The 2019 Mock Election taught more than one lesson

Simulations, debates, role-plays and mock trials are staples of Social Studies instruction. When students see ideas, concepts and processes come alive in real time with themselves as participants, they get a much better appreciation of what they are learning. Social Studies teachers like using mock elections because they come with all of these advantages while also immersing students in current events and issues. Mock elections are easy during presidential elections when the campaigns dominate the media, but “off-year” elections without presidents, senators or representatives on the ballot offer other advantages as teachers at Lafayette, the Middle School and the High School discovered when they participated in the 2019 NJ Mock Election.

4th Graders check out
a candidate's website

The NJ Mock Election was originally a project of the New Jersey Press Association (NJPA), though is now facilitated through New Jersey Center For Civic Education, the NJ Council for Social Studies and the NJ Social Studies Supervisor Association. There are many other state and national mock elections, but this program is local and provides all participating schools and school districts with detailed results, which is not often the case with national programs. 

Ms. Mazzacano leads an exploration of election
districts and population density

Lafayette Avenue School’s 4th & 5th grade teachers leveraged this year’s election of candidates for New Jersey’s General Assembly to show students differences between the state and federal government. Students might hear their parents talking with their friends about the “government” or may hear the word used on news broadcasts, but they never really know what that “government” is and they assume it’s just one thing, “the” government. Motor vehicle laws, driving age, family law and even the amount of time students have for recess, are the products of state law. Teachers also used the district maps to have students think about population density and how districts near Philadelphia and New York City are much smaller, yet have roughly the same amount of voters as the larger district in the southern and northwestern parts of the state. 

Some Chatham Middle School students realized that the candidates they were researching were different than the candidates their younger and older siblings were researching at Lafayette Avenue and the High School, because those schools are in District 27, while CMS is in District 21. 8th grade Civics teachers also used the Mock Election to highlight lesson in the Civics Literacy unit they were teacher at the time and Electoral College ballot question to forecast the upcoming unit on the Constitution. 

Mock elections at every grade level increase the chances that students will talk to their parents about what they are doing and learning in Social Studies. A 9th grader’s parents might not be very interested in the XYZ affair or the details of the Lend-Lease Act, they’re much more likely to tell their children what they think about property taxes, the state pension system and health care costs. Dialog about these issues at home informs dialog in the classroom and vice versa, and both are vital to citizenship education.

Interested in the results?  You can find them here.