It is now my fourth year teaching Global Citizenship, and I continue to update the lessons and units to reflect the changing world and the shift from teaching 6th graders to 5th graders. I have pared down the themes to Environment, United Nations, Poverty, War, Human Rights, and Sustainability with a focus in each unit on a significant figure (Al Gore, Eleanor Roosevelt, Muhammad Yunus, Gandhi, Rigoberta Menchu, and Wangari Maathai) and frequent use of magazine articles and short documentaries.The first semester wrapped up last week and I asked students to reflect on what they learned. Here are a few responses:
"In Global I learned about povverty how to help the planet. I had a lot of fun in Global yeah sometimes it can be boring but I sorta enjoyed it my favorite part was learning about poverty. It was really sad. And I didn't know how good my life was."
"I learned what sustainability means. I learned where stuff comes from and how much it effects the earth. I learned about the 7 wonders of the world. I learned about how many people are in extreme poverty."
"I leared in Global Citizenship of poverty, solders and my faverite thing was we heared the song called, 'The priece of Silecen'. I love that song."
"I learned that think about more people than your self! You should think about people in poverty!"
"What I learned in Global Citizenship is that alot of countries that need food, water, and homes. About people that live in the streets, some about people that work looking for trash. I learned too about children that do not go to school."
"I lerd that if you do not take care of the wourld it will go bad."
It's great that you're teaching children these topics!
ReplyDeleteI don't know if you talk about possible solutions, etc., but one organization related to poverty and global citizenship that kids often like learning about (and that gets awesome ratings as a charity) is Heifer International. It operates on the "teach a man to fish" principle:
http://www.heifer.org/site/c.edJRKQNiFiG/b.3813431/