|
|
|
Citizenship at key stages 1 and 2 (Year 1-6)
Unit 05: Living in a diverse world
Section 2: What are communities like?
|
|
Objectives |
| Children should learn: |
- about different communities, including family and school
- to discuss and communicate their feelings and opinions about their communities
- to recognise and respect diversity within their communities
- to work in pairs or small groups to share their views
|
Activities |
|
Outcomes |
|
Children: |
- As part of a circle time session, ask the children to come up with words that describe the things they like and dislike about school, eg happy, sad, quiet, noisy, fun, boring.
- The children investigate the ways in which their school is part of a wider community. In pairs or small groups, they talk about what the school is like and what they like and dislike about it. Then ask them to imagine that they are writing a letter/e-mail to describe their school community to someone in another country. What would they say? Encourage the children to think about the school's location, the different members of the community (including teachers, pupils, lunchtime/playtime supervisors and other staff), the uniform, activities and lessons, rules, the food, links with the local community, etc. This could be done as part of a school-linking project. Then, reflecting on the discussions in the previous section, the class make a list of the other communities and groups to which they belong, eg class, school, family, the suburb/town/village where the school is located, clubs, religious communities. It is important that the children begin to recognise that there are some communities to which we all belong and some that only certain people are members of.
- Ask the children to draw a picture of a home (their own or a home from a story they know). They stick their picture onto a larger sheet of paper, and write some words, including their feelings about the word 'home', around the border. The children then compile the pictures to make a whole-class display, collage or montage. In groups or as a class, they discuss the similarities and differences between the different homes and the words used. They consider what they like and dislike about their homes. What words did they use? What would they like to change about their homes?
- Invite other children or family/community members from different regional, cultural, ethnic or religious backgrounds to speak to the class. They may also be able to help arrange visits to places of worship, eg churches, chapels, mosques, synagogues, temples, or other important sites.
|
|
- discuss and express their feelings using appropriate language
- recognise and respect each other's needs and differences
- recognise and respect diversity within their local community
- understand that they belong to different groups and communities, including school and family
|
|
Points to note |
- Be aware that some children will have negative as well as positive feelings towards their home. It is therefore very important to reinforce the class ground rules (see page 49 of the Teacher's guide) and to give the children a choice between illustrating their own home and illustrating a fictional one. Another alternative would be to use the family as the focus for this activity.
- Link with geography: this work could be linked with a locality study; 3a-e in the key stage 1 programme of study; 3a-g in the key stage 2 programme of study;
unit 1 'Around our school - the local area',
unit 6 'Investigating our local area' and
unit 18 'Connecting ourselves to the world' in the scheme of work; and with other work on the local community or environment at this key stage.
- School-linking projects are a good way to access comparative information from children at another school. Links could be made with a school in another part of the UK, in another country in Europe, in the Commonwealth, or elsewhere. Children can then exchange letters, e-mails, digital photographs of the local area, etc. Guidelines on establishing links between schools can be obtained from the British Council's Education and Training Group, which also provides information about grants available to UK schools for these projects.
- The school's policy on visitors should be observed (see the guidance on pages 54-55 of the Teacher's guide). In addition, children could establish class rules for guests who come into the classroom, eg 'we value what people bring to our class'.
- Link with history: 2b, 3 in the key stage 2 programme of study.
- Link with RE:
unit 2D 'Visiting a place of worship - generic' in the scheme of work.
|
|
|
This unit is divided into sections. Each section contains a sequence of
activities with related objectives and outcomes. You can view this unit by
moving through the sections or print/download the whole unit.
|
|
|
|
