Role playing at the Convention National

Shared by Roberto García:

Name of the activity: Being a member of the Convention Nationale.

Level: 4º ESO

Background: The activity is based in the debates of the period of the National Convention (ca. 1792) within the French Revolution.

The activity takes place after the proper explanation about the contents they are going to work with. Besides, they will watch a scene from the film Un people et son roi (France, 2018) so that they will know the way the people’s representatives used to argue back in 1792.

Description: It is a role-playing activity in which the students, working in three different groups, and using the concepts and ideas they have been learning about the French Revolution and its phases, must build a case for, and write a speech in favour of, three different forms of government:

-        Absolute Monarchy

-        Constitutional Monarchy

-        Democratic Republic

Then, having summarize their case, they will choose a representative who will speak before the Convention Nationale (aka the students) trying to convince them to support his cause.

        Schedule:

o   5 minutes to divide the students into three groups previously designed by the teacher.

o   10 minutes to explain the activity

o   5 minutes for the groups to choose their speaker.

o   15 minutes to prepare their speeches.

o   10 minutes for the speeches (3 minutes each one)

o   5 minutes to perform a group vote.

Objectives:

-        To understand the position of France during 1792, mainly after the Varennes treason.

-        To know and be able to explain the differences and similarities between different types of government.

-        To select the main ideas of a given content.

-        To defend your political project from a parliamentarian point of view.

-        To understand the way in which a representative chamber could work.

Vocabulary	Format	Discourse type
Mainly political: monarchy, republic, absolutism, rights of man, democracy, representative, equality, freedom, citizen and citizenship, suffrage, franchise, ballot.	Written and oral	Formal narrative but not too complicated. Strong ideas shown in short sentences.