Foundations of American Democracy: Free Course

About this course

Study Foundations of American Democracy in this free English video course from Khan Academy. The classroom preserves all 30 published source recordings, totaling approximately 4h 33m, with their original lesson titles and sequence. The selected curriculum focuses on government structures, civic concepts and reasoned comparison. Use the videos to follow an explanation, examine an example and develop a study output you can check independently. The course title describes this recorded subject or learning track; your study can extend beyond watching through the practical activities below.

Course at a glance

What you’ll learn

• Follow the explanation and worked reasoning in “The social contract”, then describe the main idea in your own words.
• Follow the explanation and worked reasoning in “The Articles of Confederation and Shays' Rebellion”, then describe the main idea in your own words.
• Follow the explanation and worked reasoning in “Constitutional compromises: The Three-Fifths Compromise”, then describe the main idea in your own words.
• Follow the explanation and worked reasoning in “Multiple points of influence due to separation of powers and checks and balances”, then describe the main idea in your own words.
• Connect examples across Foundations of American Democracy by identifying the terms, assumptions and methods they use.
• Create a small independent practice output and check it against the relevant teaching explanation.

Skills you’ll gain

• Civic concepts
• Government structures
• Context
• Evidence comparison

Course Overview

The source curriculum is presented as a complete recorded video edition of Foundations of American Democracy. Representative lessons include “The social contract”, “Constitutional compromises: The Three-Fifths Compromise” and “Introduction to the public policy process”. These recordings give concrete examples to revisit while building government structures, civic concepts and reasoned comparison. Their place in the lesson list is preserved, so you can return to a particular explanation without losing its source position. Introductions, demonstrations, examples, reviews and compilations remain included whenever they appear in the original playlist. Reading a lesson title is useful for locating a topic; working through its reasoning and checking a practice attempt is what makes the recording valuable for learning.

How to study the course

• Videos 1–7: this part of the source list includes “The social contract” through “The Articles of Confederation and Shays' Rebellion”. Define the civic terms used in an explanation. Keep a brief working note, revisit an unclear explanation and test one example before moving to another part of the material.
• Videos 8–15: this part of the source list includes “Federalist No. 10 (part 1)” through “Article V of the Constitution”. Trace relationships between institutions or principles. Keep a brief working note, revisit an unclear explanation and test one example before moving to another part of the material.
• Videos 16–22: this part of the source list includes “Article VI of the Constitution” through “Categorical grants, mandates, and the Commerce Clause”. Support a comparison with details from the lessons. Keep a brief working note, revisit an unclear explanation and test one example before moving to another part of the material.
• Videos 23–30: this part of the source list includes “Article IV of the Constitution” through “Introduction to the public policy process”. Keep historical examples in their original context. Keep a brief working note, revisit an unclear explanation and test one example before moving to another part of the material.

Who is this for?

This course suits students and readers studying the U.S. civic or constitutional topic in the title. It also provides a recorded reference for revisiting a topic after an earlier lesson or study attempt. Choose examples appropriate to your background and allow time to work through the method instead of judging understanding only by how familiar the terminology sounds.

Before you start

Comfort reading English explanations is useful. The recordings teach civic and historical concepts; they do not supply an individual legal assessment.

Put the lessons into practice

Choose a civic principle, institution or case discussed in the recordings. Explain its role, identify the relationships involved and support the explanation with details from the lesson. Compare it with another example and state which features make the situations similar or different. Distinguish a historical teaching example from a current legal or administrative question. Build a small study map that links the key terms and write a concise account of the reasoning connecting them.

This optional study activity is provided by WikiFree for independent practice. Keep your working notes and use the relevant classroom recording to check a step, definition or interpretation. It is not an instructor-marked assignment.

Certificate / Assessment

Watching the public videos and using WikiFree completion tracking does not award a certificate, academic credit, an examination voucher or instructor assessment. Use your practice output to review what you can explain and repeat independently. The recorded lessons provide study material; completion tracking records your progress through that material.

Frequently asked questions

Provider: Khan Academy. Videos play from the Khan Academy channel on YouTube.