TPACK Template

Subject United States Government

The Three Branches of Government, Separation of
Powers, and Checks and Balances
Grade Level 12

Learning Objective GOVT.7 The student will apply social science skills to
understand the organization and powers of the
national government by
a) examining the legislative, executive, and
judicial branches
Content

b) analyzing the relationships among the three

branches in a system of checks and balances
and separation of powers
In this interactive white board activity, the children will touch the board to move
and sort responsibilities and roles of the three branches of government and learn
about separation of powers and checks and balances.
Pedagogy
Planning

Activity 1. As the students enter the classroom, there will be a

bellringer on the IWB asking students to write
down some responsibilities of the three branches
of government, the Executive, the Legislative, and
the Judicial. While the students are entering the
room, the teacher will be at the door greeting
them.
2. Once all students have entered the room and
thought about the bellringer, the class will come
together and review some of the answers that the
students gave to the bellringer. The teacher will
lead this discussion, and the students will raise their
hands in order to share their answers. This will lead
the class nicely into the next part of the lesson.
3. Next, the class will complete the IWB lesson about
the Three Branches of Government. This lesson
reviews each branch of government briefly, and
Pedagogy

then it asks the students to select which roles and

responsibilities fall under each branch. After a
review all of the branches, the students will interact
 with the white board by selecting which
responsibilities fall to each branch. The teacher will
guide this and select which students touch the
board, and the students will raise their hands in
order to interact with the SMART Board. Because
the students have learned about this before, this
will serve as an excellent review of the
responsibilities of each branch of government. In
review, the teacher must stress that the Executive
enforces the law, the Legislative makes the laws,
and the Judicial reviews the laws.
4. Now that the responsibilities have been reviewed,
students can interact with the second IWB lesson
about separation of powers and checks and
balances.
5. With this next lesson, the students will dive deeper
into the roles of the branches, and what authority
they hold as compared to others. The teacher will
guide the students through a brief lecture of the
roles of each branch. After the lecture is
completed, the students will interact with the IWB
to assign the roles to the various branches. The
teacher will select certain students to touch the
SMART Board. This will allow the students to
critically thinking about the various roles each
branch has, and how to discern which roles goes
with which branch.
6. After exploring more of the responsibilities of each
branch, the students will learn how a bill becomes a
law through a flow cart. This reviews each of the
branch’s role in this process, and it highlights the
differences between the branches. It is important
for the teacher to stress that these differences arise
from the founder’s beliefs in preventing one man
from becoming too power. Checks and balances
exist to prevent this. The flow chart breaks this
down, but the teacher must be able to answer the
students’ questions and ensure that there is
confusion.
7. Finally, there will be handout in which students will
have to explore how a bill becomes a law
independently. Students will be given 5 minutes to
complete this worksheet, and then we will review it
as a class. During this time, the teacher should be
 walking around and facilitating students as needed.
When the 5 minutes is up, the class will come back
together and go over the worksheet. The teacher
will ask students to use the IWB to place their
answers one at a time on the board. The class will
then discuss if everyone is in agreement, or if
something needs to change. Throughout this
exercise, the teacher needs to maintain control of
the classroom and ensure that all students are
respected. Students will need to be open to
collaboration, and be respectful of other student’s
answers. This not only helps students to learn the
material, but it will also help them to collaborate
with other students. This collaboration teaches
them a soft skill that they will be able to use in
future careers. The teacher should pose questions
to help the students think critically if an answer is
placed in the wrong order. The students will need
to help each other if there is disagreement.
8. Before dismissing class, the teacher will hand out
the homework assignment. The students need to
investigate how a bill became a law. They are free
to choose which ever bill they would like, but they
must detail who introduced it, and the flow it had
throughout the various branches.
Technology Branches of US Government:
https://exchange.smarttech-prod.com/preview/fd35b35f-
9078-4b6a-8e43-5f933f64b1fe
Technology

Three Branches of Government:

https://exchange.smarttech-prod.com/preview/2491f2ca-
15e6-4362-b247-3eade811b206