Mock Parliament Assessment Task- a study of Key Stage 3 Citizenship in the British Secondary School System

Year Level of Students Completing the Task- Year Nine equivalent to Australia

Specific Dimensions to be Assessed- Key Stage 3 Citizenship, Unit One, Key Concepts- Democracy and Justice

Introduction

The importance of designing assessment tasks that are valid, reliable and fair for students is a challenging task for teachers.  There are a number of competing priorities that need to be considered, such as the curriculum frameworks and the school’s expectations. “The fact that a system which is fit for one purpose will not necessarily be fit for all purposes is a fundamental consideration when evaluating the legitimacy of proposals.” (Newton, 2007:1)

This essay aims to design an assessment task based on establishing a ‘mock parliament’ for students in a Key Stage 3 (KS3) British Citizenship class. The assessment criteria chosen and how learning will be assessed will be explained below.

Assessment Task- Mock Parliament

Background Knowledge

The curriculum framework that has been chosen for this assessment task is the KS3 British Citizenship document. (See Appendix 1a) This particular document outlines the aims of the course, its importance, key concepts and processes, and the different levels the students could attain in the subject.  As such, in my practicum I mainly focused on designing assessment tasks for the students that focused on the key concepts and the processes involved, instead of the assessment criteria.  

The students before undertaking my mock parliament task should have prior knowledge of the justice system, their role within it, and how democracy works.

Task Overview

The task aims to build on the prior knowledge of students through a role-play about how parliament works and the different stages and people involved in turning a bill into a law.  It aims to integrate across other disciplines such as Maths, English, Health and Psychical Education.

 

Task Outline

In order to achieve a successful mock parliament in the classroom five assessment tasks have been devised.  They are: multiple choice test, mock parliament role play, group work – writing and performance task, presentation to an selected audience including peer to peer assessment, and a reflective essay.

Each of the tasks will be briefly outlined and the justification of why they were chosen will be discussed in detail in the assessment criteria section.

Task One- Multiple Choice Test

Students will undertake a twenty question multiple-choice test. (See Appendix 1b) After students complete the test individually, answers will be shared as a class.

Homework Task- At the end of the lesson students will be set homework to research the three following issues in preparation for the mock parliament: abolishing uniforms in schools, raising the retirement age to sixty-five, and lowering the voting age to sixteen.

Teachers Notes

A homework handout listing the three issues with two articles on each topic, will need to be prepared with a couple of ‘thinking’ questions to stimulate interest in the topic.

Task Two- Mock Parliament

Students having completed the background reading will firstly, vote on the two issues to be debated as a Parliament in the class. The teacher will then assign the roles and approximately 20 have been devised. They are: Speaker, Prime Minister, Deputy Prime Minister, Treasurer, four backbenchers, Opposition Leader, Shadow Treasurer, four opposition backbenchers, two pressure group leaders, two reporters and four members of the community.

The Speaker will then be giving a running order of the questions to be asked to the three main leaders of the government and the two opposition leaders. The questions will come from the remaining students in the other roles.

Once these questions have been asked, answered and debated, (the students in the main roles will have background information in front of them to help them answer) the speaker will announce that the bill has now gone to the Select Committee stage for approval.

The class will then perform the role of Select Committee and afterwards the Speaker will read out the recommendations of the committee.  

The Speaker will then ask if anyone has any objections to the bill state them now, otherwise it will pass through the House of Lords.

Once it passes through the House of Lords it will go to the King/Queen (teacher) to be signed off. The Speaker will then announce the white paper and the Parliament will then repeat this for the second issue.

Teachers Notes

The roles after the first sitting of Parliament can be rotated to give different students the chance to participate in another part.

Join now!

Teachers can adapt the number of roles based on the numbers of students in the class.

Tasks three to five are activities that can be used by teachers after the conclusion of mock parliament.  They should be used to extend the students further and to encourage them to present their views to the wider school community

Task Three- Group Work- Writing Task and Oral Presentation

Students will be divided up into groups of three to four, to continue work on the two issues studied in the mock parliament task.  Firstly, in collaboration with one another ...

This is a preview of the whole essay