“American civic education should teach students how to be citizens” and help them find their place both in the “country and in the world,” says Bill of Rights Institute president David Bobb. He argues that the recently released “Roadmap to Educating for American Democracy,” an “inquiry-based content framework” for improving K-12 history and civics, can help to achieve this goal.
The Roadmap was the product of a 20-month collaborative process between members of Educating for American Democracy, a cross-ideological coalition of over 300 scholars, educators, students, and administrators funded by the National Endowment for the Humanities and the U.S. Department of Education. The Roadmap is organized around seven themes such as civic participation, “We the People” as a political idea, and the United States’ place in the world. It provides key historical and civic concepts for each theme, covering important topics such as the virtues necessary for republican citizenship. Additionally, it gives teachers sample questions grouped by grade level and five design challenges featuring topics that tend to be left out of classroom discussion.
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