(Dan Tri) - Ms. Ma Thi Thanh Xuan - civics teacher at Olympia High School - commented that students are more excited about this subject when applying the mock trial model.
Students become litigators, learn law through role-playing
According to the 2018 general education program, the subject of civic education at high school level has a new name: economic and legal education.
Significant changes in the content of civic education also pose an urgent need for new learning methods to help students acquire knowledge and skills in two specific fields that are closely related to life.
Teachers of the Economics and Law Department of Olympia High School have introduced a mock trial model into teaching with the support and professional advice of lecturers from Hanoi Law University.
Students participate in a mock trial in the economics and law education subject at Olympia High School (Photo: Quynh Trang).
Accordingly, students will practice IRAC legal thinking (international model for analyzing and resolving legal situations) to analyze cases, write defense scripts, conduct litigation procedures in court and participate in a mock trial of a civil or criminal case.
Through this model, students have the opportunity to gain a deep understanding of the law, practice analytical - comparative - synthetic skills and apply legal thinking to life issues.
The mock trial continued to be held for grade 11 students and was upgraded to a competition with the school final round held on the morning of November 15. Students played the roles of plaintiff, defendant, and lawyer in a civil lawsuit between two businesses. The roles of judge and people's jury were taken on by lawyers and law lecturers.
For two and a half hours, students "role-played" and debated enthusiastically. Before that, the teacher only set the topic, students had to read the relevant laws, cite the law, consolidate evidence, find the opponent's weaknesses and protect their own legitimate interests to the fullest extent before entering the mock trial.
Pham Nguyen Minh Anh - a student of grade 11SS1, one of the lawyers in the mock trial - said that his group had to study more than 400 articles of the Civil Code and more than 300 articles of the Commercial Law to be able to solve the problem.
Pham Nguyen Minh Anh - a student of class 11SS1 - participated in the mock trial as the defendant's lawyer (Photo: Quynh Trang).
However, even with a basic grasp of the laws and a thorough discussion of what to say in court, "lawyers" still encounter many problems.
Real-life situations in court force students to think and analyze the law on the spot to apply it most accurately to gain an advantage, or at least not put their clients in a disadvantageous situation.
Sharing with Dan Tri reporter, Mr. Le Dinh Quyet - Lecturer of International Commercial Law Faculty, Hanoi Law University - highly appreciated the inclusion of the mock trial model in teaching this subject.
"There are many methods of conveying a piece of knowledge, but this is a very effective method.
When having to solve a real-life situation, students need to prepare a lot of related knowledge. At the same time, they are forced to practice and accumulate many skills such as analysis, argumentation, debate, communication, and legal thinking skills.
Besides, one of the goals of the capacity and also the value of this subject is that students have a multi-dimensional view of social issues.
The mock trial format will effectively support students in practicing the habit of thinking, analyzing, and uncovering all aspects to have a multi-dimensional perspective on all events and phenomena that occur in life," Mr. Quyet commented.
Mr. Le Dinh Quyet - Lecturer of International Commercial Law Faculty, Hanoi Law University (Photo: Quynh Trang).
Pham Nguyen Minh Anh shared that she decided to choose economic and legal education as an elective subject in the high school graduation exam. Although there are many subjects that she is better at and easier for her, Minh Anh still wants to challenge herself in this subject.
Minh Anh also clearly determined to study economic law. "Along with the guidance from my family, the subject has greatly inspired me to pursue economic law in the future," the female student shared.
Civic education will no longer be a subject to save points in the high school graduation exam.
"With the 2006 civic education program, knowledge is relatively accessible to the majority of students.
As for the new general education program in 2018, the content of the subject of economics and law has changed significantly, not only in increasing the duration of the economics subject to be equal to that of the law subject, but also in clearly orienting career choices," Ms. Ma Thi Thanh Xuan affirmed.
The illustrative exam for the subject of economics and law in the 2025 high school graduation exam clearly shows this change.
Illustrative test of economic and legal education subject for high school graduation exam 2025 (Screenshot).
Ms. Xuan said that previously, the exam mainly focused on the 12th grade program with the main content being law. The economic content in the 11th grade program only accounted for about 10%.
This year's exam has completely changed, including knowledge from all three grades 10-11-12 and dividing economic content equally with legal content.
The structure of the high school graduation exam in 2025 has fundamentally changed compared to the old exam structure, with changes in the number of questions, question commands, and difficulty levels significantly increased compared to previous years' exams, requiring candidates to have comprehensive capacity, knowledge, and skills.
These are factors that may cause civics to no longer be a saving subject in the 2025 high school graduation exam, according to many teachers' predictions.
After many years of teaching civic education in the 2006 general education program, Ms. Xuan commented that students are more interested in the subject in the 2018 program.
"The subject knowledge is more updated, more advanced, and more challenging for students. There are occasions when the school organizes career orientation events related to the fields of economics, business administration, finance - banking, and law. Many of my students, after attending, draw the conclusion: "So the hottest jobs are all related to your subject?"
Economics and law are two fields where the more you understand, the more advantage you will have and the more you will be able to control your life, no matter what job you do," Ms. Xuan shared.
Statistics on enrollment results from the Ministry of Education and Training in the past 3 years also show that the business - management - law group has an average of 500,000 students enrolled each year, overwhelming the majority of the remaining groups.
Source: https://dantri.com.vn/giao-duc/hoc-sinh-hao-hung-nhap-vai-luat-su-de-hoc-giao-duc-cong-dan-20241115192458444.htm
Comment (0)