A Guide for TEACHERS
Table of Contents:​
What IS Constitutionople?
Constitutionople is a gamified unit on the Constitution and Citizenship.
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However, it's not meant to be only used for the Constitution. Constitutionople is meant to serve as a framework for educators to gamify ANY of their lessons. Using Constitutionople and the provided resources, educators can ideally begin to craft their own RPG-based, exploratory units.
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Constitutionople's website serves as both resource and demonstration for what a gamified unit can look like. It can be used as is, or as scaffolding to create something entirely new.
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The remainder of the tutorial will refer to it as "Constitutionople" and refer to the constitution, but any steps used below can be used for creating your own unit.
How is Constitutionople Educational?
DEMOGRAPHICS
Constitutionople can be adapted for any age group and for most classrooms, but we're demonstrating the ideal classroom that we have in mind for it.
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Age Group: 7-12
Class: 21 Students
Classroom:
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A 1 to 1 classroom where students each have access to either Chromebooks or Macs.
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Students are already familiar with basic technology and have had practice blogging.
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The physical classroom has a lot of flexible space and bulletin board access; can be reassembled significantly to reflect the learning style change.
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The classroom has access to technology on both teacher and student sides.
STANDARDS
S-Gov.9-12.24
Analyze how people use and challenge public policies through formal and informal means with attention to important judicial processes and landmark court cases. (21st century skills)
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SS-Gov.9-12.23
Evaluate multiple procedures for making governmental decisions at the local, state, national, and international levels. (21st century skills)
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SS-Gov.9-12.15
Analyze the origins of government with attention to the purpose(s) of government, various theories of democracy, rule of law, and alternative models from other nations and groups. (21st century skills)
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SS-Gov.9-12.16
Evaluate how the U.S. Constitution establishes the Rule of Law, governmental powers and responsibilities, as well as limits to a government. (21st century skills)
What Challenges Will I Face with Constitutionople?
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Faculty Push-Back
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Constitutionople, ideally, looks nothing like a traditional unit or classroom. Some faculty will love this, and others might not. That's why we made sure Constitutionople aligns with many standards in one fun game! ​
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Student Push-Back​
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Most of your students will be on board for a fun activity like this, but some of your more traditional and high-achieving students might be concerned with such a dramatic change to their classroom. ​
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This is most easily solved by following our advice of easing them in; warn them early that they can expect big changes to the classroom, and take all student feedback and make sure they feel heard during the process.
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Parent Push-Back​
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Some parents might not like Constitutionople. When they ask their student how school was, they might not be expecting, "It was great! I fought a dragon and leveled up!" ​
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Be prepared for this sort of push-back by keeping parents involved! Explain to parents how it meets all of the traditional learning goals while making it fun, and keep samples of student's work to show parents how engaged their kids are with the content. ​
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Can I See Constitutionople in Action?
If you're curious to see how Consitutionople might look in a traditional lesson plan, look no further! Below we have a sample Constitutionople lesson plan to give you inspiration for preparing it yourself.
Setting Up Constitutionople in Your Class
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Decide if you want to go analogue, digital, or a mixture of both for your unit. Personally, Miss Snedeker prefers a mixture approach. Some ideas for using digital and traditional tools:
Digital:
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Student Blogs/Journal
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Weekly Quest System (in a blog format)
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Informative Hub (like this website)
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Adventurer Profiles
Traditional:
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Leaderboard
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Map w/ Pins for Adventurers
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Job Board (extra credit jobs)
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Guild Stations
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Certifications/Awards
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In-Class Currency
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Warn students a few weeks before the unit that they'll be partaking in a very different style of learning soon. Begin introducing classroom graphics/resources related to Constitutionople. For example, hang up a poster with the map. Begin to change out bulletin boards for Constitutionople-related activities, like the leaderboard or job board. Set up graphics for the Guild Stations (where the guilds will meet during guild meetings). If you're really into classroom decor, set up foam swords and shields on the walls.
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During this transition phase, your students will be really curious. That's good! For a fun way to gather ideas about your unit before fully implementing it, set aside some classtime to have students journal about what they think this new unit is.
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For gamification to be really successful, it should be immersive so don't hold back in this phase. Really begin making your classroom feel like an Adventurer's Lodge.
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Here are some resources that might help. All links are Amazon links, and are not affiliate links or sponsors.
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When ready to begin the unit, have some sort of Initiation Day with your students. This is a day set aside to explain how the next few weeks will be different from a regular class and to get your students separated into their guilds.
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It's likely easiest to randomly assign students into one of the three guilds, instead of having them pick. It allows them to get the chance to work with new people. Depending on time, interest, and age levels, you can do something similar to the Harry Potter sorting hat to assign students.
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Your students will have a lot of questions. It might be a good idea (if short on time) to assign it as homework, where students think of questions they have about this unit and bring them in for you to answer the next day.
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Begin the unit! Each week, students will learn some material related to the Consitution through either textbook or RWLDs. This information they learn will be used to supplement their adventures in Constitutionople. Each week, you will provide a new Quest for students to do related to what they learned that week. This will be the primary homework students perform for the week, and these quests will take a variety of forms (essays, projects, videos, etc).
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At the end of each week, students will have Guild Council meetings. These are meant to vaguely resemble the goings-on of Congress and other governmental bodies, but now your students are in control. You should perform as just a facilitator in these Guild Council meetings. This is their time to really prove what they know about the material and law-making/respect.
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Each guild will spend their first guild meeting assigning a variety of roles to each member. Every single member will have a job to do. You can give the students a list of roles (like Leader, Treasurer, Scribe, etc.) or let them come up with their own, or a mixture.
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Following this first meeting, every week students will get back into their Guilds to discuss current events. Your Guilds are coupled/paired with a local village, and its your students' job to help mediate between that village and local government. Every week, you will present the guilds a different scenario in which their village has a new request or issue. For example, maybe their village wants to have slaves. Your students will have to use what they've learned about the Constitution to decide whether or not to pass the laws the villages request. Each student has to give a vote, and will turn in "vote slips" in which they've written a brief explanation as to why they voted like they did to turn in. Each student has access to a Guild Card where they can see the progress of their village. If they choose to pass a certain law, they get a stamp on their card.
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Make sure the guilds have a different scenario each meeting. If a guild is in a tie, they will have two representatives present to the other guilds about the issue. One will represent "in favor" of passing, the other will represent against passing. The other guilds will help break the tie.
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As your students finish their weekly Quests, they'll gain EXP in similar fashion to a grade. For example,an A+ might be 10XP, an a B might be 7XP. If a student isn't happy with their level and wants to work outside of class on leveling up, they will have access to a "Job Board" filled with side quests for students to do as extra credit. The job board is first-come-first-serve, and available at any time. The only requirement is that students can only do job board quests that are at their current level.
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Finally, when your students are nearing the end of one of Consitutionople's islands (for example wrapping up information on the Executive portion of the Constitution), you can make an announcement that the island's boss is now available to challenge. This is, essentially, a quiz. Instead of having a day dedicated to the Quiz, in Constitutionople, the Boss is available starting on a certain day until a week or so later so students can choose when they want to "challenge" the Boss. Once a student beats a Boss, they move to the next island and can begin doing Quests in that region.
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Extras:
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For more incentive, offer students weekly access to an Adventurer's Shoppe. They can gain gold from quests and jobs, and spend that gold on small extras in the classroom.
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Have students keep an Adventurer's Journal or Blog throughout the unit where they can write about their adventures and how they feel so far about this style of learning, so you can get some direct feedback as well.
Sample Constitutionople Calendar
Adapting Constitutionople to Other Subjects
English
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English classes are built for this sort of activity! A lot of Constitutionople involves writing and story-telling, and those go hand-in-hand with Constitutionople.
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You can base Consitutionople off of a literary world (if you based it off of Romeo and Juliet's Verona, there's a Minecraft map!), or have the students work together to create a fictional world.
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You can use the weekly blogging as a way of gaining critical writing skills. For example, one week's blogs might be persuasive, and they write a persuasive piece about the world and their adventures. Maybe one week they need to have a blog that effectively shows their use of certain punctuation.
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Guilds no longer need to be about decided political and social issues, but are a writing workshop-style environment for Guild Mates to get together and help hone each other's skills (this is really similar to Medieval Guilds, where the entire Guild will focus on one skill, and apprentices learn from masters and help each other).
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Elementary Ed
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A lot of this material will need to be simplified for an elementary ed classroom, but this is a great way to gamify your entire class!
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Students, on the first day of class, are initiated as Adventurers. On that first day, they're assigned into a Guild. An easy way to do this is have each student's desk have their name and the guild they'll be a part of, and group the guilds together. Guilds would act more as buddy systems.
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When students do "good" things, they get XP. Students who are prepared at the beginning of class get a little XP; students who are a good buddy; etc. When students level up, they get a Certificate for each level, and maybe a reward like candy.
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Guilds will often work together in group work to support each other, and will work as buddy systems. When a student has a question, they'll learn to ask their guild buddies first.
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