Elementary Education Program

Department of Teacher Education & Learning Sciences

Lesson Plan

Name: Christy MacLaren

Grade: 5th
Topic/Concept: Social Studies
Materials/Resources:

Teaching Behavior Focus:

Learning Objectives (measurable): Students will be able to identify each branch of government
and their roles.

Standards: 5.C&G.1.2 Summarize the organizational structures and powers of the United States
government (legislative, judicial and executive branches of government).

Assessment Plan (How will you know that your students met the objective?): We will assess the
students by having them complete a quick write. Students will write the three branches of
government and explain what each branch does. This assessment hits our target learning
objectives because it will have students summarize the organizational structures and powers of
the United States government. If students cannot answer what each branch of government does,
we will know they did not met the objective. If students can answer what each branch of
government does, we will know they have met the objective.

New Vocabulary:

1. Legislative - Makes laws

2. Executive - Carries outlaws

3. Judicial - Evaluates laws

4. Veto - the power of a government official or group to keep something from taking

effect

5. Nomination - the act of choosing a person to run for office

6. Supreme Court - the highest federal court in the United States, consisting of nine

appointed justices whose decisions on constitutional cases set precedents for all

other courts in the nation.

7. President - the head of a government that takes the form of a republic.

 Elementary Education Program
Department of Teacher Education & Learning Sciences

8. Vice-President - the title of the elected official of this rank in the U.S.

government, who acts as president of the Senate.

9. Cabinet - a group of officials who give advice to the head of a government.

10. Congress - the branch of a national government that makes laws

11. House of Representatives - the lower legislative house in many governments,

including the United States, most U.S. states, and countries such as Mexico and

Japan.

12. Senate - one of the two houses of the United States Congress, or a similar part of

the national government in other countries

Note: A detailed lesson plan is specific enough for another teacher to read and teach
effectively. There should not be any question regarding what to do or how to do it.

Lesson Development (hook/engage/launch, step by step in real time, include questions you will
ask in real time, closure/revisiting learning objectives):

Launch - (10 Minutes)

- schoolhouse rock https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tyeJ55o3El0

- Lesson description - how a bill becomes a law: class is split into the legislative,
judicial, & executive branch and will go through the process of “passing” a set of
classroom laws

Pre Assessment Question - (2-5 minutes)

- Where are the three branches of government located?

- Which Branch of government has the power to veto laws?
- Can you explain what happens when a bill becomes a law?
- How is the creation of laws related to you and I and our community?

I do/we do/ you do - (17 Minutes)

 Elementary Education Program
Department of Teacher Education & Learning Sciences

- Split Students into each branch; jobs & duties of each branch are as follows….

- Legislative Branch: students in legislative to each come up with a law and vote as
a group on each law if they want to pass it
- Judicial Branch: students in the judicial branch debate whether 2 laws we created
is constitutional or not
- Executive Branch: students in the executive branch will pass or veto laws we
created and will have to justify their answer

Closure - (10 Minutes)

- quick write: have the students write what they learned about the three branches of
government and describe in their own words what each branch does and how it works
with the other two branches