After all the great suggestions from colleagues (here, here and here), I thought I’d chip in with some ideas from outside, given that this Trump thing seems to be global in impact.
In particular, I’d point you towards the endless memes and gifs out there, the new President being a gift for such vehicles. Just trawl your Facebook or Twitter feed, or simply google it, for more material than you could ever want for. I’d then point you to Jack Holland’s post here for ideas on how to then use these in the classroom.
Personally, I’m interested in how Trump plays into European politics. One ‘resource’ that I’ve found really interesting is the Every Second Counts site.
This started with a Dutch late-night chatshow picking up on Trump’s inauguration statement of ‘America first’, by putting together a package about why that should also mean ‘the Netherlands second‘. Having duly gone viral, equivalent packages have been made by other European countries and are collecting on the main site: personally, I like the Swiss one.
As well as being entertaining, they also contain pointed critiques of both American and domestic politics: watch one as a non-resident of either the US or the other state and you’ll find that you’ve been left behind at several points.
However, as stepping-off points for class discussion about political identities, self-images and othering (and gender, for that matter), these are great. Indeed, if you felt bold then you’d ask students to make their own version.
The Lithuanians don’t even aim for second…
Links to the full Teaching Trump series:
- https://activelearningps.com/2017/02/01/teaching-trump/
- https://activelearningps.com/2017/02/02/teaching-trump-2/
- https://activelearningps.com/2017/02/04/teaching-trump-3/
- https://activelearningps.com/2017/02/07/teaching-trump-4-the-view-from-outside/
- https://activelearningps.com/2017/02/16/teaching-trump-through-a-human-rights-lens/