New Ebook Brings Civic Education Into the Digital Age

We the People Now Available As an Enhanced Ebook

LOS ANGELES — We the People: The Citizen & the Constitution, an internationally acclaimed civics textbook for high school students, is now available as a Web-based enhanced ebook that can be read on nearly any device, including Macs and PCs, Apple iPads and iPhones, Android tablets and smart phones, and Windows 8 touch-screen devices.

 

“The Center for Civic Education has successfully transformed its flagship into a starship that should gain new users, retain loyal users, and provide all with an enhanced alternative to print that is durable, affordable, and easy to access and store,” said Stephen Schechter, a professor of political science and history at Russell Sage College.

 

The We the People enhanced ebook features hundreds of videos, photos, fundamental documents, and interactive exercises that give students a rich, multimedia environment for learning about the Constitution and the contemporary issues that impact today’s learners. Each lesson also includes a built-in optional teacher/guide and audio narration.

 

“We wanted to give teachers and students an affordable, easy-to-use, and interactive web-based We the People textbook that not only enhances the text, but also maintains the quality and integrity of We the People, which has been used in classrooms around the country for more than 25 years,” said Charles N. Quigley, the Center’s executive director.

 

“The We the People enhanced ebook uses hand-selected resources and web-based technology to introduce a new generation of students to the fundamental concepts of our constitutional democracy.”

 

We the People was first published in 1987, when its development was funded and cosponsored by the Commission on the Bicentennial of the United States Constitution. The commission was chaired by Chief Justice of the United States Warren Burger, who was an early supporter of the We the People program and wrote an introduction to the textbook. The program has reached more than 30 million students since 1987.

 

“The We the People program engages students in learning about the U.S. Constitution and our system of government. The program helps them to become passionate, dedicated learners and responsible citizens,” said Robert S. Leming, director of We the People.

 

“The new We the People enhanced ebook involves students in an online learning experience that allows them to dig even deeper into the history and understanding of democratic principles and ideas of representative government.”

 

We the People is priced at $19.95 per user for a six-year license or $9.95 for one year. It can be purchased at http://motuspublishing.com/shop/wethepeople.

 

Subscribers can visit the iTunes App Store and the Google Play App Store to download and install the We the People mobile app, which can be used to access their ebook anytime, anywhere using the same username and password. The apps and the browser-based versions save student answers to exercises to the cloud, which means that student work can be accessed on any device the student might use.

 

A sample We the People lesson is available at http://demoapp.motuspublishing.com/sample-media-book/. A user’s guide can be viewed at http://motuspublishing.com/ebook/we-the-people/support.

 

About the Center for Civic Education

The Center for Civic Education (www.civiced.org) is a nonprofit, nonpartisan educational organization dedicated to fostering the development of informed, responsible participation in civic life by citizens committed to values and principles fundamental to American constitutional democracy. The Center’s programs are implemented with the assistance of a network of public- and private-sector organizations and educational leaders in every state and congressional district in the country and in more than eighty other countries, many of which are emerging and advanced democracies.

 

 

Robert “Joey” Wiseman Jr.

Assistant Director

Office of Secondary Learning

Instructional Materials

Social Studies