Using NewsHour Extra Feature Stories

Overview: NewsHour Extra feature stories can help students identify and interpret key issues in current events. This activity anticipates one class period, but the follow-up essay might be assigned as homework or in another period.

Warm Up: Use initiating questions to introduce the topic and find out how much your students know.

Main Activity: Have students read NewsHour Extra's feature story and answer the questions on the reading comprehension handout.

Discussion: Use discussion questions to encourage students to think about how the issues outlined in the story affect their lives and express and debate different opinions.

Follow-up: Students can write a 500-word editorial on the topic expressing their views and send it to NewsHour Extra [extra@newshour.org] for possible publication.

Evaluation: Students are graded on their answers to reading comprehension questions and/or their editorial.

Story: Immgiration Tops Political Agendas, 12/05/05
http://www.pbs.org/newshour/extra/features/july-dec05/immigration_12-05.html

Initiating Questions:

1. What is immigration?

2. What is the difference between legal and illegal immigration?

3. What has been the historical attitude towards immigration in the United States?

Reading Comprehension Questions: (click here for printout)

1. How have American attitudes toward immigration changed over the years?

America has often been conflicted in its dealings with immigrants.

Often the country has opened its arms to those seeking a better life, as illustrated by the poem at the base the Statue of Liberty that reads "From her beacon-hand Glows world-wide welcome; ... Give me your tired, your poor, Your huddled masses yearning to breathe free."

But in the late 1800s, the nation banned immigration from parts of Asia due largely to anti-Chinese public sentiment.

Now, in the wake of the Sept. 11, 2001 attacks and with money for government services like health care and education stretched thin, Americans are approaching issues of immigration with a great deal of concern and caution.

2. What are illegal immigrants and how do they affect the U.S. economy?

Illegal immigrants, also known as undocumented aliens, most often cross the southern border with Mexico without the documents necessary to legally work or live in the United States.

Many immigrants work dangerous or unattractive jobs, such as picking fruit or construction, for less money than legal workers.

Their work makes certain products in the United States cheaper, but it also costs American taxpayers money because illegal immigrants don't have health insurance, and many of their children need special services at school, such as English as a second language programs.

3. What is the connection between immigration and concerns about terrorism?

In the post-9/11 world, many officials worry that without better monitoring of the border, terrorists could sneak into the country as easily as those seeking work.

4. What are some of the proposals in the House of Representatives and the Senate?

Some members of the House of Representatives have suggested radical solutions such as building a fence along the entire border, or rounding up the 11 million illegal immigrants and forcibly sending them back where they came from.

Senators John McCain, a Republican from Arizona, and Edward Kennedy, a Democrat from Massachusetts, introduced a bill that works to tighten security at the borders, but also establishes a guest worker program that gives the worker a legal status within the U.S. and some hope of eventual citizenship.

5. What is President Bush's immigration proposal?

In a recent speech in Arizona, President Bush outlined his plan that calls for tough measures like tighter border security, larger detention centers and tougher work place enforcement.

At the same time, the president offered a "temporary worker" program to try to encourage illegal immigrants to register to work in this country legally.

President Bush defended his plan, saying America is a "compassionate nation" that takes pride in our "immigrant heritage" and argued that, "[t]he American people should not have to choose between a welcoming society and a lawful society. We can have both at the same time."

6. What is a temporary worker program?

Temporary worker programs are not new. Currently there are two guest worker visa programs, one for agriculture workers and another for skilled workers (invented in 1990 in response to forecasts of labor shortages in the high tech industry.)

Unlike the plan President Bush has proposed, immigrants with a guest worker visa for skilled labor can eventually become U.S. citizens.

Under Mr. Bush's proposed plan, workers currently in the U.S. would first have to return to their home country and apply with an American employer.

7. What do critics say about the president's proposal?

Critics of the temporary worker program, many from within President Bush's own party, contend that it amounts to an "amnesty" or pardon for those already in the country who arrived illegally.

In addition, the plan allows for temporary workers to stay in the country for just six years, long enough to have children who would be American citizens.

At the end of six years, these immigrants would face the tough choice of staying on as illegal immigrants unable to get a driver's license or job, or return to the country they had already left.

Discussion Activity (more research might be needed):

1. What do you think about the president's plan?

2. What do you think is a fair way to secure our borders and, at the same time, deal with people who want to come to the United States because there is more opportunity here than where they currently live?

3. Research some past immigration laws, including the Chinese Exclusion Act of 1882. Could a law like this ever pass now? Why or why not?

4. How has immigration shaped your community?

Write a 300-500 word essay on any of these topics providing clear examples. Send your completed editorial to NewsHour Extra (extra@newshour.org). Exceptional essays might be published on our Web site.