Teaching civics through classroom-based projects and games
Valdone Verseckiene teaches a UNESCO class at Laurynas Ivinskis Gymnasium, Kursenai, in Lithuania. The class consists of students aged 15-18 from different classes. They normally discuss UNESCO World Heritage issues, but this school year, after the Beslan tragedy, she and her students have decided to learn more about peaceful conflict resolution in order to teach other students about developing tolerance and solving interpersonal problems in a peaceful manner.
Like UNESCO schools all over the world, we do a lot of project work with partners from numerous countries around the world. The projects in which our students and teachers participate, range from art, environment, to drug prevention projects and other.
I, personally, am interested in UNESCO World Heritage issues and my UNESCO Class changes every year, because some students leave school and others join the class, but the idea remains the same - young people interested in UNESCO World Heritage, feel responsible for making the world a better place to live and come together once a week for projects and activities.
For example, in 2002 we won The European Label for our language project "Tourist Routes of Kursenai". It was the result of a two-year project and its main outcome was a CD with a PowerPoint presentation and 14 pamphlets about 14 places in our small town that are dear to young people living here, places of historical importance and the newly created places such as Youth Amphitheatre on the bank of the river Venta.
We have decided to focus on discussing peaceful conflict resolutions this year. I would like to share one of the classroom activities that my students liked the most. Its aim was to teach them to be open to each other, i.e. to share their feelings and to listen attentively to their friends, both very important skills to develop to understand each other better.
We all sat in a circle. There were a lot of small colourful cards on the floor with abstract pictures, lines, shades, etc. so each person could see something different in the same card. Everybody had to choose one card with their eyes, but not to tell others which card they have chosen. The card had to represent how they were feeling that day. Then, in turn, everybody spoke and shared their feelings. While speaking, they picked the card from the floor, showed it to everybody and put it back when finished. Many people chose the same cards, but saw totally different things in them.
While reflecting on this activity students said they liked it and appreciated it that everybody had had a chance to share and be heard. I think that was a small but successful step towards teaching simple communication skills that are very important in developing tolerance. In the next lesson we will take one more small step forward, with an activity, I learned from Yael Sharon, a world famous expert in co-operative learning.
We know it is impossible to forget the tragic beginning of this academic year. And we think that we, teachers and students worldwide, must do something in every school to plant more seeds of peace and democracy. The innocent victims in Beslan call for that and we cannot ignore.
We support the idea of having one-day actions like Peace Day. But we should also think of more permanent activities to be taken. We believe there are schools who already have some experience in such activities and we hope they will share their experiences, which would also be one more step towards a better world.
For example, in 2002 we won The European Label for our language project "Tourist Routes of Kursenai". It was the result of a two-year project and its main outcome was a CD with a PowerPoint presentation and 14 pamphlets about 14 places in our small town that are dear to young people living here, places of historical importance and the newly created places such as Youth Amphitheatre on the bank of the river Venta.
