Here are seven tips that will help you get the Civic Mirror off to a fun and fast-paced start.
COMMIT EARLY AND DIVE IN
The goal here is to pique your students’ interest right away. Also, if you plan on linking attitude and effort-based metrics to the game-start money and Hidden Agendas you will assign them with in the Citizen Profiles stage (e.g. punctuality, task completion, participation), then telling them on the first class usually gets students jazzed up right away … and often the ones you would least suspect.
Specifically, I would …
1. Introduce CM on the first day of classes, after you introduce the course content. Then, assign the first set of readings (that correspond to “Reading Check #1” at the back of the Instructor’s Manual) for homework the next day. Tell your students they “can take as many hand-written/printed notes as they like to use for tomorrow’s open book reading check … you just want to ‘check’ that they’ve read it.”
2. Book your computer lab for the Practice Run on your 3rd class. Basically, in the first class you’ll introduce the curriculum and the Civic Mirror. In the second class you’ll conduct the reading check, mark it as a class, and move on to other course-beginning items of business. Then, at the end of the Class 2, assign the second set of readings (corresponding to “Reading Check #2”) for Class 3. In Class 3 you will start with Reading Check #2 and then, instead of marking it as a class, move straight into the Practice Run sequence of events (which are outlined in the Instructor’s Manual). Leave the group-marking of “Reading Check #2” for Class 4.
Remember, because you’ve made the reading checks open book, anyone can succeed … making them “effort” tasks that you could link to the $$ assignments a few weeks down the road.
PLAN TO COMPLETE PRE-GAME EVENTS WITHIN 3 WEEKS
The pre-game events, where students build their nation, are lots of fun and could very easily be extended for quite some time. A few recommendations to keep the Civic Mirror enthusiasm alive and kicking:
3. Set a date for the Hex Auction early on and tell your students about this date. This will keep you focused and keep things moving.
4. Pre-select readings to run along side of the pre-game events and schedule reading checks. The whole point of doing this is to plan what chapters you want to link the Citizen Profile Hidden Agendas and money to so you can pick a “distribution date” in advance. Then, be sure to communicate the readings and the ‘distribution date’ to your students so they can gear up for it.
* Remember to tell your students that the open book reading checks (and any other attitude/effort metrics you decide to use) will be linked to these assignments.
Ultimately, this will force you to plan well, start the course at a good pace, and it will motivate your students to do well. I think you’ll be surprise by how much more your students will read when they know that their open book performance will be linked to their Citizen Profile assignments. I always love warning students (in an endearing manner of course) who don’t do their readings or continually arrive late, “You know, I don’t know how happy your Civic Mirror family is going to be when they see your game-starting bank account statement.” It’s amazing how motivating this is.
5. Have students “Create their National Identity” by the end of the 2nd week. This process takes two, 30-minute chunks of time that can be reserved at the end of two classes that week.
6. Consider skipping the “National Constitution” jigsaw activity if time is a real issue. This activity is GREAT in a civics or government class … but if time is an issue, then this would be event you could skip over then return to once the game is up and running.
7. Plan an “Elections Week” where you commit to completing i) the political party formation, ii) the campaign debates, and iii) the ballot-casting. One week is plenty of time to do this and, in order to reserve class time to cover content and connect how it relates to their developing CM Country, I often assign students to do their campaigning online in the discussion forums.
Hopefully these tips help you get the Civic Mirror off to a fun and quick start!
If you have any questions, please feel free to contact us!
