Summary:
This activity has students in groups do a thorough investigation of an area of life (home, suburban, urban, or rural) and how government affects it. Then the class will share and discuss what they saw, and relate it to their own lives and region.
Expected Duration: 60 minutes
Learning Outcomes:
- identify a range of government responsibilities in a geographic area
- summarize their in-game findings about the government activity or influence
- reflect on the differences between the game and their local area
- discuss the role of government and how it affects their lives and local area
Instructions:
Introduce students to the Explore mode of the Jurisdictions: Canada web game. Demonstrate how to scroll around and click on objects to learn about them and page through the text information provided in game.
Students will then play their own game of Jurisdictions: Canada by selecting the Challenge button and the Find All mode. We recommend you have the class split into four groups and have each one select a different scene to explore. They will need to find all the objects in their group’s scene and read the popups text to learn about the government responsibility. They may wish to take notes.
After students have found all objects in the scene a congratulations popup will appear. The students can then meet as a group for a discussion. Provide students them the following questions:
- What aspects of the game are accurate to their area? What aspects are different or missing?
- Have you seen any of the objects from the game in your local area?
- Why does government get involved in the different topics you explored?
- How do government responsibilities and services affect your lives?
Reflection:
After the activity, the class as a whole can have their group present some of their thoughts and findings to the class. You can spur discussion by prompting students to give additional examples of their local area or their life and how government affects it.
Downloads:
Download this Lesson Plan as a pdf