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NZ Secondary Curriculum

This is a selection of resources and ideas for teaching peace and nonviolence.


Please let us know which resources you find helpful – and if there are any that seem less useful for the NZ context.

Let us know about resources that we can add to this list.

Email: education4peace

On this page…

  • A range of social concerns

  • Fair Trade

  • Gender issues

  • Globalisation

  • Indigenous issues

  • Multiculturalism

  • Peace and nonviolence

  • Poverty and inequity

  • Social justice and human rights

  • Sustainability

  • Wars and armed conflicts

A range of social concerns

NEW ENACT – Youth Enabling Action provides links to resources for peace-related issues from the individual to the global level. There is a focus on social actions.

  • The following are some of the topics:
    Bullying
    Disarmament for development
    Environment
    Human rights
    Nonviolence
    Nuclear abolition
    Peacemakers
    Poverty
    Peace and sports

Magazines (pdfs) from Global Focus NZ addressing a wide variety of global topics. An excellent resource, worth searching for what is needed.

  • The following are some of the topics:
    Poverty
    Natural Disasters – What on Earth is Happening?
    Inkling – Youth Voices on Global Issues
    Gender and Culture
    Pandemic – Under the Microscope
    Tourism – What’s The Hook
    Environmental Challenges in the Pacific
    In a World of Debt
    The Global Food Crisis
    Environmental Challenges in the Pacific
    The Olympics – Struggles on and off the field
    Green Wash
    Our Chemical World
    Child Labour
    Climate Change
    Human Rights
    Water – Our Taonga – Te Reo Version
    Water – Our Taonga
    Water
    Government
    Religion
    Refugees
    The People of Aotearoa NZ: Who are we?

World Vision NZ provides a very comprehensive suite of topic sheets addressing social issues relevant to the NZ curriculum as well as related links. Topic sheets cover detailed accessible information, answers to tough questions, the issue internationally and in New Zealand, actions to take.

  • The following are some of the topics:
    A to W listing
    Aid, Aids, Child Labour, Child Rights,
    Child Trafficking, Children of War,
    Debt, Development, Disease, Emergency Relief,
    Environment, 40 Hour Famine,
    Food Security, Gender, Human Trafficking,
    Hunger, Immunisation,
    Landmines, Population, Poverty,
    Refugees, Sustainable Technology,
    Trade, War, Water, Women, World Vision

UNICEF NZ has a range of classroom activities and teacher resources

TakingITGlobal provides links to online resources and tools for a range of social concerns

  • The following are some of the topics:

Peace & Conflict http://issues.tigweb.org/peace
Arms Control
Genocide
Youth Violence

Environment http://issues.tigweb.org/environment
Animal Rights
Climate Change
Sustainable Development

Human Rights http://issues.tigweb.org/humanrights
Child & Youth Rights
Gender Equality
Refugee Rights

Globalisation http://issues.tigweb.org/globalization
Child Labour
Corporate Social Responsibility
Food Security
Labour Rights
Migration
Poverty

Culture http://issues.tigweb.org/culture
Global Citizenship

OXFAM UK provides resources for classroom activities

  • The following are some of the topics:
    Climate Change
    Conflict
    Fair Trade
    Food
    Global Food Crisis
    Human Rights
    Water

The Global ED Yellow Pages – A directory of online global education resources for K-12 teachers

Text for Download – Rethinking Globalization: Teaching for Justice in an Unjust World edited by Bill Bigelow & Bob Peterson 2002

Also access additional related resources

Fair Trade

Audio on This Way Up, RadioNZ National, Saturday 30th July 2011. Interview with Orla Ryan, a journalist who comments about fair trade. Simon Morton to her about her new book ‘Chocolate Nations: Living and Dying for Cocoa in West Africa’. She was “based in Ghana for 2 years working as a journalist for Reuters. Her job was to report on the cocoa trade, a major industry with Ghana producing more than half the word’s cocoa beans.”  (22′05″)

This resource from Classroom Connections in Canada has a number of fair trade activities. Search the document for “fair trade” to find a number of very practical suggestions for the classroom.

It is designed for Grades 10-12 (Canadian system ages 15-18). Many of the exercises and resources relate to the above issues. They might need adapting but they might provide a useful starting point for relevant activities.

Chocolate: A Fair Trade and Human Rights Unit (Grades 6-10). This 30 page booklet is designed for 11-16 year olds and published by Global Education Network, Canada. It contains basic information, lesson planning guide, resources, activities and evaluation.

A range of Fair Trade resources for classroom activities from Oxfam in the UK

Actionaid UK provides information about the differences between free trade and fair trade.

Teaching about Child Labour and Fair Trade: An Educator’s Resource Kit. Download a 16 page booklet published by Developing a Global Perspective for Educators. Contents include websites, books and videos, lesson ideas and curriculum connections.

NEW Articles

A Guardian article – How fair trade can help tackle poverty and bring peace to conflict zones (Fair trade can help communities affected by war and conflict to emerge from poverty and develop sustainably) February 2010

Eat Locally, Act Globally: Fair Trade, Food Sovereignty, and the Food Crisis – Peacework article April 2009

Gender issues

Information on global gender gap

Students will read and discuss “Declaration,” a poem written by a Peace Corps Volunteer serving in South Africa. Students will focus reading and discussion on issues of gender as they appear in the poem.

Globalisation

Global issues related to development and equity and national estimates of peace and wellbeing. A range of topics and reports, including the Global Peace Index.

Indigenous issues

Indigenous Children – Australian Aboriginal Children

Multiculturalism

Israeli and Palestinian Youth to Talk Peace on Reality TV. Excellent news based language activities on the Guardian Weekly website. For ESOL students – and others!

Peace and nonviolence

25 statements. Great to display around the classroom walls.

Facts on the Global Peace Index (GPI) that quantifies the peacefulness of the world’s nations

More about the 2011 Global Peace Index (GPI)

Individual lessons and useful handouts on cultivating peace with the following units: Taking stock, The Power of Knowledge, Why Bother, What’s Possible, Getting Ready and Taking Action – as part of a whole teaching unit.

Poverty and inequity

Do You Really Know What Wealth Is? Students will examine what it means to have wealth—a concept that turns out to be philosophical as well as economic—and examine the importance of music. Based on a story from Mali, Africa. Subject(s): Language Arts & Literature, Social Studies & Geography, Environment & Health, Cross-Cultural Understanding Grade Level(s): 6–8, 9–12

The aim of this activity is to look at ways in which the government might attempt to tackle the problem of poverty in society and to assess the policy options open to the government in attempting to tackle this problem. Site has useful links and resources.

Anti Aids Drugs and Aids 

Student Voices against Poverty

Poverty

Social justice and human rights

Secondary school classroom activities. Access a selection of classroom activities, linked to the New Zealand Curriculum and down-loadable for teachers in editable Word format. Search a library of international resources from Human Rights in Education NZ.

Human Rights Here & Now provides information, classroom activities and lesson plans for Taking Action for Human Rights (Edited by Nancy Flowers, published by Human Rights Education Associates).

http://www1.umn.edu/humanrts/edumat/hreduseries/hereandnow/Default.htm

Amnesty International USA provides a range of teaching guides and lesson plans for human rights education for different education levels.

Unicef – Convention on the Rights of the Child

Rights ED resources for download by the Australian Human Rights Commission

Download resources by learning areas

Social Action Projects for Social Justice – from The Art of Teaching Science Blog, with a companion website by Routledge Publishers.

Social Justice in Action. Practical ideas by those doing social justice work published online by St Vincent de Paul Society, South Australia.

Actions by others

Stories of actions of young people who have made a difference from the My Hero website

Sustainability

TED Talk – Ending Hunger Now (July 2011)

Food Insecurity and Violent Conflict: Causes, Consequences, and Addressing the Challenges
Occasional Paper 24 from the World Food Program

Breathing Earth
A real-time simulation displays the CO2 emissions of every country in the world, as well as their birth and death rates.

The connection between the environment and peace

Facts on world sustainability

How to measure your school’s environmental footprint (It’s Australian)

Lesson plan: Climate change the great debate – natural or human

This site has lessons on sustainability for senior school presented in a grid to allow teachers to click on units they want. Many topics

Water issues

Wars and armed conflicts

War and peace

Resources for: war and armed conflict, understanding conflict, handling conflict, understanding peace, pacifism and others.

Online book: Time to Abolish War – A youth agenda for peace and justice. Resource only.

  • The following are some of the topics:
    Youth and Conflict
    Education for Peace
    Disarmament
    Ban the Bomb
    Landmines
    Small Arms
    Child Soldiers
    International Law and Human Rights
    Economic Justice
    Culture of Peace
    Campaigns
    Contact List

Lesson plans related to world peace and international conflicts.

See World Peace lesson plans for senior school aged 10 years and over. Topics include:

  • Addressing students’ questions in the aftermath of the terrorist attacks
  • Prospects for peace in the Israeli-Palestinian Conflict
  • Peace Brainstorming Activity
  • An Effort to Ban Land Mines
  • 9 steps conflict resolution
  • Peace in the Middle East
  • Peacemaker pop quiz
  • The Nonviolence Grid
  • World At Peace
  • Interconnectedness
  • Feeling Words Chart (resource) (Useful for general writing)
  • Landmine fact sheet (resource)

Landmines

Child soldiers

NEW Children and Armed Conflict

Security Council Report has published a Cross-Cutting Report on Children and Armed Conflict .

“In its fourth Cross-Cutting Report on Children and Armed Conflict Security Council Report continues to track the implementation of Security Council children and armed conflict-related decisions in country-specific situations. In general our research shows that there has been an upward trend in the incorporation of children and armed conflict issues into the country-specific work of the Council, although there are some areas where implementation of key resolutions on children and armed conflict continue to be weak. This report covers key trends over the past year and suggests options for improving Council and Working Group decision-making on this issue. “

Nuclear disarmament

Interactive Lesson plans for raising awareness of nuclear issue, eg Teaching about the bomb, The nuclear fuel cycle, and more.

WW1 and WW2

Study resources for First and Second World Wars. Personal stories included.

International conflicts

This Breaking News English website has news stories for ESOL students (and others) with accompanying exercises. Some articles which may be relevant to the social studies curriculum are Freedom Picnic and Remembering the Holocaust. Excellent current events stories for those with limited reading skills. Also has listening exercises.

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