Teaching the 14th Amendment, Magna Carta, Civil Rights

Congress and the courts have applied the 14th Amendment’s equal protection clause to many aspects of public life over the past 150 years. In this U.S. Courts activity, students will explore the 14th Amendment through the lens of Title IX, which prohibits institutions that receive federal funding from excluding students from participating in educational and athletic programs on the basis of sex. The Supreme Court’s first Title IX case, Grove City College v. Bell, also demonstrates how each of the three branches exercises its authority.

For more resources on the 14th Amendment’s equal protection clause, go here.

Explore how the principles of Magna Carta inspired American colonists to declare their independence from England in this video from the ABOTA Foundation and PBS Learning Media. The unit includes a video, background essay and teaching guide.

For more resources on the American Revolution, go here.

Freedom Summer is a game-based learning module in which players explore the relationship between the Civil Rights Movement and the contentious civil rights debate in Congress. Players are presented with a series of 20 historic events and are required to predict the consequences of each event. Players discover how events of the Civil Rights Movement and concurrent events in Congress impacted each other and the role that both Congress and individuals play in representative democracy. This resource is provided by the Indiana University Center on Representative Government.