Can you do anything about it?

What do I want to find out?

Find out about pupils´ attitudes towards participation in local and global issues, and about their willingness to take action.

What do I need?

• A worksheet for each pupil with three local and global scenarios chosen from the selection below (These can be modified to reflect your local context).
• A recording sheet for the alternative “four corners” activity.

What do I do?

Timing: 10 minutes

• Give each pupil a copy of the worksheet
• Ask them to mark one option on the scale showing how they could affect each problem.
• Ask them to justify their choice.
• Collect the worksheets.

Scenarios

In your school they are about to close down all food facilities (dining room, canteen) for financial reasons. Can you do anything about it?

In your neighbourhood they want to open a casino. Can you do anything about it?

In your neighbourhood they want to replace the existing park with a multi-storey car park. Can you do anything about it?

Fly tipping is taking place on the outskirts of your town. Can you do anything about it?

The producer of your favourite clothing brand uses child labour. Can you do anything about it?

In rural areas of Afghanistan there are not enough primary schools for girls. Can you do something about it?

In the media you read about an unlawful arrest of a Chinese political activist. Can you do anything about it?

Alternative

• You can read individual statements and ask pupils to stand in one of the corners of the class which will represent the four options in the worksheet.
• After selecting the corner ask them to give reasons for their decision. You may also allow them to change positions based on the discussions and track those changes. This alternative is more interactive but also more difficult to record the results and opinions of students.

How do I analyse the results?

• Evaluation can be done in two ways:
• Record pupils responses for each statement.
• Look for an awareness of opportunities for action for each. Are pupils more likely to feel they can influence local situations over global situations? Do they name any global campaigns? You may want to count the options in two clusters: “active” with expected positive impact (first two options) and “passive” with no impact or no idea for taking action.
• Explore the listed reasons for (not) engaging in specific cases and their categorisation. Are they mostly local or global situations?
• Note whether pupils indentify real barriers to taking action, or whether they feel a sense of apathy or lack knowledge of opportunities.

 How do I measure the change?

• Repeat the activity using an alternative set of statements based on the same criteria.
• Look for changes in the number of pupils believing they can actively contribute to the solution of the situation.
• Notice whether the balance of local to global has shifted. Are pupils more able to see opportunities to make the world a better place?
• Ask pupils what actions or campaigns they have taken part in over the period of your teaching intervention and record this numbers for future audits. You can continue to measure this over a longer period of time