Constitution Gallery Walk

I used the materials from “Founding” Documents We Don’t Learn About and the Ten Ways to Rethink the Constitution gallery walk activity for my 11th grade language arts class. Seeing the students engage with the documents from the 1700s and have meaningful conversations during the lesson was gratifying.

Students came up with poignant connections and questions to discuss with one another as they moved about the room. I love how the resource included a diversity of voices based on gender, race, and nationality. This resource helped students to see that more than just the framers of the Constitution were involved in establishing the nation.

The day I did the lesson, our advisory (or homeroom) lesson was also about the Constitution, which allowed students to generalize what they learned in homeroom to our classroom. I found that working in tangent with another class’s curriculum enriched the experience for students. I hope that I can find other ways to connect our American Literature curriculum to other subjects, especially U.S. history.

For Constitution Day, I did the Ten Ways to Rethink the Constitution Gallery Walk. I asked students to silently read as they walked around, and afterwards we gave them time to share their thoughts.

Students commented on how the Constitution was written in secret and how the system of checks and balances helped only certain groups of people. In addition, students felt it was important to know the Constitution to protect themselves. Others felt that the Constitution was an old document that should be continued to be revised and compared it to the Bible.

I appreciated this opportunity because students were able to share their thoughts about current events when this class was mostly about ancient history. Students are really afraid for their future, and I am too. Having direct evidence from the Constitution and showing the changes in the Constitution was helpful.