Understanding the Electoral College

Grade level

Middle school / early high school (best fit: grades 7–10)

Class Time

1–2 class periods (45–90 minutes)

What Students Will Learn

Students will understand that:

• Americans vote for president through a system using electors (not a direct national popular vote).
• There are 538 electoral votes total, and a candidate needs 270 to win.
• Most states use a winner-take-all approach, meaning winning a state (even narrowly) typically wins all its electoral votes.
• It’s possible to win the national popular vote but lose the election, which has happened in U.S. history (including modern examples).

Warm-up

Prompt: “Whoever gets the most votes wins the presidency.” In a few sentences, explain why this statement is true or false.

Direct instruction

Use either the PowerPoint, Google Slides, or video lesson to cover the basics of the Electoral College. Students can be provided with the guided notes worksheet or interactive notebook foldable to follow along with the presentation. A good supplemental video to use after the presentation can be found here.

Verdict Walk

Divide your classroom into three areas: 

• KEEP the Electoral College
• END the Electoral College
• CHANGE the Electoral College

Students need to get up and move to one of the three areas of the room based on their opinions. If you have sticky notes, you can have students explain the reasoning for where they are on them and post it up. Otherwise, they can just share their reasoning aloud.

Ask students in different groups questions to encourage them to share more. For example, would small states lose power in a popular vote? Does modern technology make a popular vote more reasonable? Are winner-take-all outcomes fair?

Group or Independent Work

Next, provide students with the reading "Understanding the Electoral College" along with the analysis questions. Students can work together  on the analysis questions before completing a Claim/Evidence/Reasoning paragraph.