U.S. Presidential elections social studies lesson for kids

U.S. Presidential elections social studies lesson for kids -  social studies skills studied in 2nd, 3rd, 4th, 5th grades.
We had a presidential election very recently, and it was probably hard to not pay attention to it, especially since people were getting so worked up over it. Elections are how we choose the President in our country. Choosing a leader for everyone is something we believe everyone should have a say in, which is why we decided to let the people and the people’s representatives decide who they want to lead them.
Of course, it’s impossible for everyone to agree on everything all of the time, which means someone is guaranteed to be unhappy with who gets chosen to be our President, but our democracy believes in the power of the majority. If more people vote for one candidate than the other, that person becomes the President.
This means a lot of campaigning. You don’t want to vote for someone if you don’t know anything about them. The people who are running for Presidents are called candidates. These people usually go on campaigns: traveling across the country and telling everyone what they believe in and what they will do when they are President. There are always a lot of different people running for President at the beginning of the election season, but in the end it always comes down to two, and it practically always comes down to Democrats and Republicans.

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There are actually other parties in our government, but they are not large enough to ever really have enough voters to place them in Office or even as a runner up for President. Most Americans support either the Democrats or the Republicans, and that’s why candidates for these two parties are almost always the final runners.
Most other candidates will drop out when they see that they don’t have a lot of support from the people while their opponents do. Campaigning for Presidency takes a lot of time and money, so quitting while you are ahead makes a lot of sense to candidates that know they can’t win. Continue reading below>>>

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But even though the vote of the people is very important in a Presidential election, the vote of the Electoral College carries a lot of weight too. The Electoral College is a group of our representatives, and they vote on who they would like for President as well. In many elections, even when a President wins the popular vote of the people, they still don’t get elected to President because the Electoral College voted against them.

Every four years, the United States gets a little tense as we argue and debate over who should be our next leader. But never forget that elections are one of the most important parts of our democracy. Without it, our leaders would be just like kings, chosen through family or power or wealth. Because we value freedom so much, we value the ability to choose who we want as a people, even if, as a people, we don’t always agree with each other on who we want to lead our great nation.