Early American Government Webquest

The driving question for this webquest is “How is the United States Constitution organized to balance conflicting interest in a democracy?”  Your goal while completing this webquest is to understand the topics that are going to be covered and to also answer the driving question. When you answer the driving question, you will have to write 3 paragraphs explaining how the driving question is relevant to the content. You will need to answer the question and give supporting details from articles that are provided to you throughout the webquest.  After completing the webquest, you should be able to understand how the these standards relate to one another.

To complete the webquest you must click the links that are located above the questions, read the articles and analuze each article as you go, then answer the questions below each section.  Every section has its own link. Also, answers should be written in complete sentences. 

Articles of Confederation

1. What are the Articles of Confederation, and why was this important to the states at that time?

2. What did the Articles of Confederation do?

1. How did it affect our nation?

3. What were the strengths of The Articles of Confederation?

4. What were the weaknesses of The Articles of Confederation?

5. What document came after the Articles of Confederation, and why was this document established?

6. How is this relevant  to the driving question?

Constitution Article

Questions:

1. In 1987 the Americans celebrated the 200th anniversary of what? And why was this important?

2. What was the U.S. constitution?

3. What is Federalism? And how does this tie back to the U.S. constitution?

4. The most important thing in the constitution is the separation of powers, what exactly does this mean?

5. What are the separation of powers? And what is their role in the government?

6. Without the separation of powers would the government be the same as it is today?

7. What was the main reason of the constitution being written?

Bill of Rights:

1. Who wrote the Bill of Rights and what influenced him to do this?

2. What was another thing that influenced the Bill of Rights?

3. What were the 10 amendments? Describe each of them in your own words.

Supreme Court:

• http://www.uscourts.gov/about-federal-courts/educational-resources/about-educational-outreach/activity-resources/about

• http://judiciallearningcenter.org/article-3-and-the-courts/       

1. What is judicial review?

2. Explain what the court did in the Marbury vs. Madison case.

3. What are the roles of the Supreme Court? Explain each role in your own words.

4. Explain each section of how the Supreme Court works.

Democratic-Republicans and Federalist:

1. When and who founded the Democratic-Republic party?

2. Explain what members of the party believed in.

3. What were the differences between the Democratic-Republican Party and the Federalist Party?

4. Who formed the Federalist Party? Why?

5. How did Federalist believe that the Constitution should be?

Shay’s Rebellion:

1. Explain in your own words as to why this rebellion was called “Shay’s Rebellion”.

2. Where was the rebellion mainly serious at? Why?

3. What caused the rebellion?

4. What did Shay’s Rebellion show about the government at the time?

5. In your own words, what did the rebels tried to do?

Virginia and New Jersey Plan  

1. What is the Virginia plan?

2. In what year was the Virginia Plan put into action? And what did it effect?

3. What did the virginia plan propose?

4. Define provisions.

5. What was the new jersey plan?And what did it effect

6. Who was the delegate for the new jersey plan?

7. What is the legislative body?

8. Who was William Paterson?

9. What were the three things that the articles of confederation should be amended by?

Declaration of Independence:

1. What was the name of the book that British immigrant, Thomas Paine write? What did he argue?

2. Define “natural right”.

3. What did the five-man committee do ?

4. What were the five parts that Declaration of Independence broken into?

5. Summarize the famous passage from the preamble in your own words.

6. Explain what the Declaration of Independence is today’s society.

Overall Question:

How does all of this tie back to the driving question that was given to you in the introduction? You have to write a 3 paragraph paper expxlaing how the driving question is relevant to the content that you answered questions on.  Don't forget to use evidence from articles that you have read already.

 This is how you would be graded/evaluated refer back to the rubric as you answer your questions. 

To conclude this webquest students should write one paragraph on what they've learned, also paragraph should have at least 3 examples and what they've learned and should explain on how they understood it.