The unit is planned for seventh grade students, who have been identified as Gifted and whose care curriculum is Future Studies. In conjunction with a co-teacher, I meet with approximately twenty-five students, in a Resource Room Program, one day per week. Due to the structure of the program, this course will run as a mini unit of study, for two hours per day, over an eighteen week period.
This unit aims to explore some of the popular arguments surrounding the system of capital punishment in America and seeks the abolition of the death penalty in support of a more humane punishment of life imprisonment for capital offenders.
The topic of capital punishment is presented as a future problem to which alternatives must be sought. This unit is therefore designed as a course in future problem solving. Students will be offered various tools and techniques for examining the past, evaluating the present and forecasting the future of the system of capital punishment in America.
The purpose of the unit is to put the issues of capital punishment in a national perspective, as well as help students think intelligently about how their own futures fit into this perspective. Throughout the study, students will be encouraged to express their opinions on issues of the Eighth and Fourteenth Amendments of the Constitution, as they relate to the moral, social and political arguments surrounding the death penalty.
Students will be asked to make value judgments and use deductive reasoning skills in determining moral issues that are raised within the unit content. They will be invited to use the given tools to challenge and evaluate their own views, as well as those of the Supreme Court, as they examine the landmark decisions that were rendered in the cases of Furman v. Georgia and McClesky v. Kemp.
I find the topic appealing because it requires examination of the Constitution. It raises questions of right and wrong, of discretionary judgment and of law enforcement practices. I feel that students will enjoy the open-ended discussion activities, as well as the drama and video ideas. In all, it makes for interesting debate.