DISCUSSING ACTIVE CITIZENSHIP
Active citizenship means active involvement in local communities, it may include volunteering activities, non-formal groups actions or small events like cleaning the streets, river banks etc. Active citizenship is also vital in school life. It is a combination of knowledge, attitude, skills and actions to foster a democratic society. It supports cooperation, values diversity and involves the whole community, it´s important for solving problems of various kind. School programmes should cover communication on building tolerance, fighting prejudice, openess to diversity . . .
"Migration to Europe 2015"
- "an escalating migration crisis is testing th EU´s commitment to human rights and open borders"
- "human tragedies caused by pollitical situation in the Middle East and Africa"
- "volunteers help migrants arriving in Europe"
(these are just three quotes from current newspapers)
A task for you:
How would you introduce and discuss the topic of migration to your students?
What would be the basic steps of your teaching or project activity?
Share your ideas in comments below this blog entry.
YOU CAN FIND INSPIRATION ON THESE USEFUL WEBSITES with project kits:
- Academy of Central European Schools web with colllection of creative activities:
http://bit.ly/1XmKhrz
- eTwinning Conference Brussels, October 2015
http://destination-unknown.org/ (Protect children on the move)
Task 2: Here in Greece we lately speachless watch the drowning of hundreds of migrants from Syria that tried to escape from the hell of war hoping to arrive at a safe place to continue their lives.Some of them manage to do it. Some others even babies don't manage it and lose their lives. So some photos of the desparate faces of these people will be the start for a long discussion in class and for students expressing their opinions about possible solutions to the problem.
ReplyDeleteThis comment has been removed by the author.
DeleteTask 2: Here in Greece we lately speachless watch the drowning of hundreds of migrants from Syria that tried to escape from the hell of war hoping to arrive at a safe place to continue their lives.Some of them manage to do it. Some others even babies don't manage it and lose their lives. So some photos of the desparate faces of these people will be the start for a long discussion in class and for students expressing their opinions about possible solutions to the problem.
ReplyDeleteI would suggest the online game www.taxidifygis.org.cy which is made by UNHCR and teaches the migration with the best way (virtually).Another game is www.darfurisdying.com.Games make students understand easier and feel deeply what we want to teach them.
ReplyDeleteTo address the migration to Europe in 2015 I prefer a hands-on approach.
ReplyDeleteMaterial: 2 lengths of white wallpaper (1.9 m each), black/red/green markers
Procedure:
1. Choose two smaller students. Each of them has to lie down on a length of wallpaper. Have other pupils trace their body outline with black markers.
2. Hang up body outline number 1 on the wall. Use the green markers. Ask the students to come to the front and write down one aspect of a happy childhood in legible capital letters. It does not matter whether these aspects are tangible or intangible. Once you will have collected a variety of aspects take a picture of this body outline.
3. Confront the students with videos, texts, … about the current situation of refugees. Engage them in tasks requiring their personal opinion. Allow them to relate their experience, fears, … to the class.
4. At the end of the lesson, hang up body outline number 2. Ask the students to fill in the aspects of a refugee’s childhood. Use the red marker for negative aspects and the green marker for positive aspects. I am confident that the red aspects will outweigh the green ones. Elicit comments on the relation of green and red from the students. Hang up body outline number 1 next to it and have the compare the childhood experiences. Finally, list realistic things that can be done to change this situation for the refugee children that involve your class, e.g. donating toys, a visit to the local refugee hostel, …
A possible follow-up activity is to ask parents’ permission to sponsor a child. If every student contributed 1 €/month you can already sponsor a child abroad. The class can send letters and tiny, immaterial presents to their sponsored child. In turn, they’d learn something about other parts of the world as well as hear back from the sponsored child in many cases.
As a first comment, I will share this link with you http://www.lebenskunde.de/sites/lebenskunde.de/files/flucht_fluechtlinge_migration-teil-2.pdf
ReplyDeleteit is in German, but there must similar sites in English, I hope.
Here many activities for student and the picture gallery can be enriched with photos from the last years.
Another site I found very helpful, but it is in greek is
http://noiazomaikaidrw.gr/
Here we have material to explain how many kinds of active citizenship exist (there are small videos to see and then to decide which kind of a.c. it was). So students see first examples of what it means to be active.
Another perspective could be the children's rights when students know them well, they can plan their activities much better.
Since Greece has experienced so many drownings of Syrian people, I would introduce my subject through articles and pictures from newspapers. Then I would try to see migration escalation through history and make a tour guide in Google earth or create a migration timeline, mentioning the causes and the consequences each time. Last, we would contact through skype with current organizations here in Greece that try to help these people and we would offer our help in the end for this cause.
ReplyDeleteI would ask my students to take their genograms (small family trees) and present them in class. I am sure that many families have members that have migrated in the past or that are refugees from Asia Minor. This way we can then link their own history and experience to people migrating nowadays for various reasons.
ReplyDeleteRole play. I would distribute roles to my students. Some would be the the immigrants. Others would be the people of a country, where some of them accept them, while others would be tough and negative about their entrance in their country.
ReplyDeleteI am Greek, too, and I live with this situation of people drowning, people helpless, people who just want to survive.
I had also thought about familly trees as Andreas Galanos has mentioned before, as we have lived as immigrants in the past.
Anna-Maria Nikolaou, Cyprus
ReplyDeleteI will ask from my students to interview immigrants. Immigrants could be students from the school or immigrants they came to their country. All together in the classroom think the questions and write them. After, the interviews must be complete. The students bring the answers in the classroom and we discuss them. We could also invite one immigrant to come to school and talk to the students about his experience of being an immigrant.
Task2: I would ask my students to seek immigrants in our city and ask for an interview. Ask them why they chose to immigrate to your country. Classify the responses fit into one of these categories:
ReplyDelete1. Looking for new or better job opportunities
2. Looking for a more secure and better environment
3. Forced to move out from their original place
4. Other reasons (please specify)
Combine your answers as a full class and tally the responses given by category...
The most striking and everlasting means of presenting something is the picture.So I would choose a video showing the desperate efforts of immigrants to go to a European country,then we would have a discussion about how the students felt by watching the video, how we could help them and I would ask them to propose some solutions.
ReplyDeleteSo discussion after watching a video, and as real world is in the classroom I would arrange a visit to an encampment of immigrants and the students would have the opportunity to offer a volunteer work for a couple of hours and to talk with some of them.And then of course we would present some photos,videos and interviews that the students would take by themselves.
The most striking and everlasting means of presenting something is the picture.So I would choose a video showing the desperate efforts of immigrants to go to a European country,then we would have a discussion about how the students felt by watching the video, how we could help them and I would ask them to propose some solutions.
ReplyDeleteSo discussion after watching a video, and as real world is in the classroom I would arrange a visit to an encampment of immigrants and the students would have the opportunity to offer a volunteer work for a couple of hours and to talk with some of them.And then of course we would present some photos,videos and interviews that the students would take by themselves.
I come from a country where the immigrants were part of the recent past. Students have the opportunity to hear the stories of participants in their families. That's why I would used the interview method.
ReplyDeleteThey will works in groups.
The first group - The students will interview local resident about their experiences. Before the interview, they will learn how to interview carried out, how to write questions. After the interview, which will record the voice recorder or mobile phone, students will write a story - A day in the life of an immigrant.
The second group - The students will research digital databases about immigrants and make a timeline on the topic - Immigrats yesterday, today, tomorrow.
The third group will collect seven days information from the media (TV, the internet, newspaper) about immigrants and make a poster on the topic - Let's talk about immigrants.
Their work will be presented to students and parents at the school (lectures, exhibitions) on World Refugee Day, 24.10.(UN).
Task2
ReplyDeleteMiguel Ángel Frías Gallardo
In Spain migration takes years producing. On the one hand, from the countries of Africa and across from the countries of Eastern Europe and Latin America. I introduce this topic sensitizing students why these migrations, why perform these people these perilous journeys where many leave their lives. How is your lifestyle in their countries of origin and study the causes and consequences of migration.
It would also reflect on past migrations in Spain due to the Spanish civil war and emigration present due to the lack of work by the crisis.
I seek a timeline where the most notorious migration and its causes were translated. On the other hand I invite them know reality from the standpoint of social organizations and volunteers who help immigrants. News and current debates raise the issue of migration to Europe dede Syria, problem or an opportunity?
Role play with students. So they can understand the problem.
ReplyDeleteRole play with students. So they can understand the problem.
ReplyDeleteThe name of this project is very meaningful and I really like it. Here in Turkey we have alot of migrants from Syria and also the other countries like Afganistan that tried to escape their countries and they hoping to arrive at a safe and well educated place to continue their lives.Some people say it is oppurtinity but some people dosen't like that people. first of all our pupils must understand the different facts of migration. we can show documentaries about migration. Role play may be useful.It is important to empathize
ReplyDeleteI would work with my student:
ReplyDelete1. I would ask them if they knew what their family name ment.
2. We would work on their family tree.
3. I would ask them to interview thir parents and grandparents aboout their family history to bring to the classroom some photos of their family
4. When presenting the family tree and history we would ask each other where they came from and then we would take pins and markers and pin on a map and mark all the roads their families had to cross in order to come and live here.
I would introduce the topic using headlines of newspapers in Greece, articles in tv news regarding the refugees coming to Greece, short videos from the news. I would then ask my pupils to think and write down reasons for which these people leave their country in a padlet.
ReplyDeleteAfterwards we would discuss what these people expect of their future.
We would also get into role playing where some kids will pretend to be refugees and others the volontear crew at the seaside of a Greek island.
At the end of the lesson we would right some messages in hard paper regarding human rights.
The topic is up-to-date and I think my students will like it. I ask my students to find immigrants in our town and try to interview them. (ask them about their dreams, hopes, fears and plans). Also my students can make a leaflet which will brace up them.
ReplyDeleteHere in Greece we are face to face with the drama of the immigrants of Syria. How will I introduce the topic? This month we are collecting clothes, shoes, jackets for the immigrants. We will go down to the class we have put these packets. The students have already brought clothes in the school. I will start from these point. We will make our lesson there. A break to watch the news in TV will be very helpfull, to see how many people have been drown today or how many are waiting to the borders of Skopia and Serbia to go ahead! I will go on with questions, have you ever seen immigrants, have you relatives who have been immigrants- many Greek people has left Minor Asia to come in Greece in order to avoid death in 1922.I will go on with role play. Imagine you are an immigrant or imagine you are your grandfather or grantmother who came from Minor Asia...Imagine you are citizen of the country you reach, imagine, imagine... in order to understand each other!
ReplyDeleteIn Romania our president refused the required number of immigrants from Syria and the subjects was disscused on media days and days .This subject I treated it with great students in free discussions .Firs of all i asked them to watch at TV to see what is the problem then we talk about.We compared the problem of this migration with migrations of Middle Ages.
ReplyDeleteI will tell about a little experience I've made a couple of years ago.
ReplyDeleteIn September 2013 a tragic landing of migrants from North Africa had happened in the little island of Lampedusa, near Sicily, where I live. Newspaper and TV were full of news concerning this event. I decided of starting from this moving fact to involve my 16 years old students in a detailed study of the phenomenon of migration.
First of all, I gave them some context information, such as: what were the country they come from, the trend of the population, the european laws (such as Dublin Agreement) and so on.
Then, I splitted them in little groups and let them ideate and choose some more detailed topic on which they would study and report to the class. They could also choose the way: a powerpoint, a video, a poster, a website and so on.
In a few weeks they presented their work, and each of them was discussed with the classmates.
I cannot forget one of these works: three students knew, among their acquaintances, a clandestine migrant, a very poor one of course, and they interviewed him, who told his experience in a very interesting and moving way. Other students made deep researchs about the countries, the reasons, the journeys, on what was their destiny when they came to Italy, on the concept of refugee and so on.
Of course this project is to be improved. I think that I would add to it some kind of cooperation with a class from another european country wich is experiencing the arrival of masses of migrants, in order to share different point of view and different approach to the problem.
Due to the fact that in Greece we have to deal with a large refugee wave, I think I would choose one of the videos recently shown on the Greek news. Then I would have the students write about their first impression and feelings after watching the video to see how they were affected by the visuals. Then I could guide them to explore the reasons why those people were led to leave their countries using internet sources and try to connect it with some similar Greek literature content about the refugees after the war in Minor Asia in 1922. Finally, after having been informed about the current situation and relate it to the past one of the 1922, I could turn to their creative side and tell them to write a short story about how those refugees were forced to leave their countries, the reasons, the difficulties until their final destination and what they think the end of their adventure will be like.
ReplyDeleteI live in Sicily and teach to sicilian guys. Our island has been reciving african people for several years, quite 15-20 ones: that's not news for us. When I work with my students about migrations to Europe, at first I ask them to immagine their word and their life: the war around, the house collapsed, the parants deth, no food, any future for them or their sons. I ask them to immagine what would thy do in that situations and to try to organize how to survive.. Then we can start to talk about the Others migrants.
ReplyDeleteSometimes the are able to feel the migrants.
We have just started an eTwinning project called "The colourful face of Europe"; it will deal with various aspects of migration. To demonstrate that, from a historical perspective, migration is quite natural, we started with zeemaps.com: all Twinspace members marked the places of their schools in one particular colour and the places where students plus teachers come from (or parents' generation) in the same colour but a lighter shade. The result is interesting and, of course, depends on a variety of aspects (nation, rural/ urban area, internat migration/ immigration/ emigration ...). We then continue this biographical approach by asking about experiences with migration (belonging, integration, adaptation, maybe xenophobia ...). On the whole, a lot to think about and to discuss ... and thereby getting prepared for dealing with current development and policies.
ReplyDeleteTask 2: With our students have addressed the subject on thousands of migrants arriving mainly in Sicily, Italy in all countries affected by war and knowing to risk starting with the hope of reaching a safe place to live peacefully Unfortunately for many ends badly because many adults and children die and every dream fades. So some photos desparate faces of these people will be the beginning of a long discussion in the classroom and for students who express their opinions on possible solutions to the problem.
ReplyDeleteTask 2: I would start from material from the news, press, web, official texts on the recent crisis, in order to detect its characteristics and the media discourse about it.
ReplyDeleteOf course it depend primarily on the students' age. In my 6th grades I connected this topic with Mesopotamia topic and with stories of the Bible (Tower of Babel). Pupils step by step discovered the ancient culture of this area. They are usually amazement of that. They are interested in ancient citizens and talk about them and ask who were they? Then we talked about the meaning of words like a justice, freedom, love, good and evil. We created thinking maps together. We discuss about these topics in connection with they own person. Later we watch short movies from present, contemporary history of this country (family and children testimonies). We discuss about migrant children and about the channge of their lives and about their future. Finally they make posters called: History, present and future?... My pupils want to talk about this topic. They have many questions and our history lessons are often one and only chance where to ask.
ReplyDelete