Civic Education Lesson Note: Primary 4 Term 3 Wk 2-3 & 4-5

Posted on by Pius Joe in Lesson Note, Primary, Third Term

Civic Education Lesson Note: Primary 4 Term 3 Wk 2-3 & 4-5

INTRODUCTION:

This Third Term Lesson note on Civic Education for Grade Four is prepared based on (Ajogwu(PhD)) Standard Schemes of Work drawn in line with the new Standard Physical and Health Education Curriculum (9-year Basic Edition) by the National Education Research Development Council. Civic Education is one of the major subjects under Religion and National Values (RNV) in the new national curriculum by Nigerian Educational Research and Development Council (NERDC). The other subjects being Security Education, Social Studies, CRK and IRK. Accordingly, this note is suitable to be delivered in the fourth and fifth week of the third term of the academic year. All necessary components of a standard lesson note have been included.

TEACHER:

SCHOOL:

DATE:

PERIOD:

DURATION

AGE:

CLASS: Grade or Primary Four

CLASS COMPOSITION:

SUBJECT: Civic Education

TOPIC: Responsibilities of Constituted Authority

REFERENCE MATERIALS

Ajogwu(PhD), E. L. Standard Scheme of Work in Line with National Curricular(UBE EDITION) for Middle Basic (Primary 4-6). Lesam Educational.

Campsilos.Org. (n.d.). Why take field trips? . Retrieved 07 05, 2017, from Campsilos.Org: http://www.campsilos.org/excursions/hc/fieldtrip.htm

CCMIT. (n.d.). IMPROVING OBSERVATION SKILLS. Retrieved 07 05, 2017, from CCMIT.MIT.EDU: https://ccmit.mit.edu/observation/

Daniel, J. S., & Christopher, C. (Directors). (2010). Selective Attention Test [Motion Picture].

Nigerian Educational Research & Development Council (NERDC). (2015). Civic Education for Primary Schools (9-Year Basic Education Edition). West African Book Publishers Ltd.

O, E. O., A, D. O., & B, A. A. (2015). Lantern Comprehensive Civic Education for Primary Schools book 4 (Nine Basic Education). Ikeja, Lagos: Literamed Publications (Nig) Ltd.

Penalysis. (2016, September 17). CONSTITUTED AUTHORITY AND TYPES. Retrieved July 05, 2017, from PENALYSIS: http://penalysis.com/constituted-authority-types/

INSTRUCTIONAL MATERIALS

  • Chalk/Marker and Chalk/White Board
  • Digital Display – LCD or projector
  • Video clips/Slides/Charts of:
    • A rioting community or group calmed by either a leader or security agency and/or a traditional ruler settling dispute
    • An offender or (traffic) rule breaker being warned or arrested by appropriate agency
    • A community, group, local or national leader awarding, supervising and commissioning developmental projects such as roads, hospitals, school, e.t.c.
    • A military contingent warding-off terror or robbery attack
    • Meeting of regional leaders or representatives
    • A polling unit in which hoodlums preventing citizens from voting are being arrested by security agencies who also stays to ensure that citizens vote according to their will
    • Lawmakers or monarch enacting law.

ENTRY BEHAVIOURS

The pupils should already know the meaning of constituted authority and the duties of citizens to constituted authority.

OBJECTIVES                  

At the end of the lesson, the pupils are expected not only to be able to list the responsibilities of constituted authorities but also show behavioral change: they should thenceforth see constituted authority as important member of the society instead of “lucky lords” and should be able to teach others to do the same.

PREVIOUS KNOWLEDGE

Based on the curriculum, the preceding topic is “Duties of citizens to Constituted Authority”.

METHOD OF TEACHING

Teaching by induction and field trip

TEACHER’S ACTIVITIES

  • The teacher shall, before the commencement of the lesson, arrange for pupils excursion to the nearest traditional leader or government secretariat. These include visiting or obtaining permission from the school authority and the place and person to be visited as well as other necessary preparations.
  • S/he shall guide/supervise the pupils to and from the excursion
  • Assessment/Evaluation – the teacher shall evaluate the pupils at an ongoing basis and at the end of the lesson to ascertain whether the objectives are met.

LEARNERS’ ACTIVITIES

The pupils shall actively participate in the lesson by listening, asking and giving presentations.

PRESENTATION

The lesson is presented in such progressive steps as follows:

Step 1: Introduction

Upon entering the class, the teacher impresses upon the minds of the pupils, the general but incorrect notion that political or traditional leaders (constituted authority) do not perform any work because they have servants to serve them and aids to assist them. This may be done in any way that is suitable to the teacher and which will yield expected result. Nonetheless, we suggest simple and interactive alternative way below:

  • The teacher asks how many of the pupils are either from a royal home (i.e. whose relative is a monarch) or whose relative is a popular (high profile) political leader.

If there is none, proceed to the next step, or if there is, the teacher asks if such relative always work or does any work for the government to pay him/her and what work.

It is expected that the pupils will say that the relative does no tedious work.

  • The teacher then tells the pupils the more common public opinion about political or traditional leaders – they are very rich people that do not do any work but instead, they have anything they want, any day, any time. S/he may give illustrations to make solidify the claim.
  • Thereafter, s/he asks for the pupils’ opinion: Do they think that kings/queens and politicians work? Why do they think so (whether yes or no)? Teacher receives a couple of answer and allows a few minutes of discussion (talking mostly being made by and among the pupils).
  • Following the discussion, the teacher introduces the topic by telling the pupils that the topic of the week is to know whether kings/queens and such popular politicians work and which work(s) they do.

However that not just kings, queens and popular politicians but that as they learned the week before that kings, queens and popular political are but only examples of constituted authority, they shall be learning the general responsibilities of constituted authority. Thereafter, the teacher explains the objectives of the topic to them and writes/projects the topic: RESPONSIBILITIES OF CONSTITUTED AUTHORITY on the board/screen then continue with step 2.

Step 2: Explanation of terms

Before advancing further into the lesson, the teacher revises the last lesson and explains the meaning of responsibility to the pupils.

They had learned in the last lesson that constituted authority means an individual or group of people conferred with authority (power) and backed by the law to work on behalf of a community (group of people like association, village, town), state or country. For example,

At the family level, the persons that have the authority to act on behalf of the other members of the family are father and mother who are backed by natural and local law.

At school level, the constituted authority is (members of) the school management including the prefects, teachers, headmasters, head teachers, principals, rectors, provosts, vice chancellor e.t.c.

The teacher asks the pupils and together they list the constituted authorities at:

  • Religious institutions (Churches/Mosques) level – pastors, priests, Imam, e.t.c.
  • Town or community level – kings, queens, chiefs, e.t.c.
  • Local government level – L.G Chairman and local government workers.
  • State government level– governors and state government workers.
  • Federal government level – the president, senators, ministers and other federal government workers.

After revising as given above, the teacher explains the meaning of responsibility as it is used in the topic: the works or duties that the constituted authorities ought to perform. S/he thereafter explains that although the responsibilities of the various constituted authorities vary from level to level, there are some responsibilities common to all of them.

The teacher then asks pupils to name some of such common responsibilities. After listing a couple, s/he asks for specific responsibilities of kings, queens or popular political leader (whichever they shall be visiting during the excursion). They are likely going to be unable to list more than two or three, consequently the teacher tells them that they shall be visiting such person to know more of his/her responsibilities. Thence, the teacher proceeds to step 3.

Step 3: Excursion

Having made every necessary “external” preparation for the excursion earlier, the teacher now prepares the pupils for the excursion as follow:

  • Discuss the purpose of the excursion – To know more of the responsibilities of the constituted authority.
  • Teach Them Observation Skills – Teach them how to listen and observe critically for accurate description or gathering of information:
    • They should learn to ignore distraction – such as other kids’ watching or talking to or about them there.
    • Pick and Focus – there, they should pick one thing (at a time) –seen or heard, that interests them, focus and pay attention to it and gather (by asking where necessary) as much information on it as possible[1].
    • Sketch and Jot – to remember what there had observed, they should learn how to describe by sketching and jotting on their notes (They may practice this by describing a given object in the class).
  • Introduce Area Vocabulary – teacher should make a list of words that may likely be used during the excursion.
  • Show Photographs or Poster of the place if possible
  • Discuss how to ask good questions there – The class (teacher and pupils) should brainstorm and draw-up a list of open-ended observation questions that the pupils may ask to gather information during the visit.
  • Assign Pupils to different roles – including who asks which question, how takes care of First Aid kit, e.t.c.
  • Finally, discuss standard of conduct – what is the standard way of doing things such as greeting there? Let the class (teacher and pupils) brainstorm and formulate rules they must observe there.

Once the pupils’ preparation is complete and all papers and things taken, excursion begins!

Step 4: Discussion

Upon return from the excursion, the teacher lets the pupils to discuss what they learned from the trip before progressing to the common responsibilities of constituted authorities in the next step.

Step 5: General Responsibilities of Constituted Authority

Following the discussion, the teacher explains the common responsibilities of constituted authority with the video clips, slides charts. S/he plays or displays the clips then explains to the pupils what each clip means after asking their opinion of what they think was happening in the clips or charts. The responsibilities are listed below:

  • Maintain law and order
  • Settling disputes
  • Developing the place
  • Protecting lives and properties
  • Representing the people
  • Protecting the political rights of the citizens
  • Making laws

EVALUATION

The pupils’ understanding of the topic is done through debate, presentation and assignments.

ASSIGNMENT:

See assignments below.

DEBATE

The essence of the debate is to evaluate he behavioral impact of the lesson on the pupils.

Narration:

Mr. Umar is a banker. On Monday, Mr. Umar was getting late for work so he drove as fast he could. Unfortunately, he got to a traffic light when it was only a second for the light to turn red. However, since Mr. Umar would be late if he delays any longer and there was no vehicle coming because it was at early hours, he tried beating the traffic. Too bad for him, traffic wardens were watching from a distance so he was arrested just before he crossed the light. The next day, Mr. Umar was fired for not going to work the previous day.

After the narration above, the teacher asks whether the traffic wardens did the right thing by arresting Mr. Umar, seeing that there were no vehicle on the road and the arrest cost him his job. Based on the pupils’ answers, s/he groups them into two: One group to speak in favor of the traffic wardens and the other group to counter the first group.

Each group is allowed to sit together to list and discuss their points. After some minutes, the teacher calls them for the debate.

PUPILS’ INDIVIDUAL PRESENTATION

After the debate (and after teacher’s verdict), the pupils will be given homework: a 3-minute presentation on the topic: A Society without Constituted Authority which should be presented individually in their next class (the following week).

SUMMARY

Prior to hen end of the lesson, the teacher summarizes the entire lesson into a concise lecture note which is written/projected on the board/screen for the pupils to copy. Afterwards the teacher revises the lesson. The board summary is as given below (teacher may add where s/he deems fit).

RESPONSIBILITIES OF CONSTITUTED AUTHORITY

Responsibilities of constituted authority mean the works or duties of constituted authorities perform or ought to perform. The common responsibilities of constituted authorities include:

  • Maintain law and order
  • Settling disputes
  • Developing the place
  • Protecting lives and properties
  • Representing the people
  • Protecting the political rights of the citizens
  • Making laws

ASSIGNMENT

After revising the lesson, the teacher gives the following exercises either as class or home works to the pupils.

  1. Which one best describes constituted authority?
    1. An individual conferred with authority but not backed by the law
    2. A group of people backed by the law without authority
  • An individual or a group of people conferred with authority and backed by the law to act on behalf of the people.
  1. Responsibilities means _________________________________________________________
  2. Is class captain a constituted authority? Yes/No
  3. Which one of the following persons is not a constituted authority?
    1. Leader of armed robbers
    2. Reverend Fathers
  • Imams
  1. Governors
  1. Why the leader of bad gangs not a constituted authority is even though he acts (speaks) on behalf of the gang? _________________________________________________________________
  2. Mention four responsibilities of performed by all constituted authorities
    1. _____________________________________________________________________
    2. _____________________________________________________________________
  • _____________________________________________________________________
  1. ______________________________________________________________________
  1. Mention one thing you should do when a constituted authority fails to perform his responsibility:
    1. ______________________________________________________________________

CONCULSION

The topic is concluded by marking and redistribution of pupils’ notebooks then linking the lesson to next topic: Traffic Regulations:

This week, we learned that it is one of the duties of constituted authorities to make laws (rules and regulations) while in the week before, next week we will learn about the rules our constituted authority has mad about traffic or road use.

[1] If digital display is being used, teacher may run the 1-minute video test by (Daniel & Christopher, 2010) of Monkey Business Illusion available Daniel’s YouTube Channel. Video Link: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vJG698U2Mvo

Leave a Reply