American National Government, PS 101 – Greg Shaw

My introductory American government class has involved a series of small group projects presented by students in class. The oral presentations tend to prompt a good deal of conversation, but the presentations themselves often lack polish. I believe the presenters would take more care with their ideas and their words if their work were on public display. Such an on-line posting of the groups’ work would also allow the class to focus on its responses to the written work rather than using scarce class time to sit through sometimes inefficient presentations.

As an example, I ask students to consider a case that is headed for or was recently heard by a federal court. The assignment invites students to combine their readings with our class discussions of the issue and to bring to bear the analytic tools from both on the case in question. My idea is to ask the small groups – each consisting of perhaps 4-6 students – to develop a mock ruling based on the facts of the case, their own reasoning, and the relevant precedents embodied in related cases from the past. Students could collaborate face to face or electronically to create their group’s written opinion, and those opinions would be available on the course wiki for all to review before coming to class to discuss. Not only would the broad arguments be open to debate, but also their (hopefully) close reasoning. This approach could also work for our discussion of proposals for further campaign finance reform and our re-write of the US Constitution.

Barbara Ganley’s insight that when students’ work is open to the world, or at least to the class to review, students produce better quality work is certainly intriguing, though I guess I’ll fully believe it when I see it. However, taking this on faith, I hope that peer-to-peer and group-to-group comparisons online will lead students to raise the bar of expectations. Presuming that no group wants to be labeled the slacker group, good quality work should result.

I’ll give this idea a whirl in the fall and will post a follow-up about how it turned out. I’m certainly open to suggestions, so bring on the collective brain power. Thanks in advance for any thoughts you might have.

Greg