Materials

• Computer with Internet access
• Excerpts of Paine’s and Locke’s work

Instructional Activities

1. Take a few minutes to review the discussions thus far on this organizing topic. Check for understanding. As students respond, ask them to identify what happened first, next, etc. Prompt students on the following topics:
   • Growing discontent among colonist for British rule
   • French and Indian War
   • Proclamation of 1763
   • Stamp Act & Congress
   • Townshend Acts
   • Boston Tea Party
   • Coercive Acts
   • Boston Massacre
   • Taxation without representation
   • First Continental Congress
   • John Locke
   
   
2. Display the following prompt on the board or overhead. “Thomas Paine produced Common Sense in January of 1776. This pamphlet challenged the King of England’s rule of the colonies. It also shifted the focus of colonial anger from the Parliament to the Crown.” Use the Web site below to provide a brief biography on Thomas Paine: <http://www.thomaspaine.org/>.
   
   
3. Display the following prompt on the board or overhead:
   
   The writings of John Locke and Thomas Paine contributed to a desire for independence from England.
   
   Use the Web sites identified above to obtain excerpts from Paine and Locke’s works. Put these excerpts on handouts or overheads for students. Read through the excerpts with the students, offering no explanations, or play a recording of someone reading them. Instruct the students to write, in their own words, what they think Locke or Paine meant in the passages. After a brief period for students to work alone, put them into small groups of three or four, and have each group develop a consolidated interpretation of what the passages mean.
   
   
4. Bring the class back together and have a spokesperson from each group share their interpretation of the passages. After all groups have shared, conduct a discussion to identify a “class” interpretation. Use an overhead to take notes for the class, and have them record the final product.
   
   
5. Display the following prompt on the board or overhead:
   
   The Declaration of Independence is…
   
   If time permits, allow students to complete the statement. Explain that they are going to complete the statement as a class in the next few sessions. Assign this as homework as necessary.