Students develop prediction of the US election result

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Prof. Dr. Torben Schmidt and Sina Werner developed the teaching project. | Quelle: Tengo | Copyright: Leuphana/Tengo | Download

The 2024 US presidential election is just around the corner. Kamala Harris and Donald Trump are running a close race and the world is eagerly awaiting the outcome of the election, which will be of enormous significance far beyond the borders of the USA. Around 5,000 pupils from all over Germany will be studying this election and the complex world of American politics in their English lessons after the summer vacation. Sina Werner and Professor Torben Schmidt from the Institute of English Studies at Leuphana University Lüneburg have developed an interdisciplinary teaching project for this purpose.

"The aim of the project is not only to give young people an understanding of the US political system, but also to sharpen their own critical judgment and raise their awareness of the global significance of these elections," explains Sina Werner. Project manager Torben Schmidt adds: "It is particularly important for us to combine innovative, digitally supported methods for learning English with democracy education and critical media skills".

Each participating school class is assigned a US state. On a free, interactive learning platform, the pupils gain deep insights into the political processes and opinion-forming there. They process further information about the history, politics, economy, demographics, society as well as the local and regional media landscape of the respective states into a well-founded and creatively designed election forecast for 'their' state. Delegates from the classes then cast their votes in an interactive simulated election before November 5.
The "US Embassy School Election Project 2024" is a further development in terms of content and methodology of the project already successfully carried out for the 2012, 2016 and 2020 presidential elections by the US Embassy in Berlin in cooperation with Leuphana and the Berlin educational organization LIFE e.V.. In the past, this has resulted in extremely accurate election predictions from the participating school classes. . Various research projects were also successfully carried out in the context of the project.

Task formats and media forms such as digital learning games, AI-supported tasks and multimedia exercises with automated feedback are new to the program this year. "A perfect basis for teachers to create motivating and effective lessons," says Schmidt, highlighting the benefits of the concept and inviting other schools to join in.

Teachers can find more information about the project, past and upcoming teacher training webinars, insights into a demo course and the opportunity to register for a free course for their class at http://www.teachaboutus.org.