Too young to vote | Teaching English | British Council

Theme: Lowering the voting age, young people's rights and responsibilities
Lexical area: Politics, Voting, Elections, Policies
Cross curricular links: Citizenship, Politics, Social Science.

Instructions for language assistants in italics

Classroom materials

Introduction
This is a series of activities to discuss the best age for young people to have political responsibility. It could be a sensitive subject so it would be wise to consult the regular class teacher before deciding whether to use these materials or not.

Take the title of the lesson and speculate: Who is too young to vote? Have you ever voted? Why do

Put up some key words and ask intermediate students to brainstorm words they associate with: maturity, adult, child, responsibility

1. Are you an adult?

What equivalent expressions are there for talking about being grown up or mature in your host language. Remember that these words might seem like equivalents but they are culturally loaded. For example: a Yuppie and a young Manager in 1990s Italy meant someone of about age 40 when the equivalent words in English indicated someone in their early 20s.

Be aware that attitudes towards age differ and you may learn more about your host culture with this task. Students can discuss the last question in pairs then get suggestions round the class. What is maturity? What types of responsibilities do adults have?

Task 1 Are you an adult
Young people say that they are grown up but their parents treat them like children. Some adults think that young people are grown up at 16. Others disagree. Some think you are not a grown up until you are 21. What do you think?

Is a 16 year old considered an adult in your family? In your culture? (can differ within one class, depending on religion, ethnic origin etc.)

When do you legally become an adult? (UK 18)

Is there something special which makes you an adult?

2. What's the right age?

Put students in pairs or small groups to decide what they think. Discuss the first one with them:
- Are you mature enough to get married at 16?
- Do you think it is better to wait until you are older?
- Does it depend on the person?
  
  This exercise prepares the language needed to discuss the following tasks on voting and it prepares the underlying concepts of the lesson. Hold a class vote on the right ages if you wish. Do not reveal at this stage that you can do all these things in the UK except vote - tell them this after doing the letters to the Editor.

Task 2 What's the right age?
Choose the right age for doing the following things.

16 18 21 Older Never
- Get married
- Go to war
- Vote in an election
- Have a sexual relationship
- Drink alcohol in a public place
- Pay government taxes
- Drive a car
- Live on your own

What does the law say in your country?

Is it the same as your opinion?

3. Letters to the editor

Put students in groups of 3 if possible to do this activity. Give each student a letter to read and then they can report to each other orally, compare details or pass the letters round their group.

Make sure they know that a general Election in the UK is when the government are voted in.

Task 3 Letters to the editor
Read these letters from national newspapers in the UK and find out:

Who thinks a 16 year old should be considered an adult? (Max and Charlie)

Who thinks a 16 year old is still a child? (Belinda)

How old do you have to be to vote in the UK? (18)

What can you do at 16 in the UK? (Get married, pay taxes, join the army, have a sexual relationship. Note here that you can do all the things listed in task 2 except vote.)

How do the laws for young people compare to the laws in your country?

Letters to the editor

There is a big debate in the UK this year on new laws for young people. The government are going to publish a Voting Age Report soon to decide if 16 year olds should be allowed to vote. Here are some of the views you can read in the newspapers. There is also a lot of discussion on newspaper and television websites too.

Sirs,

I ask readers to consider these facts on voting age:

Brazil 16
Cuba 16
East Timor 17
Iran 15
North Korea 17
Nicaragua 16
Yugoslavia 16 if employed
Sudan 17

So why do many people think it strange that 16 year olds in Britain want to vote?

I urge every young person to write to their MP and join the votes at 16 campaign. We have to pay tax, we can go to war for our country and we can get married. So, we should be allowed to vote on the decisions made about our jobs and our country's foreign policies!

Max Brown (Hastings)

Sirs,

Mr Brown's list of youngsters voting rights around the globe do little to convince me. How mature are our teenagers? I would not think it a good idea to give the vote to a group of people who mainly live with their parents and spend a great deal of time on the mobile phones and computers that were bought for them. Are these young people aware of what is happening in their own country? How much do they care? I would suggest that a constant diet of rubbish TV, computer games and music will not help them decide if the government are doing a good job. Other European countries have not lowered the voting age because they also recognise that voting in an election requires maturity. The average Western teenager just isn't mature enough and some 18 year olds aren't much better!

Belinda Thompson (London)

Sirs,

Why should the government lower the voting age when statistics show that 18 year olds are too lazy to go out and vote in an election? The number of people voting in the 2001 General Election was 59.4% but the percentage of 18/24 year olds was much lower! If they are not interested in politics at 18, they will not be interested at 16. I will be 16 next month.

Samantha James (Durham)

Sirs,

Some 16 year olds are not mature enough to have a sexual relationship. The law allows them to have one. Some 16 year olds are not ready to live by themselves but the law says they can walk out the door and live where they want. However, there are also many 16 year olds who are able to have mature relationships, manage their own home and work hard and pay taxes. Just because some of us are not mature at 16 is not a good enough reason to deny the vote to the rest. I really want to vote in the next election and I think I am informed enough to make a good decision. Please give me the vote!

Charlie, 16 (Northampton)

4. Votes at 16
Pairs can compare their choices and then pairs or small groups discuss whether they would lower the voting age in their country. Hold a class vote on this.

Task 4 Votes at 16
Here are the main arguments put forward in the Votes at 16 debate.
Which views support lowering the voting age? (1,2 and 4)
Which views argue against a change in the law? (3,5)
Tick the opinions you agree with.
Would you change the voting age?

6 year olds in 2004 are more mature than an average 16 year old in 1967 when the voting age was decided. They have more experience of life.

When young people are learning about politics at school it is natural for them to want to vote at the end of it.

A move to lower the voting age is not in line with the rest of Europe. In all other European countries they can vote at 18. We shouldn't be different.

The internet and the large number of TV channels we have now have changed the amount of information we get. Young people today see far more news and have information programmes made especially for them. They are better informed about government, the Economy and the World.

People at 16 are still very self-absorbed and not very interested in their rights or their responsibilities. They are much more mature at 18 and ready to think about the way their country works.

5. Are you interested in politics?
This light hearted quiz can be done in pairs. When you run through the quiz try to bring out discussion of the issues that might interest them and how much they feel involved in the workings of their own country. Do their parents involve them in political discussions? Do they watch the news regularly?

Task 5 Are you interested in politics?
The statistics show that not enough people bother to vote in elections. Young people are even less likely to vote. Some young people, however, are very interested in politics and love to talk about the issues in the news.

What about you? How interested are you in politics?

Quiz: Are you a political animal?

1. There's a knock at the door and you find a member of a local political party waiting to talk to you. What do you do?

Say you are very busy and close the door

Listen to what they say and decide if you want to continue the conversation?

Ask about issues which are important to young people in your area?

Invite them in and have a long discussion about policies you care about?

2. There's a debate on one TV station about new laws for young people. There's a good music concert on another station. What do you do?

Watch the concert. It's far more interesting then politics

Watch a bit of the debate to see if it is interesting and switch TV channels if you get bored

Record one programme and watch the other so that you don't miss anything

Watch the debate and log on to the programme website to email your views. You feel very strongly about new laws affecting you.

3. When you open a newspaper, what do you do?

Go straight to the horoscope, TV, sports or review pages to find some sort of entertainment

Look for articles about young people in all parts of the paper

Read the main headlines and find out what is happening in other countries too

Go straight to the political comment and articles about politics and the government in your country. You always want to know what is going on.

Look at the letters to the Editor again

Which letter writer do you agree with the most?

Write a reply to one of the letters. You can compare the situation in your country with the current situation in the UK. You may agree or disagree with the letter writer.

6. Making your views known
Pairs or groups can discuss these questions. Hold a feedback session on the first question before continuing. Ask students to consider ways that communication could be improved between themselves and their schools when talking about the final question.

Task 6 Making your views known
Some young people complain that nobody is interested in hearing their opinion on issues that affect their lives. There can be many ways for young people to make their voices heard. Writing letters to national newspapers is one way.

Think of 3 other possible ways to make young voices be heard

What opportunities are there in your area for young people to discuss their interests and concerns?

Do you think the opinions of young people are valued at school and in society in general?

Have you ever participated in a public debate? Where? What was it about?

7. Citizen X
It can help students to imagine what a new person in their country (like yourself) might need to know in order to live there. Look at the BBC's Citizen X site to get more idea of the types of topics covered and look in the Guardian's teacher and learner site www.learn.co.uk for more information on citizenship courses. Read out some of the definitions: A good citizen is a person who…

The mini project on citizenship can be done with students who are used to working with the internet. You can also cover this topic by taking some pages from citizenship sites for students to look at.

Task 7 Citizen X
Students in UK schools now study a new subject called Citizenship. The people who support the voting age at 16 think the citizenship lessons prepare students for voting. Citizenship courses are designed to help young people become better and more active members of their society.

Think of 2 things that you might study on a citizenship course
Write a definition of a good citizen
Find out more about Citizenship in the UK from websites for schools. Present your findings to the class.
How does your school prepare you for life in your society?

Internet links

The official campaign site has an excellent PDF booklet to download which you could use in class with higher level students. There are links to all the latest news on this issue here.
www.votesat16.org.uk

An online debate: Should 16 year olds be allowed to vote?
http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/talking_point/2093082.stm

This site is aimed at teenagers and is packed with excellent information and activities on being a UK citizen.
www.bbc.co.uk/schools/citizenx/index.shtml

This site teaches young people about the constitution, elections and has fun and games.
www.channel4.com/learning/microsites/c/citizenpower/index2.htm

This site has a good range of teacher support and PDF fact files for students to use for projects.
www.explore.parliament.uk

Essential UK archives
The tested generation covers a very important political issue for the UK today which affects young people.
Freedom and you is a good follow up covering the amount of responsibility parents give young people
A Multicultural society gives students an idea of the diversity of the UK population. This also links to the theme of citizenship and tolerance in society.
Young roots links to citizenship and building a sense of community.

By Clare Lavery

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