Alabama Social Studies SS24.US2.12a
The Standard
- SS24.US2.12
- Compare and contrast major domestic initiatives of John F. Kennedy and Lyndon B. Johnson, and explain how Kennedy’s assassination led to both change and continuity in these initiatives.
Investigate the major elements of Lyndon Johnson’s Great Society program and explain how it represents an attempt to expand the American social safety net, including the War on Poverty, Medicare, Medicaid, and Head Start.
2024 Alabama Course of Study: Social Studies
Teacher's field guide
What This Standard Means
What Students Need to Do
- Students identify what the War on Poverty, Medicare, Medicaid, and Head Start were meant to do and whom they served. They explain how these efforts added health care, early learning, and poverty programs to earlier federal support.
What Mastery Looks Like
- A student can distinguish Medicare's original coverage for adults 65 and older from Medicaid's coverage for eligible people with low incomes. They can explain how Head Start fit within the War on Poverty.
Common Misconceptions
- Students often swap Medicare and Medicaid or assume Medicaid covered every low-income person in 1965. They may think the War on Poverty was one cash payment or that Head Start was health insurance.
How to Assess It
- Exit ticket: Match Medicare, Medicaid, and Head Start to an older patient, an eligible low-income patient, and a preschooler from a low-income family. Then explain how one expanded federal help.
Lesson moves
Ways to Teach It
Give pairs program cards and audience and benefit cards; have them build a chart showing whom each effort served and what it provided.
Read a short excerpt from Johnson's 1964 poverty speech, then ask: Which problems could health insurance address, and which needed other programs?
Run a four-corner quiz with cases about an older adult, an eligible low-income patient, a preschooler, and someone seeking job training.
Show a current Medicare eligibility page and a local Head Start flyer; ask students to trace both services back to the 1960s.
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Related Standards
- SS24.5.8
Analyze how the government-funded New Deal programs of President Franklin D. Roosevelt impacted American society.
- SS24.US2.20
Evaluate how federal policies and legislation have shaped American society since 1988.
- SS24.US2.5b
Analyze the impact of the Great Depression and the resulting social programs on the American family and minority groups.
- SS24.US2.12
Compare and contrast major domestic initiatives of John F. Kennedy and Lyndon B. Johnson, and explain how Kennedy’s assassination led to both change and continu...
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