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Events-Based Course Outline: AP U.S. Government and Politics
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by Susan Ikenberry
Georgetown Day School
Washington, District of Columbia
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Note to Teachers
The syllabus below is a good example of a course planned to take maximum advantage of current events. This course, offered in winter and spring of 2004, began the day after the Iowa caucuses. When I planned the schedule over our winter break, I had no idea how much would transpire at the Iowa caucuses. Right away there was so much to talk about! What had happened to Howard Dean? How had he risen and fallen so quickly? Were the media making too much of "the scream"? What had happened to Gephardt? Was John Kerry, who had looked so lost, going to be able to make a move after all?
All this played out while the course was running. Advertisements were plentiful on C-SPAN, so I typically brought these in on the first class of the week, and devoted 10 or 15 minutes of our 70-minute period to showing these and letting students comment on them. Students enjoy this, and it does more for their critical thinking than they realize. If there are no current advertisements, I use political cartoons, such as those from Daryl Cagle's Web site:
 Today's Best Cartoons
You'll also notice that some important material is crunched in at the end; this has less to do with the decision to make the primaries the focal point than with the fact that our school lets seniors out early for group projects. I was lucky again when the Supreme Court released oral arguments on the University of Michigan cases. They arrived just in time for me to use in the judicial section.
It should be noted that this is a bare-bones approach in terms of reading, with very few readings beyond those in the textbook. Nonetheless, I was proud of the way this course turned out, and my students -- a tough audience, as it happened -- were pleased. What's important is to be ever on the lookout for ways to use current events to teach the course.
Course Outline: AP U.S. Government and Politics
Textbook: Fiorina, Peterson, and Voss (FPV), America's New Democracy, 2nd ed.
This textbook is engagingly written, backpack-friendly, and if read with care, along with some supplemental readings and projects, sufficient for an AP course.
Dates for assignments reflect when they are due.
January 20
The Iowa caucuses will have just taken place. Students watch some C-SPAN video and discuss this unusual way of nominating a presidential candidate.
January 21
Pages 3-25 in FPV. What do the authors mean by "America's New Democracy"? What's "new" about it?
January 22-January 26
Chapter 7: National elections (FPV)
Much-needed background for the upcoming primary elections. Students also take a look at McCain-Feingold information on page 268 and information on congressional redistricting on page 485. Students should know which candidate they're going to be studying and begin collecting information on his or her candidacy. There will be a New Hampshire debate on January 22 that students should watch.
January 27
Students don't have class, but the New Hampshire primaries are taking place anyway, so we try to put on the results while finishing homework. We'll discuss them in class.
January 29-30
Chapter 6: Individual participation
This provides much-needed background information on voting patterns. Students discuss the New Hampshire primaries and then debate the question: is low voter turnout a bad thing?
February 3-5
Chapter 5: Polling
Primaries held in Arizona, Delaware, Missouri, New Mexico, and South Carolina; students look at the results. How has polling affected these elections? How has it affected the coverage?
Friday, February 6
Chapter 5: The media
Students examine the ways that the media are handing the primaries.
Tuesday, February 10
Test
February 12
Chapter 4: American political culture
Discuss this topic in light of what students have learned by following the primaries.
February 17
Discussion of political developments
February 19, 23, 24
Chapter 8: Political parties and interest groups
These will be important to understanding the elections -- parties still play an important role, but some would say it has diminished. From what students have learned from studying a primary candidate, what role do they think the party has played in his or her campaign?
Interest groups are also important. What role are various interest groups playing in primary candidacies?
February 26
A guest speaker from a major public interest group comes to class (a former lobbyist with Common Cause).
March 2
Paper with election predictions due
March 4
Students watch the election coverage on the night of March 2. How well did their prediction hold up? How much did the analysis jibe with their thinking?
March 8-9
Chapter 10: The presidency
March 11
Chapter 11: Bureaucracy
March 15, 17, 18
Chapter 9: Congress
March 31
Return from spring break: What's Congress been up to?
April 1-2
Chapter 12: The judiciary
April 6, 8, 9
Chapter 13: Civil liberties
Students will argue some of these cases in class.
April 13, 16
Chapter 14: Civil rights
Students will listen to oral arguments for the University of Michigan affirmative action cases Gratz v. Bollinger and Grutter v. Bollinger.
April 20
Test on Chapters 12, 13, and 14, as well as on Congress and the presidency, and a bit on the bureaucracy.
April 22
Cases not discussed: individual research, to be posted. Each student comes to class prepared with a one-page summary of a significant Supreme Court case. Students explain the case in class and hand out their summary.
April 26-27
Chapter 15: Public policy
April 29
Federalism
Discussion of the AP Exam
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