Hands-on English current events activityfor ESL October 2004 Note: You are welcome to print, copy and use this activity with your students. You are also welcome to link to this site. However, please don't re-publish this activity anywhere without permission. Go back to Hands-on English main page. (Don't miss the next activity--read below about our new Update Service!) H e l ps u p p o r tH a n d s - o nE n g l i s h ! Buy a subscription--get great classroom material, mailed 6 times a year! Buy a subscription for a friend! Thank you!

Citizenship activity: Election 2004: Counting Electoral College votes. Here is an activity to help your students understand how the U.S. presidential election process works. Included here is a reading which summarizes the process, a chart to track electoral college votes, and a map showing electoral votes for each state. If your students are interested in following the election on election night, they can use the chart below to keep score. Our chart arranges the states alphabetically. An alternative is to have the students create their own chart according to time zones. Give the students a copy of the map (below) and ask them to mark the times zones on it, using the phone book as reference. Then they can draw up a chart for each time zone, writing the names of the states in one column, the number of votes each state has, and two blank columns for the candidates. As the results are reported in by the news media, the students can log the votes on their chart. To practice the two-letter state abbreviations and state names, see our crossword puzzles in the September/October 2004 issue of Hands-on English (Vol. 14, No. 3). This exercise combines a geography lesson with a matching exercise. We hope your students enjoy this activity! Happy teaching! Best wishes, Anna p.s. Our readers are telling us that their students are really interested in learning about this election! If you have a lesson to share or some teaching suggestions, please contact me and I'll pass these along. Thank you!   Reading: Electing a president, 2004. True or false: "On November 2nd, 2004, there will be an election for president in the U.S." You may be surprised to hear that this is false! In fact, there are really 51 elections on that day. There is an election in every state and in the District of Columbia (Washington, D.C.). When the polls open in the morning, people can go to vote. When the polls close in the evening, the votes are counted. Each state counts their votes and decides who got the most votes for president in that state. After they choose a winner, that state gives all its Electoral College votes to the winning candidate. The first candidate to collect 270 Electoral votes wins. For example, in Ohio if more people vote for Bush, Bush will get all of Ohio's 20 Electoral College votes. But if more people vote for Kerry, then Kerry will win all of these 20 Electoral votes. Ohio is a "swing" state. That means no one is sure who will win there--Bush or Kerry? There are many swing states this year. No one is sure who will win this election. On election night, you can find out who is winning the presidential election by counting the Electoral College votes from each state. Vocabulary: Electoral College, polls open, polls close, candidate, swing state, choose a winner, count the votes, election night.   (please scroll down to see the chart & map)

	State	Electoral votes	Bush (Republican)	Kerry (Democrat)
1.	Alabama	9
2.	Alaska	3
3.	Arizona	10
4.	Arkansas	6
5.	California	55
6.	Colorado	9
7.	Connecticut	7
8.	Delaware	3
9.	District of Columbia	3
10.	Florida	27
11.	Georgia	15
12.	Hawaii	4
13.	Idaho	4
14.	Illinois	21
15.	Indiana	11
16.	Iowa	7
17.	Kansas	6
18.	Kentucky	8
19.	Louisiana	9
20.	Maine *	4
21.	Maryland	10
22.	Massachusetts	12
23.	Michigan	17
24.	Minnesota	10
25.	Mississippi	6
26.	Missouri	11
27.	Montana	3
28.	Nebraska *	5
29.	Nevada	5
30.	New Hampshire	4
31.	New Jersey	15
32.	New Mexixo	5
33.	New York	31
34.	North Carolina	15
35.	North Dakota	3
36.	Ohio	20
37.	Oklahoma	7
38.	Oregon	7
39.	Pennsylvania	21
40.	Rhode Island	4
41.	South Carolina	8
42.	South Dakota	3
43.	Tennessee	11
44.	Texas	34
45.	Utah	5
46.	Vermont	3
47.	Virginia	13
48.	Washington	11
49.	West Virginia	5
50.	Wisconsin	10
51.	Wyoming	3
	TOTAL	538

Notes: In 2004, at least 270 Electoral College votes are needed to win.
The District of Columbia (Washington, D.C.) is not a state but has 3 Electoral College votes.
* Two states (Nebraska and Maine) can divide their votes according to the winner in each congressional district.
In all the other states, the candidate who wins the most votes in the state wins all of the Electoral College votes.
This is called "winner takes all."

This U.S. map shows the number of Electoral College votes in each state.
Mark the four main time zones on this map (Eastern, Central, Mountain, Pacific).
You can find this information in the telephone book.

As always I am interested to hear what you and your students are doing in the classroom, and I welcome comments and teaching suggestions.--Anna Silliman,

Every issue has ESL activities written for adult students, including grammar activities, multi-level dictation, a multi-level crossword puzzle, and teaching tips sent in by readers, as well as many other ESL activities.

A subscription is US $29 per year. Order by mail, to P.O. Box 256, Crete, NE 68333 USA, or order online at www.handsonenglish.com!

See our order form: