This document provides teaching resources for a lesson on the roles of backbench MPs and the opposition in the UK parliament. It includes links to videos about a typical MP's day and week, their personal websites, and an online game. It suggests having students investigate these resources and write a sample timetable for an MP's day before revising it based on what they learn. The lesson aims to develop an understanding of backbench MPs' roles and how the opposition influences policy. Teachers are encouraged to arrange visits to parliament or invite local MPs to speak.

1. L2.20a: MPs and HM Opposition
Teacher Notes: PowerPoint SWF file
L2.20a MPs and HM Opposition
As with all our IWB resources, these slides contains activities that could be used as a complete lesson.
You may decide to use some or all of the resources to meet the needs of your students.
Before the lesson
Log in to www.politicsteacher.co.uk as you will need to be logged in to watch the videos. We advise
opening the page with the video before your lesson as this helps to reduce the possibility of the
video buffering.
We strongly suggest arranging a visit to the House of Commons for this unit. Or to invite your local MP
to come and talk to the students about life in Westminster.
The following links are also available on L2.20 – mp and lords visits and visiting parliament
http://www.parliament.uk/education/in-your-school/mp-and-lord-visits/
There are also some great, inspirational activities here
http://www.parliament.uk/education/visiting-parliament/key-stage-5-programmes/
Networking Suggestions
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If you have access to email you may find it useful to send a class email to your local MP
If you have access to video-conferencing such as Skype, you may be able to ‘meet’ with your
MP that way.
Your students could find out if their MP is on Twitter and follow them that way, asking them
questions with the @ facility.
Slide 1: Introduce the lesson objectives:
Click the mouse or tap the slide to reveal the following learning objectives:
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To develop an understanding of the role of backbench MPs
To begin to consider the role of the Opposition

2. L2.20a: MPs and HM Opposition
Slide 2: Role of an MP
This lesson will focus on inviting your student to think about the Role of an MP
Click the mouse or tap the slide to ask your students:
What do you think these MPs do all day?
Slide 3: MPs timetable
A handout with a weekly calendar is available to download on L2.20a - timetable
Give a copy of this calendar to each student.
Invite your students to write a timetable for what you think an MP does in a day
Invite your students to compare what time you think they start and finish work, what they do in a day
with others in the class.
Slide 4: Investigation
The next part of the lesson provides resources for your students to investigate what it is like to be an
MP. If you have access to computers or laptops the students can watch the following videos and play
the online games independently.
If you do not have access to individual computers you could do this as a whole class or set the
investigation as a homework task.
The following videos and resources are available as links on www.revisepolitics.co.uk
- Lesson links -L20a
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A short video about the life of an MP (2 minutes).
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A video clip about Chloe Smith, the youngest MP and her ‘typical day’
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Sometimes behaviour in the House of Commons is terrible! (This is ten minutes of selected
footage showing some different types of behaviour in the house - you may wish to show/watch
some or all of it to think about some of the challenges that MPs face in the debating chamber).
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MPs personal websites about their duties
The following two links are available on the page
http://www.nickymorgan.org/
http://www.giselastuartmp.co.uk/a-day-in-the-life/

3. L2.20a: MPs and HM Opposition
(You may wish to use Google to find more to investigate)
The following text is with these links :
in order to get a picture of what an MP does with their time. Have a look at your MP’s website and see
how they have been spending their time.
● A link to short video about an MPs typical week:
http://www.parliament.uk/education/online-resources/videos/mps-in-their-own-words/mp-no-typicalweek/
● Play the game MP for a week
http://www.parliament.uk/education/online-resources/games/
It is aimed at slightly younger children but it still reinforces some of the activities that an MP
● BBC article - Role of an MP
http://news.bbc.co.uk/democracylive/hi/guides/newsid_8148000/8148397.stm
The following text is next to this video link:
Read through this article and consider:
What factors do they say effect the success of an MP?
What can backbenchers who are in Opposition do to influence policy?
Who instigates most of the legislation that goes through the Commons?
● MPs in their own words
http://www.parliament.uk/education/online-resources/videos/
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Voting on Bills in the House of Commons
The following text is next to this video:
This video provides a is technical explanation how MPs vote in the House. This is quite useful for
revising the process of legislation again. It also provides the opportunity to discuss the archaic
procedure and the importance of history on the behaviour in the House of Commons.
Slide 5: Changes to timetable
Having considered all these video clips and the article, would you now change your timetable for an MP?
Slide 6: Revisit the lesson objectives
These lessons objectives will be looked at in more detail in L2.20b