The upcoming presidential election is a hot-button topic among most Americans. It’s also been a little heated for some librarians and teachers in their respective libraries and schools. While some educators either cannot or choose not to offer any sort of election programming due to the divisiveness in American politics (including several who declined to speak with us), others were ready, willing, and able to offer a variety of programs to reach and teach the future voters of America, and celebrate the right to vote. PW spoke with three educators who are doing their best to get preschoolers to middle schoolers excited about the democratic process, the election, and casting their own votes.
Every year, Erin Winder, an elementary teacher librarian and student council advisor at C.C. Ronnow, at Dual Language Elementary School in Las Vegas, oversees the yearly elections for her fourth and fifth grade students. She believes that this year is especially exhilarating with the presidential elections upon us.
“I am teaching our students about the elections with an actual democratic process!” Winder said. “At our school, we have three presidential candidates, four VP candidates, and one treasurer candidate—who happens to be my daughter.”
Winder explained that her students run their campaigns much like real candidates, introducing themselves to the voters and giving speeches to make the case that they are the right person for the job. After the speeches conclude, each fourth and fifth grader votes on their Chromebooks and receives their own “I Voted!” sticker.
As the school’s teacher librarian, Winder also curates resources and develops lessons to integrate content on the election and democratic process into her K–5 library curriculum. She also facilitates discussions about fake news and things the kids might hear on television.
With her younger grades, Winder hosts election-themed storytimes and gives kindergarteners and first graders a glimpse into the democratic process by having them vote for apples vs. oranges. Her second and third graders receive another layer of instruction on how voting actually works—except for the electoral college. “I’m still trying to figure that out,” Winder said.
With each grade level’s various elections, she and her students talk about agreeing and disagreeing and not arguing over how they and others vote, and handling winning vs. losing. “We discuss how it’s okay to disagree with someone, because we don’t want our friends to be robots. That would be boring,” Winder said. “But when we disrespect someone for something they believe or say, we have a problem.”
The older grades dive even deeper into the U.S. Constitution, the Bill of Rights, and the lack of rights and social and racial inequities, too. “I keep it real and talk about being Black in America,” Winder said. “We know that long ago, people of color didn’t have any rights; but today while we have rights, they may not be all the rights we need.”
Her lessons also include fun election facts and profiles about presidents, but nothing specific on the current presidential candidates. She needs to keep things neutral. “Many kids, however, do repeat what they hear big people say,” she said. “It’s only natural since most people’s first parties are whatever their families are, because that’s all you know.”
Winder’s ultimate goal is to teach election basics—including the qualifications of the president and what the parties represent in terms that children can understand—and at the same time encourage civility and find common ground. “Within my instruction about elections and voting, I’m teaching life skills and social emotional learning skills,” Winder said. “I want my students to know that voting is important, that their voices matter, and that whoever wins in these elections, we have to support each other to get to the other side.”
Karina Quilantán-Garza, aka “Cue the Librarian” on Twitter, and “Q” (for short) is an award-winning library media specialist, a doctoral candidate at Sam Houston University, and an international speaker/presenter. She also has an impressive list of digital media learning credentials she uses to help her students become responsible digital citizens. Q hopes to instill this love of learning in her students at Jaime Escalante Middle School in Rio Grande Valley, Tex., and for them to experience it during the school year, and beyond.
This academic year, Q is concentrating on the district’s social studies curriculum (to help her teachers who are piloting a new ELA program) in her middle grade library. And, with the November elections around the corner, she has been laser-focused on teaching her students about the election process and the impact the results will have on them and in their own backyard.
“Since we live on the U.S./Mexican border, a lot of policies are in place at the government level that will directly influence and affect our livelihoods in the Rio Grande area,” Q said. “I have students who literally walk across the bridge between the U.S. and Mexico to get to school.”
And when they arrive in the morning, Q is ready to teach the standards embedded into their social studies curriculum, specifically about voter and policy awareness. “My job as a librarian is to ensure that my students are interacting with the curriculum in an engaging, informative, and fun way,” she said.
First on Q’s must-do list is to teach proper database research: how to access them, filter results, determine their credibility for her middle graders, and use the upcoming election as a topic. She’s also collaborating with her school’s history teachers to create a mock election.
But, before her students cast their votes, they will be working in collaborative groups on designated databases—i.e. News-o-Matic, Britannica, and Election Central (part of PBS Media Learning), and MackinVIA—and using graphic organizers to record the information they are learning about the candidates and their individual campaign’s key issues. Her students will also be discovering how voters’ perspectives change depending on where they get their news. “They’ll be closely looking at the candidates’ strengths and weaknesses,” Q said, “and how my students’ own beliefs and biases could potentially sway their votes.”
With this new knowledge, Q will further engage her students by “hiring” them to become “election analysts” in an “Election Digital Escape Room” that she’s created. To escape, the analysts must solve puzzles and answer questions related to the elections, the candidates and their political parties and platforms, and discern the reliability of databases they are using. “The kids must complete free response answers to questions, each choose one candidate, and identify a key issue that the candidate cares about,” Q said. “Only then will they earn the title of ‘election expert.’ ”
Shortly after, the experts will receive an “I’m an Informed Voter!” button, and a Google form to vote in the school’s mock election. Once all of the votes are tabulated, the results will be announced on Election Day. But the election results that Q cares the most about are those that will impact her students’ lives.
“Being an educator on the Rio Grande and so close to the border, I want to make this a meaningful experience, and one of the key lessons of the year,” Q said. “Immigration is one of the major issues that the candidates are trying to address. And because most of my students, like many Mexican Americans, have first-generation immigrants in their families or direct contact with family with connections to immigrants or individuals with undocumented status, I think changes in the border and immigration policies could resonate deeply with them.”
She’s already seen this reinforced in their writing and heard it in their discussions on the rhetoric surrounding immigration on the campaign trail, during debates, and in the media. “This [the rhetoric] often amplifies stereotypes and triggers debates about our identity and inclusiveness, and our role in American society.”
It’s no surprise to Q that these issues stir up strong emotions in her students. It’s why she takes time to listen to them, to acknowledge their feelings, and to teach them how to separate feelings from facts to think more objectively. “I tell them to start with what you know, what you feel, and see where the information and the research leads you. And, if you feel the same afterwards, then at least you’ve backed it up with cold hard facts versus just allowing your feelings to guide your thinking. Look at the information and it will lead your judgment.”
Chrysalis Cantrell is a youth services librarian at the Westover Library, part of the Arlington Public Library System, in Arlington, Va., where she and her library are hosting a “Family Storytime: Voter’s Edition” in honor of the upcoming elections. But, before this story time starts, there’s some voting to do.
“I wanted to find a good way for our kids to learn a little about voting and what it’s all about, and so I decided on a storytime where they get to pick between a dinosaur- or a pirate-themed storytime,” Cantrell said. “This way, they wouldn’t just be voting for something—they could see and actually experience the benefit of voting.”
To get things rolling, Cantrell and other library staffers designed campaign posters and grabbed books to create a dinosaur vs. pirate book display, a ballot box, ballots, stickers, etc. And they’ll explain the voting process with the help of their two storytime theme candidates. “We’ll have dinosaur and pirate puppets share why they should earn the kids’ votes.”
Voting will run from October 28 through November 7, and the winning storytime will take place on November 8. Cantrell hopes that many of the library’s young patrons and their adults vote early, join the fun, and enjoy the winning storytime’s theme. She’d also like the kids to leave with some understanding that their votes matter and can affect change.
“Whether it’s a dinosaur or a pirate storytime that wins, I think they’ll all be happy with the results, and with what their vote did,” Cantrell said. But, in case someone is disappointed or upset, she will have the candidate puppets and books ready, and some reassuring words. “I’ll assure them that it’s very possible that the storytime theme will come back in a few weeks!”
