting are kept to a minimum
• Helps to prevent discrimination
• How has this been challenged recently?
• Citizens may vote by secret ballot without
coercion or fear of punishment
“One
person,
one vote”

10. • This painting depicts a reception that George Washington held for
his wife Martha, a common occurrence during the President’s free
time. Why have the president’s duties increased over the past 200
years?

11. Shared Power and Conflict
• The Constitution created three branches of government and each
of those branches
• This allows for checks and balances, but it does not state what the
relationships between branched should look like…

12. The President vs. Congress
• Having Congress and the president work together is essential, but
has included a lot of conflict over the years
• Can you think of any examples of these conflicts?
• The president’s power has expanded without formal changes to
the Constitution which has interfered with Congress
• In addition, the president has taken certain liberties in
interpreting how to enforce Congressional laws
• The development of political parties may also create conflict if the
president and Congress are controlled by opposing parties

13. The Amendments
• 11th Amendment- Suits against states
• 12th Amendment- Election of
president and vice president
• 13th Amendment- Abolition of slavery
• 14th Amendment- Rights of citizens
• Due Process Clause (again)
• Equal Protection Clause- states must
apply the law equally without
discrimination
• 15th Amendment- Suffrage for
African-Americans

14. The Amendments
• 16th Amendment- Income tax
• 17th Amendment- Direct election of
U.S. Senators
• 18th Amendment- Prohibition
• 19th Amendment- Suffrage for
Women
• 20th Amendment- Term dates
• 21st Amendment- Repeal of
Prohibition

15. The Amendments
• 22nd Amendment- Limit on presidential terms
• 23rd Amendment- Presidential electors for Washington D.C.
• 24th Amendment- Abolition of poll tax
• 25th Amendment- Presidential succession
• 26th Amendment- Voting age
• 27th Amendment- Congressional salaries

16. Exit Slip
• If you could add an amendment to the Constitution, what would it
say?

17. U.S. History Examples

18. Exit Ticket
• Do you agree more with isolationist or imperialist ideals?
• Which do you think would have benefitted America the most
during the late nineteenth century?
• Which would be most beneficial in America today?

19. Famous Muckrakers
• Ida Tarbell exposed the corrupt
business practices of the Standard
Oil Company
• Upton Sinclair exposed terrible
working conditions in
slaughterhouses as well as lack of
regulations when dealing with food

20. Question
• Do we have anything similar to muckrakers today?
• How does the government feel about them?

21. Upton Sinclair
• Famous muckraker for his work The
Jungle
• His intention was to shed a light on the
poor working conditions in Chicago
factories
• He ended up portraying the horribly
unsanitary conditions in
slaughterhouses
• Still led to change…

22. The Pure Food and Drug Act, 1906
• Roosevelt was outraged and demanded reform
• Established the Food and Drug Administration as a government
agency
• Also passed the Meat Inspection Act
• Together, these acts regulated the content and inspection of food,
prohibited the use of addictive drugs in non-prescription
medicines, and required accurate labels on food and drug products

25. Connection
• The most recent presidential election consisted of a career
politician (Hillary Clinton) running against a political newcomer
(Donald Trump). How does this election mirror the Election of
1912?

26. The Underwood Tariff
• Called Congress into special session and
appeared before them for the first time in
100 years to introduce this tariff
• Claimed high tariffs blocked competition
and lower rates would help businesses by
putting them under “constant necessity to
be efficient, economical, and enterprising”
• Sought to open American markets to foreign
products and foreign markets to American
products

27. Connection
• Presidents have continued Wilson’s tradition of appearing before
Congress to make suggestions on what bills they should consider.
• What do we call this annual event?

28. THE GREAT DEPRESSION
1. On your first slip, write down your profession or place of
employment. If you rely on a spouse to support you, indicate
that on your slip.
2. On your second slip, write down how much money you have
saved up in the bank.
3. A few years ago, you saw stocks were rising in value and decided
to invest your disposable income. On your third slip, write down
how much money you have invested in the stock market.
4. On the fourth slip, write down whether you rent an apartment or
own a house.

29. THE GREAT DEPRESSION
• You’ve just woken up on October 29th 1929. The sun is shining
through your bedroom window and it looks like its going to be a
nice day. You step outside to retrieve your newspaper, and you see
the headlines.

30. THE GREAT DEPRESSION
• Shocked and worried about what this
will mean for your investments, you
rush to get ready and head to the
stockbrokers to sell all of your stock
and retrieve what money you still can.
When you get there, he begs you not to
sell and tells you that what you’ll make
from selling will only cover the cost of
what you still owe him from buying on
the margin. You decide to sell anyway
just in case the stock market drops
even more.

31. THE GREAT DEPRESSION
• You leave upset, but comforted knowing that you still have some
money in the bank to support your family with. Just then, you hear
in passing that the banks had been using their customers money to
invest in stocks themselves. Without the permission of their
customers, banks around the nation had invested and
subsequently lost money playing the stocks. You rush to the local
branch of your bank to take out any money you can.

32. THE GREAT DEPRESSION
• Unfortunately, everyone else had the same idea as you. The bank
did not have enough money to give everyone their savings back so
only the first few people who made it to the bank that day got their
savings back.

33. THE GREAT DEPRESSION
• Now most of the town is worried about money and stop buying
anything that is unnecessary. If your job belongs to one of those
industries, you will most likely be laid off or have your wages
greatly diminished.

34. THE GREAT DEPRESSION
• With even less money in circulation because of the lowering of
wages and layoffs, those of you who have more essential services
begin to be laid off as well, since your employers simply cannot
afford to pay you.

35. THE GREAT DEPRESSION
• You now have no job, no savings, no
investments… but at least you have a
home, right?
• Renters, how will you pay for rent with
no money coming in or saved up?
• Homeowners, technically, you don’t own
your homes, the banks do. You give them
a mortgage payment each month that
goes toward the loan you took out when
you purchased the home. Once you can
no longer pay your mortgage payments,
the bank will foreclose on your property,
and you too will become homeless.

36. THE GREAT DEPRESSION
• Many people found themselves in this exact predicament in
1929/1930 after the stock market crashed.
• How do you think they felt? What would you have done if you had
experienced the effects of the stock market crash firsthand?