Vocabulary pre-learning

Pre-learningvocabularyallowspupils to learn the meaning of words and use visual images to help themrecallthem. Pleasefeel free to change the visual images to onesthatworkbetter for yourpupils.

Have the words and images availableduring the lesson as a word mat or display, sothatchildrencanbeprompted to recall as needed.

Vote / A vote isachoice made by a particularperson or group in a meeting or an election. /
General Election / An electioniswhen people vote to chooseMPs. /
Laws / Rules for the whole country. /
Parliament / Wherelaws are made. /
Opinion / What people think. /
Legislation / Laws /
Draft / An earlyattempt of writingsomethingwhichischangedbeforeitisfinished. /
Government / The Governmentrun the country. The political party thatwins the mostseats at a General Election takes charge of the Government. /
MP / A member of Parliamentwhoiselected to help makedecisions about how to run the country. /
Prime Minister / The leader of the winning party at a General Election. The leader of the Government. /
A Bill in Parliament / A Bill is what a law is called before everyone has agreed to it in Parliament. /
Debate / Whentwosidesgivetheirviews on aparticularsubject and then vote about it. /
Opposition / The MPs in Parliamentwho are not in the Government’spolitical party. /
Minister / An MP whois part of the Government. /
Political party / The MPs and other people who have the samepoliticalideas. /
An Act of Parliament /
Argument / A point of view or opinion. /

Stages of a Bill sorting activity

ThirdReading
OverallconsiderationoftheBill intheHouseofCommons and finalvotes to decide whetheritgoes anyfurther
TheRoyalAssent
The Queensigns-off theBillas anewlawor‘Act ofParliament’.
SecondReading
Thisis themain debatingstagewhereallMPs candiscuss theBill, ask questions andvoteonit. Itcould bevotedout atthis stage.
ConsultationStage
The Governmentmakes a draftoftheBillandasks seniorofficials tomake comments.
CommitteeStage
Asmallergroup ofMPs look attheBillindetail.They maymakechanges,called
‘amendments’, based ontheirdiscussions
ReportStage
Amendmentsmade during theCommitteeStage arereportedto everyoneinthe
House ofCommons. MPsmay vote on theseamendments
FirstReading
The Government tells everyone about theBillbyreading outitstitleintheHouse ofCommons tolet everyoneknowaboutit.
LordsStages
TheBillgoes to theHouseof Lords who followsimilarstages.They cansuggest amendmentsto theBillandsenditback to theCommons,whomay sendit back againuntilan agreementcan bereached.Ifno agreementcan bereached,the House ofCommons can eventually voteto pass thelaw withoutconsentfromthe House of Lords through anAct ofParliamentwhich gives themmore poweroverthe House of Lords.

One School Uniform

Ideas for arguments for and against all schools having the same school uniform.

For / Against
It would be cheaper and easier to shop for. / It would be boring.
It would make all schools the same. / You couldn’t tell which school people go to by looking at them.
If you changed school, you wouldn’t need to buy new uniform. / Children at different ages need to wear different things.
It would stop fights between schools as you wouldn’t know which school children go to by looking at them. / Different schools do different things, so need different uniform.
People wouldn’t be bullied for wearing different uniforms. / Not everyone wants to wear the same thing.
It will make everyone equal, whatever school they go to. / When you go to sports competitions, you wouldn’t be able to tell the teams apart because they would all be wearing the same.
It would give a sense of national pride, like an army uniform that everyone was dressed the same. / On school trips, people won’t know which school you are from, so it will be more difficult to help pupils who get lost.