World History II: Absolute Elections Project
Absolute Elections
The Age of Absolutism was a time in which kings had vast power. This time was marked with leaders, both good and bad, that the people never had any say in. The Divine Right of Kings, or notion that God had chosen the king, ruled the day and gave leaders absolute dominion over their people. But what if the people could have chosen their leaders? Who would they have tolerated and or elected if given the chance? The following project will give us the opportunity to explore that concept.
The Candidates Matchups:
1. Peter I vs. Louis XIV
2. Charles I vs. Cromwell
3. Maria Theresa vs. Frederick II
4. James II vs. William and Mary
Directions:
You will be assigned two (2) absolute monarchs that come from one of the four “candidate matchups” above. You will then choose one (1) monarch to support and one (1) monarch to oppose. As a campaign manager, it is your job to find reason’s to support the one monarch and find reasons (dirt) on the other candidate that would make people not want to support them. You must be persuasive so find good facts!
Steps (Check off as you go)
______1:Students MUST use Biography.com, Britannica.com, and/or the textbook to help research their people. Any other sites must be teacher approved.You should also use the information from your notes we did in class!
The basic information you must have on each candidate :
1)Country they ruled
2)Time period of their rule
3)Challenges faced
4)Accomplishments
5)Negative things associated with them
6)Lasting effects of their rule (positive or negative)
______2. Create two (2) political propaganda posters. One piece of propaganda should be a positive poster encouraging people to vote for your candidate and the other piece should be a poster of negative campaigning.
Each (2) poster MUST include:
1)All of the required information from step 1.
2)Candidates name
3)One (1) picture of candidate(drawn or printed)
4)One (1) picture representing something they stand for(drawn or printed)
5)Campaign slogan ie) “Make America Great Again”
______3. Political Advertisment on TV highlighting the differences between your candidates. The television commercial should include a speech/jingle that highlights both the positives of your candidate and the negatives of your opponents. Length requirement is 1 to 2 minutes.
Note: You can spilt the video into two (2) separate ads of no less than 30 seconds per ad
Included are some ads you could use as examples:
Positive Ad:
Negative Ad: