Fact Mountain U.S. Constitution is the best educational trivia/game app for a complete study of the Constitution of the United States of America!
To try the app, go to App Store or Google Play . Download the freemium version and tap “Instructions.”
What are the main features of your U.S. Constitution app?
It’s “freemium”, so you can play its game modes for entertainment (yes, fun and games studying history!), look at study material, and try the two games for free before purchasing.
How do you play the first of the app’s two games?
One game uses the “flash cards” popular in studying for exams. All flash card clues on the screen are at your chosen difficulty level. When you begin to type an answer, the app suggests possible answers to speed the game and help you earn more points. Points allow your mountain hiker to make game progress along the track at the bottom of the screen toward the winning score. This score varies by level.
We recommend starting with Level 1 as in other video games and winning the game twice before moving to Level 2. Even Level 1 is a skill-building adventure for new players and provides great entertainment. We guarantee you’ll discover things you didn’t know!
You can just play solitaire, or read the clues aloud as host and play together with friends, dividing into teams if you want.
Our app may become your favorite trivia quiz, at least while studying U.S. history and the Constitution for a class. Measure success both by the levels you attain while playing and by how few clues you need to become a winner at those levels.
Once you have reached Level 5 with “flash cards”, let your brain try the other game.
How do you play the second game?
This is the harder “pyramid” game used in academic competitions.
You see multiple clues on the screen, one at a time, all for the same answer. Clues get easier until you are correct. Points allow your hiker to make game progress toward the points needed to win.
The easiest few clues always appear in the “pyramid” game. Over time, your brain learns those easiest few clues for each answer.
We have minimized pure trivia, concentrating on more useful stuff you actually need to know. Again, play with friends or just solitaire.
These two games are excellent study aids for students from middle school through college, and much better for retaining information than most games.
How can you study the Constitution with a trivia app?
Our study mode lets you scroll through and read and study all clues for the Preamble, any Article or any Amendment at the same time.
Many links offer access to the Constitution’s text. You get easy access to the relevant Federalist Papers (mostly written by Alexander Hamilton). You even get an easy way to read the most common legal interpretations of Constitution clauses.
Law students will find the app worth its weight in gold in Constitutional Law. The app links to several famous Supreme Court cases and explains how those decisions relate to the Constitution.
Ours is one of the best digital games/video games/trivia games out there for developing a detailed knowledge of the US Constitution.
Where else do Fact Mountain apps get noticed?
Entrepreneur Magazine, Tech.co, Apps400.com, and AppsMirror.com
To see U.S. Presidents and our other Fact Mountain subjects, look around our site. The church-related apps are free; the others are freemium.
Introduction to the Constitution
The U.S. Constitution was created for a new nation. The document is an improvement on the Articles of Confederation, which governed the U.S. in the years after the country first became independent from Great Britain.
The Constitution’s original copy is in the National Archives in Washington, D.C.
The Preamble declares the Constitution’s multiple purposes: “to form a more perfect union”, “establish justice”, “insure domestic tranquility”, “provide for the common defense”, “promote the general welfare”, and “secure the blessings of liberty to ourselves and our posterity.”
The Constitution’s First Three Articles
The written Constitution was created after the Declaration of Independence by our Founding Fathers (led by James Madison), within a Constitutional Convention chaired by George Washington.
The Constitution contains seven Articles that set up the United States government.
Article I discusses legislative powers, like the ability to declare war and to collect taxes. The bicameral Congress (meaning “two legislative houses”) includes a Senate, with 2 Senators per state, supervised when in session by the Vice President, and a House of Representatives, with at least one Representative per state.
Article II discusses the executive branch, governed by the President and Vice President. It also discusses the limits of the President’s executive authority.
Article III discusses the judicial branch, which starts at the top with a Supreme Court, led by a Chief Justice, whose job is to ascertain the true meaning of the Constitution. The Article creates “inferior”, or other federal courts, at lower levels. The Article also discusses the range and limits of judicial power.
These three Articles set forth the idea of “checks and balances”, so that none of the three branches of the national government can govern the people of the United States by itself without some input from the other two.
The first two Articles also explain the President’s and Congress’s roles in foreign affairs.
The Last Four Articles
The final four Articles explain how to add new states to the Union and how to amend the Constitution. They establish fundamental law and the federal government’s sovereignty over state governments: the federal government’s laws are the supreme law of the land, and governments in the individual states cannot pass state laws that contradict federal law.
Article VII, the final Article, required that nine states (of the thirteen states at the time) ratify the Constitution before it would take effect. Eventually, all states did ratify it, with Rhode Island the last.
The Constitution’s First 10 Amendments
The Constitution’s first ten Amendments collectively have the title “Bill of Rights.” They offer specific protections to, and specify Constitutional rights guaranteed to, all Americans, including to keep and bear arms, to a speedy and public trial, and to own private property.
They also provide limits on federal government powers and government officials; powers not listed are expressly granted to the people of the United States.
In the years since the Constitution was first written, these same protections, rights and limits have been extended to states and their powers.
Other Amendments
The seventeen later Amendments include equal protection and due process under the law for everyone and have been added to meet the needs of modern society over the last two centuries.
One Amendment outlaws slavery (since the end of the Civil War). Another limits the President to two full terms (since the end of World War II). Amendments also give women the right to vote and specify what to do if the President dies or becomes incapacitated.
America is still building a more perfect union. The United States Constitution allows this building to continue.