Unit Web Activity Lesson Plans

Unit 6: Individual Rights and Liberties
Working for a Living

Overview

This lesson is designed to help students learn about regulations governing teenage workers, including hours, ages, rights, and limitations.

Correlation to Textbook

This lesson correlates to Unit Six, Chapter 44: Rights and Responsibilities in the Workplace in the Street Law textbook.

Correlation to the National Standards for Civics and Government

I.A.3. The purposes of politics and government: Students should be able to evaluate, take, and defend positions on competing ideas regarding the purposes of . . . government and their implications for the individual and society.

Objectives

At the conclusion of this lesson, students will be able to:

1. Describe regulations governing teenage workers from the federal government and from your state.
2. Explain the possible consequences to adolescents of working.
3. Summarize details about the minimum wage laws, both federal and state.
4. Explain a brief history of the minimum wage.
5. Express an opinion regarding workplace rules for adolescents in a letter to an elected representative.

Before You Teach This Lesson

1. Before you take your students to the computer lab or assign this lesson for independent research, go through it yourself to make sure that it suits your purposes and that the links all work.
2. Decide if you want your students to complete all steps. For example, you may decide to skip the step about the minimum wage.
3. This lesson is designed for use in a computer lab, to enable all students to gather their own information. You may decide to make it a pairs or group activity, so that students work together to answer the questions.
4. Note: The Youth Rules! Web site from the U.S. Department of Labor is also available in Spanish.

Lesson Plan

1. Review the lesson outcomes with the students.
2. If a Resource Person is helping to co-teach this lesson, introduce him or her and explain how you will work together.
3. As a large group, ask students if any of them work outside school. Then ask students to brainstorm the benefits of working as a teenager. Record their answers on the chalkboard or on an overhead projector. Then ask students to name some of the potential risks for teenage workers. Record these answers as well.
4. Ask students if they know of any rules that apply to young workers. Why do they think the government regulates the work of young people? (What is the government’s role or responsibility in this sense?)
5. Have students begin the Web-based lesson and proceed through the steps you chose.
6. When they have gathered all of their information, have them discuss their ideas either with a partner or with the whole class.
7. Have students start their letters to their representatives in class, then finish for homework.
8. If you intend for your students to mail the letters, you may want to provide them with a formal letter format. They should hand the letters in to you before mailing them.

Suggestions for Using Resource People

Contact your local bar association to find a labor lawyer. Ask the attorney to co-teach with you and speak to your students about labor issues for adolescents.

Timing of Lesson

The timing of this lesson depends on how many of the steps you want your students to complete. This lesson is designed for two 45-minute class periods or one 90-minute block. You can do the computer lab section of the lesson in one 45-minute class period if you skip the step about the minimum wage. Depending on how much discussion you want before the students start their letters, you may need extra time.