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What you have to look forward to!
After witnessing our debate, I realized that making a decision about the constitution or slavery was not easy... especially because in the real circumstance, making a decision then, meant that the United States of America would have to deal with the consequences NOW. Making a decision was a huge deal, therefore, (in our case at least) it took a while to feel comfortable with what we suggested. Sometimes I felt uneasy about what my delegate truly implied. Also, sometimes two delegates from one state would disagree. This didn't create a large problem however, it does show that each and every state wanted to make sure that the decision they make was the right decision. During the true debate of 1789, the delegates did not know what the ramifications would be.
ReplyDeleteOne of the big topics of discussion today was the idea of representing a state based on population versus representing a state by the state itself. Population would be the "unequal" choice here, and having all states equal would be the opposing "equal" choice. Disputes of each of these choices came up today; usually the larger states in favor of population while the smaller states were in favor of all of the states being equally represented. Because of the different perspectives of the delegates, argument was brought about which actually happened at discussions like this back then. With each delegate experiencing a different situation in his state, each of their opinions toward this debate differed.
ReplyDeleteOur debate today was interesting. It must have been really hard to make decisions back then and agree about evrything. As a class, we didn't argue much about anything, we mostly just went with the flow and were agreeable. I'm sure it wasn't really like this in 1789! They must have argued over every possible decision, because their choices would affect the future. This made me realize that forming a government wasn't easy! Everyone has their own say and wants their oppinion to count.
ReplyDeleteI felt that everyone in our discussion today was too easy. Everyone seemed to agree on everything and there was no debate. However, I think the main reason it may have been that way was because we already knew the answer to the debates. To them as Alex said, it was a lot of pressure for them to make a decision. Where as for us we know what to choose. If the debates were our own personal opinions they would be a lot more interesting and debatable.
ReplyDeleteForming a government is definitely not as easy as what we were doing in class today. Different states have different opinions on an issue, it is very hard to or can never satisfy everyone's want. In the real convention, delegates should get very loud while discussing issues and getting emotional (maybe). It shouldn't be as peaceful and quiet in class today. The delegates would stay strongly on his point of view and to argue with the others.
ReplyDeleteThere was definitely more conflict than I would have expected. Pertaining to the fact that creating something from scratch is hard enough, having so many people participating and disagreeing just added to the chaos. Sure, it was only a simulation, but I am confident that I got a feel for what it was like for these candidates. It's impossible to satisfy everyone, and that was definitely reflected today during our debate. Even if something is 100% what you wanted, there were delegates who were settling for a lot less than what they bargained for. Class was quiet, but in real life clearly it would not have been the way things went today. There would be more emotions. Seeing that we are already a part of a system that works, it's difficult to relate. But everyone certainly got sometihng out of today's simulation. Perhaps tomorrow with slavery as the topic, it will get more of a reaction out of us. Slavery is something that we have more experience on which will contribute to the reaction that the delegates will have.
ReplyDeleteAfter today I realized the difficulty of making a decision that appeals to everyone in the nation. The process of forming a government was not as easy as it seems due to the fact that everyone had many different points of view and different ways to approach a topic. What we did in class was a watered down version of what would really happen and we still had a pretty hard time with it. Even if you were determined to go along with a plan half the time there would be another group of delegates wanting the opposite and it would be difficult to settle on something.
ReplyDeleteI feel that our debate today was productive. We came up with a few things to pass. Many people were hesitant to talk, but very strong ideas were brought up. It was fairly hard today to get everyone to agree on something, just like it was when our government was being formed. I also feel like there was not as much debate about slavery as there actually was back then. Most of us agreed without much conversation. By doing this simulation, I have a better understanding of how difficult making up new ideas and compromises and then getting everyone to agree.
ReplyDeleteI also agree with Erin and Alex. There was not much debate between any of us today, but it could be because we do know what happened as they mentioned. Also Tiffany mentioned that forming a strong government was also a struggle because different states had different opinions and everyone needed to be satsified for things to work out. Forming a government defintely takes a lot of hard work and time.
ReplyDeleteIn todays arguement i realized that it is very difficult to find common ground between a large group of people with many different points of views. I also realized that when the state delegates had to represent their state some of the things they were saying they may not have agreed with. For example, during slavery many people in the class did not agree with it but it was their states belief that it should be aloud so they were forced to go along with it.I also agree with Tiffany we defianetly need to get more emotional about this in class because there is no way the delegates were this calm when they met.
ReplyDeleteThis simulation of the Constitutional Convention was supposed to help us as students to understand exactly what happened during the late 1780's. However, due to the fact that the class did not master the skill of pretending to be the actual delegate this was hard to do so. The arguments themselves were successful on the flip side. Debating between representation and slavery issues, we found the same results established in our simulation in close proximity with the actual Convention. It is certainly challenging to pretend we did not know the actual outcomes of the Convention; yet that is obviusly inevitable. We all played the parts of the delegates well other than the personality aspects. The viewpoints of the states were accurately stated and therefore todays simulation was overall successful. There were patterns amongst the small and larger states when voting for representation issues and patterns amongst the northern and southern states for the slavery topic. This, however, made the debate today so interesting as one state had viewpoints in variation to another.
ReplyDeleteAfter our discussions in class it is much easier for me to understand how difficult agreeing on certain situations can be. It was also very difficult to act the part of our delegate when the topic of slavery came up because hopefully we are all against it. My delegate specifically was strictly southern which made it hard to vote a certain way without your personal thoughts intruding. It was also difficult not to "predict the future" as Mr. O stated in class. I agree with Jesse we do need to use more emotion at the next meeting because the delegates were obviously much more enthusiastic than we were. But they were also making a national decision when we were only doing a simulation which had ideas that not many of use personally believed in. Overall it was a great experience and it helped the class learn how the Southern states were corned at the Convention. I am looking forward to the next meeting and hopefully the class as a group will be able to be more thoughtful about the situation which will make it a lot more fun and interesting for all of us.
ReplyDeleteAfter our class debate I realized it was hard to discuss slavery since it had already happened, so each of us had to bout what actually happened aside and use what we knew from our persons point of view instead of our own. Also going against our own opinion in other topics was difficult. Lastly, I realized it must have been really hard back then for all of them to agree since everyone had their own opinion and ideas. All in all it was really cool to see what it was like to somewhat be in there position and see what some topics they discussed.
ReplyDeleteI agree with everyone that it was hard to capture the true emotions and debates in our class simulation versus the real Constitutional Convention. We knew what happened, but the difficult part of the simulation was avoiding our opinions and pretending to be a person (who may have been nothing like you) living many years ago. The real Convention was very serious and conjured up heated debates among the delegates because the future heavily depended upon them. This already happened, so as a class, we did not feel the pressure they had. Additionally, we cut off our simulation and did not sign a Constitution. During the real Convention, three people, including my delegate, George Mason, did not sign the Constitution. The other two delegates included Elbridge Gerry and Edmund Randolph. One of the reasons George Mason did not sign the Constitution was because the other delegates unanimously rejected his idea of the Bill of Rights.
ReplyDeleteOverall, our simulation helped depict the struggles the delegates were faced with in deciding how our government would work. It was not so easy and many times, the Southern States felt as if they had less of a say.
Mainly for me and probably most of the class, the most difficult aspect of the debate was expressing the views of your delegate. While it was easy to state your ideas, you really had to be conscious about your statements to accurately simulate the convention. Also, the atmosphere in our debate was completely different in comparison to the Convention. In the debate everyone kind of nodded and agreed with whatever sounded historically accurate, when in reality the stress placed on the delegates, to basically reshape the nation, was to an extreme.
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