Teaching material
Introduction
Education for peace inevitably requires a dialogue with our own past and society. This means that there needs to be an effort to understand who we have been, the stories that have shaped us, how those stories are interwoven, and how such stories are not always expressed or narrated in the same way. For this reason, education for peace is closely intertwined with matters as vital as identity, memory, and the collective construction of methods to recover and update events, experiences, and memories which have left their mark on the social body.
Similarly, education for peace is a social, historical, and cultural commitment to return to our own past, to expand its possibilities of understanding, and to propose options for overcoming what is inadmissible of it: exclusion, indifference, pain, and the destruction of the other and of ourselves.
Although peace is impossible without the silencing of rifles, education is the only thing that enables its achievement in time: reconciliation, respect for differences, and peaceful coexistence. In this way, through the following didactic sequence, aimed at educators and students in the tenth and eleventh grades, we propose the development of classroom activities around the relationship between identity, memory, narration, and peacebuilding.
It consists of six class sessions, of approximately 45 minutes each, from which we intend to articulate the aforementioned topics. Thus, through the use of different sources and literary and testimonial resources, students are invited to participate in discussions, individual and group tasks, creative writing, and a dramatic work that explores the stories of war, violence, injustice, and justice of our society, all of which also makes it possible to build empathic relationships, establish emotional ties with others, and become aware that we can all assume an active role in the construction of peace.
Next, we present two descriptive tables in which statements of Citizen Competencies and Educational Performance are made explicit through the realization of the present didactic sequence. We thus hope to articulate these activities to an important part of public policy on citizenship education in our country.
Table 3 Basic standards of civic competencies promoted:
Table 4 Proposal of education for peace performances promoted :
Session One - Who am I?
Step 1
Invite the students in your class to discuss the complex and unfinished identification process by which we define ourselves and others. As we know, our identifications (gender, origin, preferences, traits and orientations) are impossible in absolute isolation, that is, they require the presence and absence, and closeness and distance from others. Therefore, our participation in peace initiatives and actions requires a permanent examination of who we are and our relationship with others. In this regard, we suggest that you read aloud, for the whole class, the following text, or that you invite one of your students to do this reading:
In the same boat
Jose Saramago
It wasn't worth worrying about. The sun had just dropped into the ocean when the man with a boat emerged at the end of the dock. He had a bundle in his hand but was alone and looked crestfallen. The cleaning lady went to wait for him on the dock. Before he opened his mouth to find out how the rest of the day had passed, he said,
The man who had a boat (H): Be calm, I bring food for both of you,
The Cleaning Woman (M): And the sailors?
H: As you can see, none came,
M: But you left them praised, at least,
H: They told me that there are no longer unknown islands, and that, even if there were, they were not going to leave the peace of their lands and the good life of the ships of the line to get into ocean adventures, in search of the impossible, as if we were still in the time of the dark sea,
M: And you didn't tell them about the unknown island,
H: How could I tell you about an unknown island, if I don't know it,
M: But you have the certainty that it exists,
H: As much as the sea is dark,
M: At this moment, seen from here, with the jade-coloured waters and the sky like a fire, I can't find anything dark about it,
H: It is an illusion of yours - the islands seem to fluctuate on the waters, but it is not true,
M: What are you planning to do, if you lack a crew,
H: I still don't know,
M: We could stay and live here, I would offer to wash the boats that come to the dock, and you,
H: And me?
M: You would have a trade, a profession, as they say now,
H: I have, I had, I will have, if necessary, but I want to find the unknown island, I want to know who I am when I am on it,
M: You don't know,
H: If you don't get out of yourself, you don't get to know who you are,
M: The king's philosopher, when he had nothing to do, sat next to me, to watch me darn the stockings of the pages, and sometimes he took to philosophizing, he said that every man is an island, but as that was not going with me [...] I didn't care, what do you think?
H: That it is necessary to leave the island to see the island, that we will not see each other if we do not leave ourselves [...] "
The fire in the sky was dying down, the water suddenly acquired a purple colour, and not even the cleaning woman would doubt that the sea really is dark, at least at certain times.
Step 2
After this public reading, ask your students to write individually in their notebook or on a sheet specially prepared for this, their answer to the questions that arise from the following consideration:
The man who had a boat expressed his desire to find the unknown island with an unusual purpose: ‘I want to know who I am when I am on it.’
Why is it so important for some people to learn new things, interact with human beings of various kinds, and travel to unknown places?
What does all this have to do with knowing yourself?
What does the statement made by the man who owned a boat mean to you? ‘If you don’t get out of you, you don’t get to know who you are […] we don’t see each other if we don’t get out of us.’
Step 3
At the end of the proposed writing, organise the class into subgroups of 4 or 5 members with the intention that they read their answers among themselves and share their points of view on the matter.
Step 4
Organise a closing full session in which the members of the different subgroups present the answers to the questions posed, their agreements and disagreements, and their points of view on what it means to think and affirm oneself in relation to others. We suggest that you highlight on the board the most relevant elements exposed by the students; that you make an image in which you emphasise the power of flexible and dynamic ways of seeing ourselves, as well as the risks of more rigid and static postures.
Step 5
To continue the work started in this session, ask your students to carry out the following activity outside of school:
a: Interview a friend who does not belong to the class, a family member, or adult very close to you and take note- write in a notebook or on sheets prepared for it- of the things that you have regarding the following questions:
With which people is it easier to understand each other and why?
With which people is it more difficult to understand each other and why?
b: Search the Internet for images that you can download and print or videos of no more than one minute, or in magazines and newspapers for images that you can cut, in which it is evident:
The ease of understanding between people or groups.
The difficulty or impossibility of understanding between people or groups.
Session Two - Being with others
Step 1
To begin the session, organize subgroups of 4 or 5 students (they can be the same as the previous session or different, according to their preference) in order for them to read their notes from interviews with family or friends regarding the people with whom they are facilitated and with whom it is difficult for them to understand each other. The idea is that from the shared notes each subgroup makes an analysis and summarizes the result of the same in a two-column table in which they highlight:
What things facilitate understanding between people (column 1).
What things hinder or impede understanding between people (column 2).
In a supplementary way, the members of each subgroup will choose, among the different images brought to the class, the two that they consider most representative for each column.
Step 2
Ask a delegate from each subgroup to read aloud the result of the work done. Make a large box on the board and write in two columns the most relevant traits identified by the students in relation to what facilitates and what prevents understanding between people. To give greater support to the elements identified, it would be worthwhile for the students to exemplify these traits with the narration of some of the interviews conducted.
Keep in mind…
By selecting images - photographs, illustrations, drawings, illustrated comics, caricatures, memes or small videos - that represent situations of solidarity, peace and situations of open disagreement, the visual language serves as a support or complement to the conversation of the participants, which tends to facilitate, at the same time, greater connections between social, cultural and aesthetic elements at stake
Step 3
Once you have completed the table with the contributions of the different subgroups, it is time to invite them to paste the selected images on the board next to each column. If any group selects a video, it would have to be arranged in a way to see it next to the other images. Immediately afterwards you can have the subgroups take turns in front and try to see the correspondence between images and words constructed by the whole group. This will certainly give more strength to the characterization performed.
Step 4
At the end of the session it is key that you highlight to your students the collective construction of the conclusions of the entire activity. It is worth noting, among other things, that:
Recognising who we are, as individuals and as members of different social groups, means valuing the elements that we share or have in common with others, as well as those things that differentiate us from others.
Turning our differences and difficulties of understanding with others into absolute, irreconcilable positions often leads to difference, rejection, discrimination and even violence, both in everyday relationships and in the broader social dynamics.
The main challenge, both in the understanding of ourselves and in the construction of peaceful coexistence, consists in a frank and sensitive communication with those people with whom, in principle, it is difficult for us to understand ourselves.
Session Three - The hardest thing is to build
Step 1
Now put forward to your students a discussion about the relationship between memory and narration, based on the reading of the testimony of a young man who has experienced first-hand the consequences of war, that is, the radical expression of violence against women. we as a society must turn the difficulties of understanding into absolute and irreconcilable positions, which presents us with the challenge of building peace based on reconciliation.
Ask one of your students to read the following story aloud and slowly to the whole class:
Step 2
At the end of the reading, organize students into subgroups of 4 or 5. It is important that these are made up of members in whom there is not necessarily a high level of closeness, precisely as a way of putting into practice our ability to communicate and understand each other with those we have less familiarity with. The idea is that each subgroup elects one of its members to take note of the most relevant aspects of the following questions:
Taking into account what Diego Fernando recounted, review and highlight all the difficulties you have had to face.
What personality traits and contextual circumstances have allowed you to overcome these difficulties?
What things do you think make you an agent of change and peacebuilding? Why?
Keep in mind…
Giving each subgroup a copy of Diego Fernando’s story can facilitate the students’ work around their testimony.
Step 3
Now it is time to share the results of the work done in subgroups. It encourages all the subgroups to present their views on the issues raised in plenary. It is key that you highlight their contributions, giving special priority to the points of view around the question about Diego Fernando’s role as an agent of change and a builder of peace. To close the activity, we suggest you take into account the following approaches:
Peace is not built alone, it requires social commitment, a sense of responsibility and the cooperation of others: people, organizations.
The artistic creation: imagination, resourcefulness, expressiveness, are an inexhaustible source in the construction of peace.
Colloquially it is often said: "destroying is easy, what is difficult is building." Something similar happens with peace: it requires creativity, a sustained effort over time, commitment, and perseverance
Step 4
In order to continue this activity, ask your students to search the printed press or the internet for a real and relatively current story of a person, a family, or a community that has suffered the consequences of war or situations of extreme violence in our country.
Divide the class evenly into two parts. The idea is that one part directs its search to stories in which the victims did not obtain or have not yet obtained justice, while the other half focuses their efforts on finding stories in which sooner or later justice was done for the people involved. It may be relevant that you suggest that students look for stories that involve different protagonists, even different from those that appear in Diego Fernando's story. Each student must cut or print the chronicle, column, or testimony found, a fundamental input for the development of the following sessions.
Keep in mind...
It is essential not to include stories from people known to the school actors, in order to maintain respect for their privacy and not incur the risk of re-victimization.
Session four - Between stories and roles: impunity and justice
Step 1
You can start the session with an open dialogue around the stories selected by your students. Allow them to freely comment on the most relevant facts of the stories brought to class. This report will often mix stories of impunity with stories in which justice was finally done
Step 2
It is time to organize students into teams of 4 or 5, taking into account the criteria raised above, that is, that those who brought stories to class with an unjust ending (groups A) and those who brought stories with a just ending (groups B) are grouped together. To do this, you can suggest that they organize themselves according to the similarities between the newly socialized stories, in a way that makes it easier and more comfortable for them to work. Once gathered, the members of each group will choose among the stories brought to class the one that is most interesting to them.
Step 3
Now present to your students the basic guidelines that we propose below, so that the stories chosen by each of the groups (A and B) inspire the development of the script for a short theatrical performance (scene of 5 to 7 minutes). Said script may contemplate some or all of the elements presented below:
Characterization of the central characters of the story: personality traits, ways of expressing themselves, of dressing etc.
Creation of new characters (with their own characteristics).
Definition of a narrator that serves as a common thread to the script.
Appropriation of the situation represented.
Composition of a basic scenography in which the events take place.
Keep in mind...
Converting an article or journalistic chronicle into a theatrical performance means making a story pass from one literary genre to another, so activity itself is an invitation to explore the imagination and expressive freedom of the students.
It is important that students have at least one week to work as a team both in the development of the script and in the preparation of its dramatization. In this regard, the following guidelines can be very useful: Guidelines for drama and dramatization.
For the elaboration of the script:
Synopsis: what the work is about - what the situation is that is going to be represented and in what time and context it unfolds.
Technical file of the work: name of the work: author (s); name of the theater group; members; director (s); actors and / or actresses; music (if required); costumes, scenery and lighting (if required).
Characters.
Development of the work: includes the brief description of the environment in which the representation takes place (this is called annotation) and the dialogues of the characters. In case it is only about corporal expression (e.g. dance or mime), the dialogues can be replaced by a description of the movements of the characters on stage.
For the dramatization:
Role distribution (direction, performance, technical support). Rehearsal of the scene that will be represented in class: dialogues, turns, movements, among others.
At the close of the session, it is important that you deliver to each of the subgroups a copy of the format that contains said guidelines (Annex 3), as well as an example of a scene, taken from a contemporary Colombian theater play, which illustrates the proposed structure (Annex 4). For the following sessions, it is essential that the first of the dramatizations is carried out by subgroups A, that is, those who are in charge of stories of injustice and impunity (session 5) and that those in which it occurred otherwise - subgroups B - (session 6) follow. This will help, in closing the whole sequence, to emphasize the relationship between the achievement of justice and the construction of peace.
Keep in mind...
It is not necessary to be an expert in dramatic arts to guide the writing of theater scenes and the staging of them by students. Nor is it essential that they learn written dialogues by heart. In their dramatizations there should be room for improvisation or for reading their parts aloud.
Session five - The moment of drama
Step 1
You can start the session by establishing in agreement with the students the order in which the dramatizations will be carried out. These can be carried out in any of the school facilities (theatre, auditorium, library, others) or in the classroom itself, so as to make it possible to easily adapt the space, ensure the comfort of the whole class, and the agility of the presentations.
Step 2
It is the moment of the dramatizations. Emphasize the need for the class to pay due attention to each and every one of them. It is worth bearing in mind that it is not a talent show and that the most relevant thing is the effort in the preparation, adaptation, and staging of the dramatized stories.
Step 3
When all the groups scheduled for this session have completed their performances on stories of war and violence which led to impunity and injustice, we suggest you organize a plenary discussion based on issues such as:
How did you feel embodying characters involved in situations of injustice, a product of war and violence in our country? This should be specifically addressed to members of groups A.
How do these stories - represented - affect the society in which we live and of which we are part? - addressed to the whole class.
By the end of the session, you could highlight the main elements expressed by your students regarding these questions, make a general balance on this first part of the activity and maintain favourable expectations about the stories that will be dramatized in the next class.
Session 6 - The country is with justice
Step 1
As in the previous session, begin by establishing with the students the order in which the role-plays will take place. You can take the opportunity to give some indications regarding organization, as a result of the experience acquired in the previous class. By this time there should be clarity about the convenience of maintaining the same scenario or defining one more in line with this type of presentation.
Step 2
It is the turn of the dramatizations of the stories of subgroups B, that is, of the scenes that represent, in some way, the performance of justice, the reparation of the victims, or the reconciliation between the parties involved.
Step 3
Once the totality of the subgroups has made their representations publicly, it is necessary to move on to deliberation and collective construction of conclusions. To facilitate the closing of the didactic sequence of education for peace, in this last plenary session, we suggest you ask your students the following questions:
How did you feel embodying characters involved in situations resulting from war and violence in our country, in which justice, reparation for the victims, or reconciliation between the parties involved was finally obtained? This should be specifically addressed to members of groups B.
Based on the activities carried out, what relationships can you establish between identity, memory, the achievement of justice, and the construction of peace?
How can each of the participants in this activity - and in the entire didactic sequence - contribute to building peace, both at school and outside of it? What kind of commitments and specific actions are you willing to take to join this collective desire?
Keep in mind...
If there is enough motivation on the part of the students, it might be worth considering carrying out this activity in settings other than the classroom, for example, in a school cultural event or outside of it (culture house, museum, libraries public, others), with the assistance of parents, friends, neighbors or a wider public. To do this, you could either make a special presentation of some of the scenes dramatized in class, or a montage in which these scenes are articulated in a single play.
Tips for evaluation
Keep in mind that in this part of the work the idea is not to classify the students according to who made the best contributions or who made exactly what was asked of them and who did not. Rather it is a persuasive pedagogical strategy, in relation to the paths and vital possibilities that are not open to everyone when we actively participate in the construction of peaceful, just and inclusive environments. Therefore, the best result is a good process, carried out with expectation, sensitivity, joy, and commitment. In this way, we suggest that you consider, especially, the level of involvement of your students in the face of the challenges posed: individual writing, group work in the classroom, the search for information, the completion of tasks and their participation in each of the activities, spaces for deliberation and construction of agreements.
If the development of this sequence of activities allows the participants to gain respect for themselves and mutual respect; if it also contributes to all elements to understand our role as builders of peace in the society of which we are part, then this proposal as a whole, and your effort in its development, will have been worth it.
