Declaring Freedom

Engage

Students have always been known to complain. But complaining in itself can be the foundation of understanding and change. In America our Founding Fathers often indulged in gripe sessions. In fact, a list of grievances makes up the largest part of the Declaration of Independence. Declaring Freedom is a lesson that brings forward the grievances of today’s youth and asks them to use the principles that our Founding Fathers used to declare their independence. 
 

Explore

Write down the following 6 points and then explore the links below to better understand and prepare yourself for the assignment.  You may use what ever method you wish to document your work making sure that it can be evaluated by your teacher for completions. 
1. How did the ideas of John Locke and Thomas Paine influence Jefferson’s writings in the Declaration of Independence?
2. What precedents exist for specific elements in the Declaration of Independence, both in previous documents and in historical events?
3. How is the Declaration structured?
4. Discuss the meaning of the three natural rights that Jefferson identified in the Declaration of Independence: "Life, Liberty, and the Pursuit of Happiness."
5. For each one of the three natural rights what does this right specifically refer to in your lives today?
6. What did Jefferson mean when he said “all men are created equal’?
Some helpful background:
   Most Americans were opponents of the Stamp Act of 1765 which was designed to raise money to support the British army stationed in America after 1763 by requiring Americans to buy stamps for newspapers, legal documents, mortgages, liquor licenses, even playing cards and almanacs. This act was viewed as illegal and unjust because it taxed Americans without their consent. In protesting the act, American leaders cited the following prohibition against taxation without consent: No scutage [tax] ... shall be imposed..., unless by common counsel... from the The Magna Carta, http://www.yale.edu/lawweb/avalon/medieval/magframe.htm, written in 1215, 550 years earlier (Avalon Project, 2007).
  The Stamp Act was repealed in 1766 but soon similar taxes were levied by British Parliament. The American Revolution began in earnest as the colonial leaders created the Declaration of Independence which was adopted by the Continental Congress on July 4, 1776, in which the colonies declared their freedom from British rule. Thomas Jefferson, the principal author of the Declaration, incorporated many other writers’ ideas into his document.  One influence was the author Thomas Paine. Paine suggested that the colonies should declare their independence.  On January 10, 1776, Thomas Paine published a booklet called Common Sense. In the booklet, he described his vision of a government in which the people, through their elected representatives, would have supreme power. He was the first to openly suggest independence from Britain. The booklet was broadly circulated, and even George Washington read it. Thomas Paine's booklet would have a major influence on Thomas Jefferson in his writing of the Declaration of Independence.
   Another influence was philosopher John Locke, whose works such as Two Treatises on Government put forth such ideas as unalienable rights or natural rights of all men and that a good government has a contract with its citizens to abide by the consent of the governed.
Using the ideas from these authors here are some other resources to help understand why:

• Thomas Jefferson wrote a justification of why he supported declaring independence from England which showed how he used the current thinking of his time and used the natural rights ideas.
• He also was a man that owned slaves. Here is background that may shed light on why Jefferson wrote that "All Men Are Created Equal"
• Other Web site resources:
  You may want to use this link to get some ideas on student rights http://www.teach-nology.com/policymakers/student_rights/
  The following documents are available through the EDSITEment resource The Avalon Project At The Yale Law School http://www.yale.edu/lawweb/avalon/avalon.htmunless otherwise noted.
  1. The Magna Carta http://www.yale.edu/lawweb/avalon/medieval/magframe.htm  (June 1215). Of structural interest is the preamble and the last section (#63). What differences and similarities do the students notice? Section 1 and Section 12 also have relevant content.
  The Digital Classroom  http://www.archives.gov/digital_classroom/index.htmloffers a digitized copy of the Magna Carta, http://www.archives.gov/exhibits/featured_documents/magna_carta/, a translation of a 1297 version, http://www.archives.gov/exhibits/featured_documents/magna_carta/translation.html, and an analysis, "Magna Carta and Its American Legacy" http://www.archives.gov/exhibits/featured_documents/magna_carta/legacy.html
  2. The First Charter of Virginia http://www.yale.edu/lawweb/avalon/states/va01.htm (April 10, 1606). A relevant section begins "And we do also ordain, establish, and agree, for Us, our Heirs, and Successors, that each of the said Colonies shall have a Council" and ends "pass under the Privy Seal of our Realm of England;" a statement of the colonists' ability to pass laws.
  3. The Mayflower Compact http://www.nationalcenter.org/MayflowerCompact.html (November, 1621).
  4. English Bill of Rights http://www.yale.edu/lawweb/avalon/england.htm (1689) for comparison to the list of grievances (such as quartering troops, a standing army, suspending of laws).
  5. The Royal Proclamation http://www.yale.edu/lawweb/avalon/proc1763.htm (October 7, 1763) issued at the conclusion of the French and Indian War. Look at the section beginning with "for the security of the Liberties and Properties" and ending with "and call General Assemblies."
  6. The Resolutions of the Continental Congress, http://www.yale.edu/lawweb/avalon/resolu65.htm, also known as The Stamp Act Congress (October 19, 1765). Especially relevant is the list of complaints (such as the complaint beginning "That the only representatives of the people of these colonies...").
  7. The Articles of Association http://www.yale.edu/lawweb/avalon/contcong/10-20-74.htm (October 20, 1774). For comparison to the list of grievances, look at the passage from "the present unhappy situation of our affairs is occasioned by a ruinous system of colony administration" to "whenever a wicked ministry shall chuse so to direct them." Students should also look at the statement beginning "To obtain redress of these grievances."
  8. The Virginia Declaration of Rights http://www.archives.gov/national-archives-experience/charters/virginia_declaration_of_rights.html (June 12, 1776), written by George Mason and accessible from EDSITEment through The Digital Classroomhttp://www.archives.gov/digital_classroom/index.html. Especially pertinent are the first three sections.

Explain

The class will be broken down into small groups.  Each student will be expected to participate in a group. Each group project will be graded using a rubric created by the teacher. Each student will research the project. In order to obtain a grade of A, all students will be expected to make significant contributions to the end product. Each member of the group will be responsible for reading all of the background materials prior to the groups’ first meeting. For the first meeting the instructor will set up an audio/video conference with each group, this will be done using Nortel’s Network PC Client of which each student will be given an account.  Those students who can not access the live video stream will be connected in real time to the live audio feed. Students may wish to meet at one location if possible but it is not necessary. (If the Nortel Client is not available students will take place in either a conference call or convene in a small group setting)
   The video conference will be 90 minutes and attendance and participations is mandatory for the class.  The instructor will lead the discussion on the background of the Declaration of Independence. The 6 main points from Explore will be the focus of the discussion.
   In a follow up to the conference the group will collaborate and post their answers to the follow questions on the discussion board for the class on the school’s content management site. (NOTE: each student must also respond to at least 2 other postings from your classmates groups).
1. List the main ideas in John Locke's theory of natural rights and revolution. Then read Jefferson's first two paragraphs in the Declaration of Independence. What similarities and differences do you see?
2. Write a letter to Thomas Jefferson expressing your views on his ideas about equality and slavery and why did he use the saying "All men are created equal."?

Elaborate

Here is where you get to apply your learning to real time! 
   You have overheard your classmates at times make various complaints about the treatment of young people. Complaints not unlike those motivated the Founding Fathers at the time of the American Revolution. List the 5 complaints you and your classmates have about the treatment of young people. The complaints should be of a general nature (for example: no cell phone use in the school, no access to myspace...). Collect the lists from the other members of your group and share them so you can discuss the issues and identify the most important ones to address.  Remember that we often are more eager to express what's wrong than we are to think critically about the problem and possible solutions.
As a group now answer the following questions:
* WHO makes the rules we don't like?
* WHO decides if they are fair or not?
* HOW does one get them changed?
* WHAT does it mean to be independent from the rules?
* HOW does a group of people declare that they will no longer follow the rules?
   Now try to imagine yourself back in 1776 and what is the process involved in our deliberation and attempts to redress grievances.  What are you going to do about it? In order of effecting some changes you need to compose a document based on your complaints to be sent to the appropriate audience. As you begin to compose your document, you should consider the following questions.
* To whom would you send your complaints? Why? What reasons would you give for your decision to write out your complaints? (Preamble)
* What makes you think your complaints are worthwhile? Aren't there good reasons why things are the way they are? Why should things as they are be changed? Would it be possible to summarize the thinking behind your desire for change in a single sentence? (statement of beliefs, or the thinking behind the complaints)
* Is there anything in particular the reader should notice about your complaints? Is there anything you need to keep in mind to make sure your audience understands and appreciates your complaints? What kinds of events inspired your complaints? (the list of complaints)
* Have you already tried to make any changes in the treatment of young people? In what way? (prior attempts to redress grievances)
* Is it possible to say in a single sentence what it is you really want to happen? It would take time to change the system to accommodate all of your complaints. What should happen right away? (declaration of independence)
* Who would be willing to sign his/her name to this list of complaints even if it were going to be seen and read by many people? (the signatures)
   Now as a group read the transcript of the Declaration that you received at the outset of the class. The goal here is to understand the structure of the document and the basic intent of each section.
   Final Project: Each group will publish and declare (present) their "declarations."  Each group must turn in a document and a multimedia presentation of their declaration.  If you have typed up the document on the computer try to use a background that would symbolize an aged document. Make hyperlinks in your document to support your grievances (at least one should be from the Declaration of Independence). Make sure that each member of the group signs the document. 
      The multimedia presentations that are acceptable are a PowerPoint, a video using Movie Maker, a webpage or the group making a ceremonial reading to the instructor via video conferencing.
Make sure you document: 
1. What roles did each member in the group play for this project?
2. What part of their own declaration would they say most resembles the 1776 Declaration of Independence? Which complaint? Which part of their beliefs?
3. What changes did they make in the course of writing their documents and how did the group decide to proceed?
In your final journal entry each student needs to respond these questions:
1. Give an example of a document that served as a precedent for the Declaration.
2. Describe and list the sections of the Declaration of Independence and explain the basic purpose of each.
3. What reason(s) did the Founding Fathers give for their decision to write out a declaration?
4. What beliefs did the Founding Fathers declare they held?
5. What are a few of the complaints? Are any specific events mentioned? If not, is the information given sometimes sufficient to figure out to which events the complaints refer?
6. In what way(s) did the framers claim to have already tried in addressing the complaints?
7. What will change in the colonies as a result of the Declaration?
8. Which signers do you recognize?
9. Through your project were you able to connect with struggles of the Founding Fathers? Why or why not?

Evaluate

Evaluation for this lesson will be out of 100 points broken down as follows:
* Class and CLC group participation work: 25
* Group project: 50
* Discussion Board: 10
* Journals and Final reflections: 15

Refer to the .doc or .pdf version of this lesson plan, Evaluate section, for the rubric table which includes elements such as content detail, applied understanding, etc. and 4 corresponding proficiency level rankings for each element.

Extend

* The historical events students choose could also be added to the bulletin board by connecting an excerpt of a particular complaint to a brief, dated summary of an event. The complaints relate to actual events, but the precise events were not discussed in the Declaration. Why do the students think the framers decided to do that? (Someone might notice that, in the fragment of the early draft discussed below, the complaint referred to a specific event.) Would the student declarations also be more effective without specific events tied to the complaints?
* This unit can serve as a model for studying any of our nation's important historical documents. A study of the Constitution could begin with a role-play in which students imagine themselves marooned on a desert island, with little hope of rescue. Working in groups, students should come up with the 10 most important concepts for ensuring harmonious living in the new community and write them down in a list.

After the initial round of listing, ask some "what if," "what about" and "what would happen" questions to help cover their omissions. Then post the revised lists on the classroom bulletin board or, if you have a computer in your classroom, post them electronically. At this point, you could introduce students to the Constitution, relating the concepts the students have come up with on their own to articles in the Constitution and talking about why a particular tenet is as important now as it was then. You could then compare your "living classroom constitution(s)" with the U.S. Constitution (especially the Bill of Rights) and selections from the Magna Carta, the Mayflower Compact, etc, depending on the age and sophistication level of your students.

The Avalon Project's The American Constitution - A Documentary Record http://www.yale.edu/lawweb/avalon/constpap.htm contains many relevant documents for this type of study.
* Students can now look at the American Declaration as a precedent of documents that came after it. A fruitful comparison could be made with the French Declaration of the Rights of Man—1789, http://www.yale.edu/lawweb/avalon/rightsof.htm, available through the Avalon Project. This declaration is also known as the French Declaration of Independence.
* Students could attempt to conduct a Declaration Convention in which they use the small group declarations as the basis of a single document representing the entire class.
* Volunteers could stage a dramatic reading of the entire Declaration.
* Students may be interested in seeing an image of the original Declaration, http://www.archives.gov/national-archives-experience/charters/declaration_zoom_1.html, now exhibited in the Rotunda of the National Archives Building in Washington, D.C. Unfortunately, this version has faded badly. The most frequently reproduced version of the Declaration is taken from the engraving made by printer William J. Stone in 1823 http://www.archives.gov/national-archives-experience/charters/declaration_zoom_2.html. This image also is available online and has not faded as much as the original Declaration.