Larry Ferlazzo’s Websites of the Day…

It’s time for another one of my The Best Of…. lists. This one will highlight the ten — well, actually eleven, since there’s a tie for first place — best websites for learning about civic participation and citizenship.

Even though the main focus of this list is assisting English Language Learners, a number of the sites are appropriate for native-English speakers of all ages. I’ve tried to strike a balance between including resources to help immigrants to the United States prepare for their Citizenship test and also list sites that encourage everyone to become active citizens in improving their communties — whatever country they live in.

I was particularly interested in doing this list since I’m starting to teach a Government class this coming semester that will be using a great deal of technology. All these sites will be helpful to my class, and I wanted to make sure that I also included some that non-U.S. residents might find useful — I hope my Government students will be working with classes around the world.

I’m listing the U.S. Peace Corps ESL/EFL Training Manuals at number ten. They provide excellent lessons and examples about how to apply the teachings of Paulo Freire in an ESL/EFL class. The idea is to draw-out the personal experiences of students through the learning process and to then take collective action for social change.

The number nine site is Ben’s Guide To U.S. Government. It’s sponsored by the United States Government Printing Office, and offers a very accessible description of government here in the U.S. There are three levels based on people’s age (and English level) which is very helpful to English Language Learners.

Number eight is a site sponsored by Brown University and the International Institute of Rhode Island. It provides basic information about United States history and government, specifically geared towards preparing people for the U.S. Citizenship test. The language and presentation is very accessible to English Language Learners of all levels.

Number seven is a site that is not very engaging and not well-designed. However, it has critical information for anyone considering taking the U.S. Citizenship test. It’s a link to the U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services, and has a list of the questions that will be on the new Citizenship test. It’s optional for applicants to take it now, but in a couple of years it will be the only version given.

I’ve ranked the website of the Civic Participation and Community Action Sourcebook as number six. Much of their book (though not all of it) is on the site. It provides excellent lesson plans and examples of students learning about public life and government through taking action in their communities.

Number five is a great site called American Epic. There’s an index on their main page that provides access to many well-done digital stories (with audio) providing examples of civic participation and information about democratic values. These stories include Core Democratic Values, You Be The Judge, and Compromising For The Public Good.

Number four is the Civic Participation module of the Center of Congress at Indiana University. It’s part of a larger group of excellent Interactive Learning Modules about public life in the United States. The Civic Participation site includes well-done audio visuals that have text with audio support covering various strategies for resolving community problems.

U.S. Citizenship Podcast is number three. It has an extraordinary amount of resources related to preparing for the U.S. Citizenship test. They recently posted a wealth of quizzes related to the new U.S. Citizenship Test — they’ll be a huge help to ELL’s and their teachers.

Number two is The Community Organizing Toolkit. I was a community organizer for nineteen years prior to becoming a classroom teacher. I believe organizing is an extraordinarily effective way to develop leadership, learn, and create social change. Though I have a number of issues with how this animated, text, and audio presentation portrays organizing, it still gives an important perspective for people to hear.

Now, for my number ranked website for learning about civic participation and citizenship….. It’s a tie between two extraordinary sites.

One is US Citizenship, an online self-access course created by Charles LaRue at the Metro North Adult Education Program in Minnesota. It’s very accessible and engaging — my students have really liked it. It does cost $30 per year, but for that small amount your whole class can use the site.

The other number one site is EL Civics For ESL Students. Christina Niven has designed a wonderful site to help people learn about the United States and everyday life skills. The images, text, design, and support materials are very accessible to all levels of English Language Learners.

(I’m adding iCue’s U.S. Government & Politics section)

U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services has a page of updated information on the new test, including multilingual translations of the questions.

The Catholic Legal Immigration Network (CLINIC) has just performed a great service for recent immigrants by helping to develop and distribute the new U.S. Citizenship test questions in eleven additional languages.  The U.S. government provides translations in four major languages. CLINIC has recruited community organizations from around the country to do these eleven, and are hoping to do more.

I’ve recently learned from Susan Wetenkamp-Brandt about a top-notch resource to help English Language Learners prepare for the newly-revised U.S. Citizenship test. It’s a step-by-step online program to study for the new test. Audio support is provided for all the text, and it include practice questions. It’s available for anyone to use as a “guest” — you just can’t register, log-in and save your work unless you’re a Minnesota resident working with the Minnesota Literacy Council.

Karen Hilgeman has developed a number of additional online citizenship activities.

Law Focused Education also has a number of citizenship-related games.

Thinkfinity has lesson resources for teachers that are related to citizenship.

I thought it might also be useful to include this link — a slideshow from the Sacramento Bee showing a citizenship ceremony involving immigrants from 94 countries.

You can also access my United States History Class blog and see an entire year’s of lessons designed for student self-access. You can also see links to the students blogs used during the course. The lessons include quite a bit of original material I developed for use in both of the classes, and they are available for download (during the year students would open up the documents and cut-and-paste the exercises into their own blogs).  You’re obviously welcome to use the resources there with your students. I just ask that you not publish or reprint any of my original materials for use other than by your students.

These sites, and more related to Citizenship, can be found on my website. You’ll find 8,000 categorized links there.

You can find other “Best of…” lists here.

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