Voting in a Direct Democracy
In Direct Democracy the citizens of a place vote directly on the laws they follow. There may be elected official but those officials cannot create new laws or take certain acts without the consent (vote) of the citizens. Direct Democracy is a means by which a community can come together to solve a issue equitability. As a community our class will now come together to solve a real issue. Below are two examples of common issues classes have. Students may come up with their own as well. These issues will be written on a white board.
Issue 1 : An assignment the teacher gave was unfair or really difficult. The whole class should be allowed to redo it!
Issue 2 : One student is especially rude (or some other problem that affects other students) during class. Something must be done.
Issue 3+ : All communities are different. If our class has a particular issue they think is important to solve any student may wait for their turn to speak and put forward an issue.
If you have the "talking stick" no one else may talk. The teacher is the "censor" and may block students from debating if they are not polite and/or talk out of order. A time limit will be placed on the debate. Once the issues have been collected we will raise our hands for each issue. The issue to get the most hands raised will be addressed. The others may not.
Now that an issue has been selected it must be decided what to do about it. We will debate back and forth until two options are chosen on what to do. Both options will be put on the whiteboard. Repeat debate steps from step 1. The teacher may modify actions if they break school or classroom rules as a judge.
Each action will be assigned to LEFT or RIGHT. Two piles will be formed of rocks just like the Athenian Greeks did, LEFT and RIGHT. Which ever pile is larger (more rocks) is the action that will be taken by the class to solve the issue.
The students and the teacher are obliged by the vote results to put the action in effect. This step will be different depending on what was voted on.
CONGRATULATIONS you participated in Direct Democracy! If you think this was helpful we may repeat this for other issues but only if they do not take too much time, the class is polite, and the issues are something the teacher is willing to address.