What is the role of government?

So much of Global II is about the government and about its functions in society, before we can get too far into the curriculum it is important for us to establish what it is exactly that the government does.  I'll start off this lesson with a couple of discussion questions:

What is the purpose of government?

Why do we have government?

What does the government do?

After eliciting a few answers from the students I'll transition to ask the students a new set of questions:

Is there a government in school?

Who is the government in school?
The students will quickly identify the principal and the other members of the administration, they'll then add teachers to the mix and eventually custodians and cafeteria workers.

What do all these people have in common?
They're all adults and in school they all have a certain amount of power over and responsibility to the "citizenry" -the students.  The people the students name all also have a very wide range of jobs and responsibilities, so to get a better idea of what it is that these adults (the government) do here in the school we will engage in a bit of scientific research.  The class will be given a "scientific field journal" and together
we will go out into the "wild" of the hallways looking to catch adults in the act of working.  As we leave the
room I will don my Pith helmet and begin speaking in my best Australian accent (a pretty bad cross between crocodile Dundee and the crocodile hunter). 

We will go down to the first floor where I will warn the student no to try to feed or disturb the adults as we don't want to spook them and cause a stampede.  I will remind them that the "adults are just as scared of you and you are of the adult."

As we search the first floor I'll point out some of the adults we come across.  I'm always sure to point the students toward the teachers on hall duty.  We look into the cafeteria to sketch the cafeteria workers.  We'll generally see a custodian or two on there way somewhere usually carrying tools.  We'll look into a classroom and we always run into our security guard or as I call him on the "safari" securtatus officaurus.  We'll engage some of the adults we encounter about the specific duties they are engaging in (all in the bad Australian accent mind you.)  Eventually we'll wind our way around to the main office where I inform the students that behind these doors is the home of the "king of the adult jungle", a rare and powerful adult, the schoolus principalus.  Fortunately I work in a great school with a great Principal who not only encourages my non-traditional approach, but who also is willing to play a role when needed.  As we enter the office the Principal comes out of his office to talk to the kids about what it is that he does in the school.  He mentions being in charge or maintaining order, but he stresses that he is the "head go-for" and that the biggest part of his job is to make sure that everyone in the school has what they need to do their jobs.

After our encounter with the Principal we return to the classroom where we'll debrief about our safari.  The students will share what they recorded in their "field journals" and we'll  talk about the role of government.  The students will generally settle on the primary function on government being to maintain order and safety and to ensure that everyone's basic needs are met.  I'll finish the class by asking the leading question;

What is going to happen when government fails to fulfill these basic functions?
But to answer that we'll need to go through the rest of the unit.

As always please feel free to take any of the ideas above, modify them, use them for yourself.  Please leave a comment to let me know the changes you've made or how the lesson worked for you.