Last time you counted 100 ballots for two seats on the student council under the single transferable vote. Aoife and Cara took the seats. Today you keep every ballot exactly as it was and count them a different way. A different person takes a seat. The question is not which count is cleverer. It is what each system lets citizens do with their vote, and what it quietly takes away.

On these ballots the first preferences are: Aoife 40, Brian 25, Cara 20, Diarmuid 15. For two seats, name the top two.

Your teacher models the count on the board machine first. Then open the interactive in pairs.

Hold both results in view. Aoife and Cara under the transferable count. Aoife and Brian under first past the post. Steelman first past the post: it is easy to explain, the link from first mark to seat is direct, and the winners are simply the people with the most first preferences. Nobody needs to follow transfers. Steelman the transferable count: more ballots help elect someone, a second preference can still matter when a first choice is out, and here Cara reaches a seat with support that first past the post never adds together. Then ninety seconds of silence. Write one sentence for each stem: First past the post is strong when... A second preference is worth filling in because...

You took the same 100 ballots and two seats and watched two counting rules seat different people. First past the post reads first preferences only and never moves a ballot. The single transferable vote can move later preferences when a candidate is elected or excluded. You compared how citizens shape the result under each rule, without crowning a winner, and you wrote one strength of each system.