TPACK Template

Subject U.S. Government and Politics

Grade Level 12th Grade

Learning Objective GOVT.7 The student will apply social science skills to understand
the organization and powers of the national government
by
a) examining the legislative, executive, and judicial
branches;
Content

b) analyzing the relationships among the three branches

in a system of checks and balances and separation of
powers; and
Complete the sentence below:

In this interactive white board activity, the children will touch the board to move and sort
Pedagogy Planning

government powers and learn about what powers each branch of the government holds.
Activity In this activity, students will get an introduction to the three
branches of the national government. Using the interactive white
board tool, students will be able to use their prior knowledge to
test what they already know about the branches of government
prior to the unit.

- First, the teacher will be explaining slide 2, on the

executive branch, which includes which figures are a part
of this branch. Since this tool is generalized for use from
grades 7-12, I would give an even more in-depth
introduction to other players in the executive branch (and
later the other branches) that are necessary to know at
the 12th grade level for this subject.
- In the next slide, slide 3, students will get a chance to
come up to the Smart board in order to drag a power that
they believe is held by the Executive Branch.
- Once students have placed three powers into the three
boxes, the teacher will go up to the board to drag out any
incorrectly placed powers. If there are any incorrectly
placed powers, students will continue taking turns, using
group discussion, in order to place the remaining missing
powers needed in order to complete the slide.
- These above steps will continue for the remaining
branches, in slides 4-7, the legislative and judicial
branches. As powers are filled in, the correct powers will
be further explained to what they exactly mean and the
parameters to which the branches are able to exert these
powers.
- When all three branches that require the students’
interaction with the Smart board tool, the class will
reflect on any powers that they remain confused about as
to why they did not fit into the branch that they believed
it to be a part of.
- The examples used for this lesson are not the only
powers held by each branch, so further into the unit the
students will be given a more in-depth list of the powers
held.
- For homework, each student will choose a power of their
choice to further research. They will use Google Slides in
order to create a presentation culminating their research.
In the first slide, they will provide a brief introduction to
the branch that their power is held by. Then, on slide 2
the student will compile a list of important roles in these
branches and real-life examples of each powerful player
in this branch. Finally, the students will research a power
of their choice that is held by this branch. They will
provide a description of what the possession of this
power entails and the parameters they may use it in. In
the last slide, students will provide a real-life example of
 Technology
Techn https://exchange.smarttech-prod.com/preview/fd35b35f-9078-
ology 4b6a-8e43-5f933f64b1fe