LESSON PLAN
FREEDOM
OF SPEECH
LESSON PLAN
FREEDOM OF SPEECH
LESSON PLAN
GRADE LEVELS:
6th through 8th
NUMBER OF CLASS PERIODS:
1-2 (approximately 55 minutes)
AUTHOR:
Yolanda Medina Zevas
INTRODUCTION/LESSON OVERVIEW:
In the United States, freedom of speech is one of the most protected rights through the Constuon, and has been protected
now more than ever by the Supreme Court. It is an essenal part of Americans’ daily lives. Many Americans struggle with
understanding the language and subsequent interpretaon of the Constuon, especially when it comes to the rights listed in
the First Amendment. While many Americans agree that speech should be protected and why, they oen disagree over when,
why, and how speech should be limited or restricted. This lesson encourages students to examine their own assumpons and
to deepen their understanding of the currently accepted interpretaon of free speech rights under the First Amendment.
Essenal Quesons:
• How does the First Amendment of the U.S. Constuon protect the freedom of speech?
• Why did the founding generaon value free speech?
• What types of speech can be limited by the government?
• How has the Supreme Court’s approach to the protecon of speech changed over me?
Objecves:
• Students will be able to state the importance of the First Amendment’s free speech clause to self-government.
• Students will be able to explain why the founding generaon protected free speech.
• Students will be able idenfy condions under which speech can be limited.
Materials:
• Warm up Worksheet of Speech Hypothecals
• Access to the Interacve Constuon or printed copies of the excerpt of Common Interpretaon
“Freedom of Speech and of Press” by Georey R. Stone and Eugene Volokh
• Common interpretaon graphic organizer
• Find a full version of the Common Interpretaon here.
• Arcle Quesons
• Exit Ticket
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PROCEDURES:
Warm up/Acvaon of Prior Knowledge (10 minutes):
• Students will read the First Amendment excerpt at the top of the Warm up Handout. The teacher should
discuss with students what they believe it means. The teacher can follow up with quesons to assess
students’ prior knowledge around freedom of speech.
• Students will then interpret the meaning of the First Amendment’s free speech clause in 10 hypothecal
controversial situaons, using the graphic organizer provided. Students should complete the graphic
organizer individually.
• The teacher can ask the whole class some of the hypothecals, asking students to move to dierent
sides of the classroom for an “Agree” or “Disagree” answer.
• The teacher should discuss varying interpretaons of the First Amendment’s free speech clause.
o This discussion should include some historical context of why the founding generaon
thought the freedom of speech was important.
• Addionally, students should be able to brainstorm reasons why free speech is important to democracy.
o Cizens need to be able to speak freely in order to make eecve electoral decisions,
oversee government acons, parcipate in the policy making process and public discourse,
and hold policians accountable to their acons.
o Having a diverse set of public opinions, known as the marketplace of ideas, leads to an
informed search for truth and understanding on a topic.
o Self-expression and culvang yourself as an individual can inform your polical understanding
and acons as a cizen.
Class and Individual Invesgaon (15 minutes):
• Students will access the Interacve Constuon or will be provided printed copies of the following arcles
to answer quesons on the graphic organizer included. Students will read the Common Interpretaon essay,
“Freedom of Speech and of the Press” wrien by both Georey R. Stone and Eugene Volokh.
• The class will read the several paragraphs together, through queson #4, stopping to answer the guiding
quesons. At this point, the teacher will assign students to read and answer one of the quesons #5-9 and
be prepared to share out their answers with the class. Students will focus on one parcular example of
how the government has limited free speech.
• Aer students have read the enre arcle and answered their assigned queson, they will meet in groups
made up of students who each answered a dierent queson. Each student will share the answer to their
assigned queson, as well as discuss the quesons below:
1. According to the arcle, why is it important to protect speech, even if that speech is unpopular
or oensive? Provide evidence.
2. According to the arcle, when is it acceptable under the First Amendment to limit or punish speech?
Provide evidence.
• When students have completed the reading, have them revisit the hypothecals. If any answers have
changed, the students should mark their new answers with a check mark.
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Whole Class Review/Debrief (15-20 minutes):
• Small groups should report out on their conversaons.
o When can speech be limited?
o Which of the hypothecals remained unclear or dicult to determine?
o How has the Supreme Court’s approach to the protecon of speech changed over me?
• To conclude, have students share out answers on the following queson: When is it most pressing
or important to limit free speech? When is it most important to protect free speech?
Oponal Extension Acvity: Take a Stand:
Choose one hypothecal or one broad statement such as “Hate speech should be limited.” Have one student
take a stand for the statement. Have another student take a stand against the statement. Each of the students
will make a brief speech in support of his or her statement. Other students, one at a me, will join the two sides,
making addional arguments to support or refute the statements unl all students are standing. Students are
allowed and encouraged to switch sides as they are swayed.
Closure/Exit Ticket (5-10 minutes):
On the way out the door, have students record answers to the following:
1. When, where, or how can speech be regulated or limited?
a. Answers may include me, place, and manner restricons.
b. Answers may include disncons between high and low value speech or
between polical and commercial speech.
c. Answers may vary but must address issues discussed in the arcles.
2. Explain one way in which your understanding of the speech provision of the First Amendment
has changed over the course of today’s lesson.
a. Students who are stuck may use their warm up worksheets to check how their atudes
changed aer reading the arcle and/or aer talking to others.
b. Students may explain any way in which their understanding has changed including dierences
between commercial and polical speech, the lack of protecon that cizens have against corporaons
or employers, the acons that have been interpreted as speech, or anything else they may have
learned over the course of the lesson.
6th-8th grade Common Core Standard
CCSS.ELA-LITERACY.RH.6-8.1
Cite specic textual evidence to support analysis of primary and secondary sources.
CCSS.ELA-LITERACY.RH.6-8.2
Determine the central ideas or informaon of a primary or secondary source; provide an accurate summary
of the source disnct from prior knowledge or opinions.
CCSS.ELA-LITERACY.RH.6-8.4
Determine the meaning of words and phrases as they are used in a text, including vocabulary specic
to domains related to history/social studies.
CCSS.ELA-LITERACY.RH.6-8.6
Idenfy aspects of a text that reveal an author’s point of view or purpose (e.g., loaded language,
inclusion or avoidance of parcular facts).
CCSS.ELA-LITERACY.RH.6-8.10
By the end of grade 8, read and comprehend history/social studies texts in the grades 6-8 text
complexity band independently and prociently.
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WARM UP SCENARIO WORKSHEET
DIRECTIONS:
Read the text of the First Amendment of the U.S. Constuon as it refers to speech. Read each of the hypothecal
situaons and decide if the government can restrict a person from these First Amendment acons. Place an X in
the box that best matches whether or not you think the government can limit the speech in that situaon.
“Congress shall make no law ... abridging the freedom of speech.”
HYPOTHETICAL SITUATION YES
NO
A person burns an American ag in protest of government policies.
A person creates a website asking people to support an an-war agenda.
A person writes and publishes an essay about the superiority of his or her race.
A person cricizes the U.S. president on a blog about public policy.
A law is passed prohibing violent video games from being sold to children.
A public school student cricizes the principal and teachers on social media
while o campus.
A public school student wears a pin every day in opposion to
the current president.
A public school student starts a website for students to say hateful
things about other students.
A student threatens violence against his school on social media
in the form of a poem.
A person posts online that someone should assassinate Supreme Court jusces.
A city passes a law prohibing a rally against the mayor in a public park.
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ARTICLE QUESTIONS:
TO BE ANSWERED INDIVIDUALLY
1. According to the arcle, why is it important to protect speech, even if that speech is
unpopular or oensive? Provide evidence.
2. According to the arcle, what kinds of acons, words, or things are included in the
term “speech” as it is found in the First Amendment? Provide evidence.
3. According to the arcle, when is it acceptable under the First Amendment to limit
or punish speech? Provide evidence.
TO BE ANSWERED IN SMALL GROUPS
What is the most protected type of speech?
When is it most pressing or important to limit free speech?
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EXIT TICKET
Idenfy at least three ways in which speech can be regulated or limited.
1)
2)
3)
Explain one way in which your understanding of the speech provision of the First Amendment
has changed over the course of today’s lesson.
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GRAPHIC ORGANIZER
FREEDOM OF SPEECH AND THE PRESS
BY GEOFFREY R. STONE AND EUGENE VOLOKH
Georey R. Stone is Edward H. Levi Disnguished Service Professor of Law, University of Chicago Law School.
Eugene Volokh is Gary T. Schwartz Professor of Law, UCLA School of Law.
“Congress shall make no law . . . abridging (liming) the freedom of speech, or of the press.” What does this mean today?
Generally speaking, it means that the government may not jail, ne, or impose civil liability on people or organizaons
based on what they say or write, except in exceponal circumstances.
Although the First Amendment says “Congress,” the Supreme Court has held that speakers are protected against all
government agencies and ocials: federal, state, and local, and legislave, execuve, or judicial. The First Amendment
does not protect speakers, however, against private individuals or organizaons, such as private employers, private
colleges, or private landowners. The First Amendment restrains only the government.
The Supreme Court has interpreted “speech” and “press” broadly as covering not only talking, wring, and prinng,
but also broadcasng, using the Internet, and other forms of expression. The freedom of speech also applies to
symbolic expression, such as displaying ags, burning ags, wearing armbands, burning crosses, and the like.
1. What do you think these “exceponal circumstances” might be?
2. What types of people are protected under the First Amendment?
What groups might not be protected?
3. What exactly are “speech” and “press”?
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The Supreme Court has held that restricons on speech because of its content— that is, when the government targets
the speaker’s message — generally violate the First Amendment. Laws that prohibit people from cricizing a war, opposing
aboron, or advocang high taxes are examples of unconstuonal content-based restricons. Such laws are thought
to be especially problemac because they distort public debate and contradict a basic principle of self-governance: that
the government cannot be trusted to decide what ideas or informaon “the people” should be allowed to hear.
THERE ARE GENERALLY THREE SITUATIONS IN WHICH THE GOVERNMENT CAN CONSTITUTIONALLY RESTRICT
SPEECH UNDER A LESS DEMANDING STANDARD.
1. In some circumstances, the Supreme Court has held that certain types of speech are of only
“low” First Amendment value, such as:
a. Defamaon: False statements that damage a person’s reputaons can lead to civil liability
(and even to criminal punishment), especially when the speaker deliberately lied or said things
they knew were likely false (New York Times v. Sullivan (1964)).
b. True threats: Threats to commit a crime (for example, “I’ll kill you if you don’t give me your money”)
can be punished (Was v. United States (1969)).
4. Why is free speech so important to self-government and democracy?
5. The Supreme Court can constuonally restrict free speech that is “low value” speech.
What are three examples of “low value” speech under the First Amendment?
c. “Fighng words”: Face-to-face personal insults that are likely to lead to an immediate ght are punishable
(Chaplinsky v. New Hampshire (1942)). But this does not include polical statements that oend others
and provoke them to violence. For example, civil rights or an-aboron protesters cannot be silenced
merely because passersby respond violently to their speech (Cox v. Louisiana (1965)).
f. Commercial adversing: Speech adversing a product or service is constuonally protected, but not as
much as other speech. For instance, the government may ban misleading commercial adversing, but it
generally can’t ban misleading polical speech (Virginia Pharmacy v. Virginia Cizens Council (1976)).
Outside these narrow categories of “low” value speech, most other content-based restricons on speech are
presumpvely unconstuonal. Even entertainment, vulgarity, “hate speech” (bigoted speech about parcular races,
religions, sexual orientaons, and the like), blasphemy (speech that oends people’s religious sensibilies), and violent
video games are protected by the First Amendment. The Supreme Court has generally been very reluctant to expand
the list of “low” value categories of speech.
6. Is hate speech free speech? Support your answer with evidence.
2. The government can restrict speech under a less demanding standard when the speaker is in a special
relaonship to the government. For example, the speech of government employees and of students in public
schools can be restricted, even based on content, when their speech is incompable with their status as public
ocials or students. A teacher in a public school, for example, can be punished for encouraging students to
experiment with illegal drugs, and a government employee who has access to classied informaon generally
can be prohibited from disclosing that informaon (Pickering v. Board of Educaon (1968)).
3. The government can also restrict speech under a less demanding standard when it does so without regard to
the content or message of the speech. Content-neutral restricons, such as restricons on noise, blocking trac,
and large signs (which can distract drivers and cluer the landscape), are generally constuonal as long as they
are “reasonable.” Because such laws apply neutrally to all speakers without regard to their message, they are less
threatening to the core First Amendment concern that government should not be permied to favor some ideas
over others (Turner Broadcasng System, Inc. v. FCC (1994)). But not all content-neutral restricons are viewed as
reasonable; for example, a law prohibing all demonstraons in public parks or all leaeng on public streets
would violate the First Amendment (Schneider v. State (1939)).
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7. To what extent can relaonships aect the freedom of speech?
8. What are content-neutral restricons? Give two specic examples.
Courts have not always been this protecve of free expression. In the 19th century, for example, courts allowed
punishment of blasphemy, and during and shortly aer World War I the Supreme Court held that speech tending
to promote crime—such as speech condemning the military dra or praising anarchism—could be punished
(Schenck v. United States (1919)). Moreover, it was not unl 1925 that the Supreme Court held that the First Amendment
limited state and local governments, as well as the federal government (Gitlow v. New York (1925)). But starng in the
1920s, the Supreme Court began to read the First Amendment more broadly, and this trend accelerated in the 1960s.
Today, the legal protecon oered by the First Amendment is stronger than ever before in our history.
9. In history, can you nd an example of when a person’s speech has been limited?
Explain why it was limited at that me.
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AFTER HAVING READ THE ARTICLE, ANSWER THE FOLLOWING QUESTION:
1. According to the arcle, why is it important to protect speech, even if that speech
is unpopular or oensive? Provide evidence.
2. According to the arcle, when is it acceptable under the First Amendment to limit
or punish speech? Provide evidence.
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