"Our One Common Country" author talk in Stratford, CT

[L Verge]

"Finally - sometimes school needs certain entertainment, too, to motivate."

Boy, do I agree with that! I also think that analogies help to give better meaning to concepts. A dogmatic drill of facts shuts down the average student, but using the same idea in a way that is relevant to a student's life brings on a "teachable" moment.

We're veering away from the Emancipation Proclamation and the Thirteenth Amendment here, but in teaching the Lincoln conspiracy to children (and many adults), I use an analogy to make the principles of "vicarious liability" and "laws of conspiracy" better to understand. First, many don't know what the word "conspiracy" even means. The minute I use the word "gang," however, they come alive. That (unfortunately) is something they can relate to in this day and age.

My analogy is the idea of a bank robbery where three members of that gang decide to rob a bank. One is the get-away driver and remains in the car while the other two enter the bank. In the course of the robbery, one of the guys shoots and kills a bank employee. Who is guilty of murder? The students are surprised to discover that, under the definition of vicarious liability, technically they all are.

I then change the scenario and have the driver outside change his mind, spot a cop on the corner, and report that a bank robbery is in progress. By the time the cop gets to the bank, however, the murder has already been committed. Will a jury find the driver guilty of murder? Probably not, because he tried to stop the bank robbers by going to an authority (one must be able to stop a conspiracy, not just drop out).

My parting words were always to "choose your friends wisely because they can get you in trouble." I actually had a vice principal hug me one day for using the gang analogy in order to get the point across in Booth's conspiracy. If I had played the law professor - or the dry old historian - and droned on with stuff that the kids could not relate to, I would have failed with my lesson plan.

Roger and I have both used mock trials in our classrooms too in order to bring the Lincoln assassination to a conclusion. My education staff at Surratt House uses them too in grades 5-8 as a concluding activity after a PowerPoint presentation. Let me just tell you that the students are very sharp in getting judicial points across; they are ham actors to boot; and Mary Surratt does not fare very well at their hands most of the time.

While we can argue about the errors and interpretations made by Spielberg's script until the cows come home, we have to ask ourselves whether or not he got a "teachable moment" across in the end. Since I have not seen the movie, I can't make my personal, final judgment; but, I'm betting that he came very close.
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