The kids are heading back to school as the Trump administration threatens criminal charges against our state and city officials and broadcast his eagerness to bring federal troops to our streets. So it is not a coincidence that I get asked this question by friends and neighbors who know I study civic education in schools.
The question comes wrapped in hope and fear. We know that education is the lynchpin of democracy, a thin rope holding up our fragile political system. We know that new forms of ignorance are loudly on the march today. And we know that demagogues rely on popular ignorance to turn resentment into “solutions,” which are then used to end the democracy that got them elected. It’s an old story.
The founders of our politics knew this—they had read the Greeks, Locke and Montesquieu. They knew, as Madison wrote in the Federalist, that men are not angels. Accordingly, they built structures into the Constitution in hopes of preventing tyrranical concentrations of power: the checks and balances and separation of powers you probably learned initially in school. Is this curriculum still taught?
The short answer is Yes, schools in Washington and across the US do still teach civics but not as much as they used to and not as much as they could.
Let me elaborate by sketching civic education at the three grade levels—elementary, middle, high—and then peer into a gaping problem in the lower grades. I’ll end with some low-hanging fruit that could strengthen civic education in our state.
First a definition. “Civics” is the study and practice of democracy, and here are its basic questions:
- How is our government organized?
- How did it get that way?
- What makes it a constitutional democracy (aka a republic) and how is that different from the alternatives?
- What are the rights and responsibilities of members (citizens)?
- What are the main political debates and compromises now and in the past?
- How do we sustain the patriotism—Lincoln’s “bonds of affection”—needed to hold ‘We the People’ together in a common union?
Here’s a tip: To see the civics curriculum at school you must look for it in the “social studies” curriculum. This is school jargon for a group of four subjects: history, government, geography and economics.
In elementary schools, you should find state and national social studies at grades 4 and 5. If a school has decent resources and good leadership, you’ll also find something like Communities or Geography in grades 2 – 3. This grades 2-5 sequence is customary (it goes back about a century), teachers around the country in past decades were accustomed to teaching it, it laid in lots of basic civics vocabulary, and it’s what our state education office in Olympia still recommends today.
In middle schools, the 6th grade social studies curriculum is typically world history and geography. This provides an important comparative perspective, so it is not to be dismissed as non-civics just because its reach is global rather than local. Then we have 7th-grade state social studies and 8th-grade national social studies. Notice that this is the second cycle of state, national, and world social studies.
In high schools, students get another cycle of world history (10), national history (11), and US government (12). In some schools (larger, better resourced) there will also be electives in Economics and Comparative Government.
But there’s a problem. It starts in the elementary grades and bubbles up from there. In the two decades since Congress passed an act called No Child Left Behind, we have robbed Peter to pay Paul. The grades 2-5 social studies sequence has been starved to feed instruction in reading and math. NCLB mandated testing in these subjects with stiff penalties for what were dubbed “failing schools.” Its furious focus on reading and math led to the near exclusion of social studies and therefore civics in the elementary curriculum.
Washington state participated fully. Social studies administrators were let go, curriculum materials weren’t purchased, professional development for teachers was focused on raising scores in reading and math. It continues today: The director of social studies instruction at the state education office is gone as of last month, and none of the state’s mostly rural Educational Service Districts now has a social studies leader.
This matters because the decimation of elementary social studies undercuts later learning. That’s because learning is, if anything, cumulative. The things you know well—whether your vocations or hobbies—are things you have learned over time, cyclically. Civic learning in middle and high school is built atop a foundation that was laid earlier. Facts, concepts, and skills learned roughly in the lower grades are then revisited, revised, and fleshed out in the upper grades. This isn’t repetition, it’s spiral learning and it leads to subject mastery.
This learning progression is now broken. The bedrock of civic learning has been squeezed out of elementary schools and the effect—the ignorance—flows upward from there. How far? Maybe all the way to the civic mess we are in now.
The path to strengthening civic education in Washington schools is clear enough. First, restore robust social studies education to the elementary grades. The easiest way to do this is to reestablish the curriculum that was extant in our elementary schools before NCLB: the grades 2-5 sequence described earlier. This can overlap the elementary reading curriculum since students don’t read reading; they read content. Why not civics? Second, restore a social studies manager to the state office in Olympia and to the nine service districts. The state’s nearly 300 school districts can’t be expected to accomplish this restoration without someone coordinating the effort. Surely this much we can afford. Our republic depends on it.
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A very interesting distillation of how civics is taught in our schools, and how this has changed since NCLB was enacted under Bush. My question is, how is the solution, as mentioned in the article, being worked on by educators to reach said solution? It’s obvious to many of us that today’s understanding of civics and political systems is falling down seriously. Are there steps to build this back into our overall system, from elementary on to H.S.? That would be another great article. Thanks to Post Alley and the author for providing this assessment.
I don’t have a lot of hope that civics courses will save us from ourselves in a landscape of misinformation and hyper polarization that the forefathers never saw coming. For now, I’d focus our energies on getting back to the same page with shared values and behaviors on our school grounds. Schools remain some of the final public gathering spaces we have as the (well documented) trend of civic/group participation continues to decline — it’s a great way to practice being a citizen without even mentioning the constitution.
I do agree that elementary civics curriculum is terrible though — too much bureaucratic mumbo jumbo and not enough focus on the stuff that might capture a seven year olds imagination — like police officers and firefighters and garbage trucks! Start small and local, show government’s value, and build up to the bigger principles.
Thanks for your reply. I guess I have some hope, based on your reply, as our 8 year old is absolutely fascinated with garbage trucks. Thanks again for your article.
Thanks, Walter, for this summary of the Washington State civics teaching situation. The “spiralling” nature for the presentation of civics materials–so essential for the deep understanding of this complex topic – is not different from the way we teach other subjects, but it is useful to highlight it here, since other claimants of curricular space often dismiss elaborated treatment of civics materials as duplicative.
And surely in these times we need meaningful civics education. Among other measures, our kids deserve a foundation for a broad view of responsible citizenship, based on Lincoln’s First Innaugural reminder of our historic bonds of affection and the potential of reflecting when possible the better angels of our nature.
I agree for the most part. Your book title “Education for Liberal Democracy” has an implicit stated bias. While I personally like this direction, I wonder how some well-educated conservative (note: I do NOT use the term “Republican” for good reason) might disagree or want to change the wording. And your item #5 is a full year-long college-level course!
Joel, thanks for the questions. (1) “Liberal democracy” is a neutral term preferred by political scientists (also “constitutional democracy” or “republic”) as it points clearly to a fusion of two ideas, which summarizes our type of government: Liberalism (the idea of individual rights and limited govt) and democracy (the idea of popular sovereignty and majority rule). Both Pelosi and McConnell are ‘liberal democrats’. (It’s a big tent.) So “liberal” here doesn’t mean left of center. (2) Yes, question #5 could ground a whole college course (a good one!) as could each of the others. But each question also can be addressed in a rudimentary way in the 4th grade.
Thank you for the clarification / definition.
Walter, thanks for laying out the path of civics education from elementary through high school in such a clear, concise manner. I appreciate your pointing out the recursive structure of how students are introduced to civics as part of the Social Studies curricula at different levels.
Not all students will become passionate readers of literature, nor will every student find pleasure in learning mathematics or science, but every American student will in time become an adult, and must be prepared to act as a citizen of this (still) democratic republic.
Just-retired 4th and 5th grade teacher here. Right now in Seattle Public Schools, the only “approved” curriculum is the “Time Immemorial” Native Studies sequence. While essential, it does not cover anywhere near enough. In fact, many of the lessons state something like, “Teach this following your traditional curriculum” because the lessons are designed as “counter narratives.” However, SPS no longer has a “traditional curriculum,” so there is nothing to counter. It’s really frustrating.
For years, I stitched together 4th and 5th grade curriculum that wove multiple perspectives and a range of sources together to give kids a whole picture, including Time Immemorial. Our students dove into history and civics with projects like creating presidential candidates and researching political platforms, role playing the events leading to the American Revolution, and acting as time-traveling historians analyzing the choices made by the Lewis and Clark expedition. They became passionate about history and excited about civic engagement.
But it’s hard work finding appropriate resources, and doing a good job required doing a LOT of reading and research. I was lucky to work with colleagues also enthusiastic about the work, principals willing to support us, and a program that enabled us to integrate reading and writing instruction with social studies themes so we could fit everything in.
Sadly, I don’t see the same energy for history, civics, and geography in newer teachers, or for doing the independent work required to create materials and projects. The ugly, divided political environment makes teaching current events difficult. Fewer parents seem to discuss politics, history, or current events with kids, and no-shared-media-viewing or newspapers at home means kids arrive with very little background or interest compared to a decade ago.
We need to demand that comprehensive social studies is incorporated into school curriculum at every level. But teachers also need to develop their knowledge and interests; it’s their energy and attitude that will hook the kids.s