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Stand With Refugees

Middle, Secondary

Description

Imagine your life, your home, your livelihood and your community were destroyed in the chaos of conflict or disaster. Imagine you and your family were running for your lives with just the few possessions you could carry. Imagine you took the agonizing decision to flee, only to find wire fences and treacherous seas standing between you and safety. For millions of ordinary people, these unimaginable situations have become a daily reality. Fleeing conflict and disaster pushes people into poverty. For people already living in poverty, running for your life does not mean leaving hunger, sickness and hardship behind

It can be challenging to explore these issues in the classroom. Walk With Refugees helps students think critically about the reasons why some people are forced to flee and to recognize the many links and commonalities between the lives of those forced to flee and their own.

The resource consists of three sections:

  • Exploring Images
  • Using Video to Develop Empathy
  • Interpreting Data
conflict or disaster. Imagine you and your family were running for your lives with just the few
possessions you could carry. Imagine you took the agonising decision to flee, only to find wire
fences and treacherous seas standing between you and safety.
For millions of ordinary people, these unimaginable situations have become a daily reality. Fleeing
conflict and disaster pushes people into poverty. For people already living in poverty, running for
your life does not mean leaving hunger, sickness and hardship be

Imagine your life, your home, your livelihood and your community were destroyed in the chaos of conflict or disaster. Imagine you and your family were running for your lives with just the few possessions you could carry. Imagine you took the agonizing decision to flee, only to find wire fences and treacherous seas standing between you and safety. For millions of ordinary people, these unimaginable situations have become a daily reality. Fleeing conflict and disaster pushes people into poverty. For people already living in poverty, running for your life does not mean leaving hunger, sickness and hardship behind

It can be challenging to explore these issues in the classroom. Walk With Refugees helps students think critically about the reasons why some people are forced to flee and to recognize the many links and commonalities between the lives of those forced to flee and their own.

The resource consists of three sections:

  • Exploring Images
  • Using Video to Develop Empathy
  • Interpreting Data

 

General Assessment

What skills does this resource explicitly teach?

The lessons help students use and improve their skills of enquiry, questioning and analysis. They also encourage and support habits of critical thinking.

Strengths

Migration has become one of the great issues of the day. Increasing numbers of people are fleeing conditions that are intolerable and their numbers are likely to grow as a result of the impact of climate change. Governments are struggling with the question of how to respond to this vast migration. The topic is therefore of critical concern.

The resource adopts a pedagogy that avoids telling students what they should know in favor of providing them with useful resources in the form of pictures, videos and data so that they might construct their own understanding of the issue.

Recommendation of how and where to use it

The resource has relevance for those units of study dealing with human rights, global citizenship, and geopolitics. it would also be of interest in media studies classes where students are investigating the power of media such as pictures and film.

Relevant Curriculum Units

The following tool will allow you to explore the relevant curriculum matches for this resource. To start, select a province listed below.

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  • Alberta
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    • Grade 8
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      • Math
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        • Knowledge and Employability: Statistics and Probability
        • Statistics and probability
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        • Knowlege And Employability: Statistics and Probability
  • British Columbia
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    • Grade 8
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      • English/Language Arts
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        • Questioning what we hear, read, and view contributes to our ability to be educated and engaged citizens.
    • Grade 9
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      • English/Language Arts
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        • Exploring stories and other texts helps us understand ourselves and make connections to others and to the world.
        • People understand text differently depending on their worldviews and perspectives.
        • Questioning what we hear, read, and view contributes to our ability to be educated and engaged citizens.
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        • Analyzing the validity, reliability, and representation of data enables us to compare and interpret.
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        • People & Places in the World: Global Quality of Life
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        • Analyzing the validity, reliability, and representation of data enables us to compare and interpret.
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        • Citizenship 9: Engaged Citizenship
        • Citizenship 9: Global Citizenship
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        • Knowledge and Employability: Statistics and Probability
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      • Math
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        • Knowlege And Employability: Statistics and Probability
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      • Geography
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        • Issues in Canadian Geography (Academic): Liveable Communities
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        • Interdependence: Atlantic Canada in the Global Community: Human Rights in the Global Community
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        • Statistics and probability
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        • The Contemporary World: Wealth
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        • The Individual in Canadian Society: Interaction & Interdependence of Nations
  • Yukon Territory
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    • Grade 8
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      • English/Language Arts
        • Step 4Relevant matches
        • Questioning what we hear, read, and view contributes to our ability to be educated and engaged citizens.
    • Grade 9
      • Step 3Select a subject
      • English/Language Arts
        • Step 4Relevant matches
        • Exploring stories and other texts helps us understand ourselves and make connections to others and to the world.
        • People understand text differently depending on their worldviews and perspectives.
        • Questioning what we hear, read, and view contributes to our ability to be educated and engaged citizens.

Themes Addressed

Human Rights (2)

  • Refugees and Immigration
  • Social Justice

Sustainability Education Principles

Principle Rating Explanation
Consideration of Alternative Perspectives Good

Walk With Refugees is intended to raise awareness of the push and pull factors that have created the world's forcibly displaced population and to develop empathy for the plight of refugees. The activities, however, are designed to support the teacher's efforts rather than guide it. Students are presented with pictures and data and open-ended questions that allow them to come to their own perceptions of the issue.

Consideration of Alternative Perspectives:
  • Satisfactory: absence of bias towards any one point of view
  • Good: students consider different points of view regarding issues, problems discussed
  • Very good: based on the consideration of different views, students form opinions and  take an informed position
Multiple Dimensions of Problems & Solutions Very Good

Students investigate the many reasons why people migrate between countries. These reasons can be classified as economic, social, political or environmental. Some people choose to migrate to another country to enhance their career opportunities. Some people are forced to migrate due to war or famine. Refugees and asylum seekers fall into this second category of forced migration.

Multiple Dimensions of Problems & Solutions:

Effectively addresses the environmental, economic and social dimensions of the issue(s) being explored.

  • Satisfactory: resource supports the examination of  these dimensions
  • Good:  resource explicitly examines the interplay of these dimensions
  • Very Good:  a systems-thinking approach is encouraged to examine these three dimensions
Respects Complexity Good

The combination of pictures, videos and data help students explore the experience of the refugee, to question their assumptions, to compare their lives with those of the refugees, and to think about why refugees leave their homes, what challenges they face, and how welcoming Canada is to those seeking asylum.

Respects Complexity:

The complexity of the problems/issues being discussed is respected.

Acting on Learning Satisfactory

The resource is intended to raise awareness and understanding of the refugee crisis rather than have students take action. Such awareness and understanding are, however, a prerequisite to informed action. Since the resource has been produced by Oxfam, there is opportunity for interested students to contact that  agency if interested in acting on their knowledge. 

Acting on Learning:

Learning moves from understanding  issues  to working towards positive change — in personal lifestyle, in school, in the community,  or for the planet

  • Satisfactory: action opportunities are included as extensions 
  • Good: action opportunities are core components of the resource
  • Very Good: action opportunities for students are well supported and intended to result in observable, positive change
Values Education Very Good

Discussion of the refugee crisis and our response raise questions of justice, fairness, ethics, and individual and collective responsibility.

Values Education:

Students are explicitly provided with opportunities to identify, clarify and express their own beliefs/values.

Empathy & Respect for Humans Very Good

The activities associated with the exploration of images helps students identify with the plight of the refugee while the video section in telling the stories of refugee children serves to develop students empathy for others.

Empathy & Respect for Humans: Empathy and respect are fostered for diverse groups of humans (including different genders, ethnic groups, sexual preferences, etc.).
Personal Affinity with Earth Poor/Not considered

The resource is focused on the struggles and challenges facing people who are forced to flee their homes and our common humanity.

Personal Affinity with Earth:

Encourages a personal affinity with -the natural world.  

  • Satisfactory: connection is made to the natural world
  • Good: fosters appreciation/concern for the natural world
  • Very Good: fosters stewardship though practical and respectful experiences out-of-doors 
Locally-Focused Learning Good

Refugees come from elsewhere but they arrive here. Although the resource is a UK one, students can investigate Canada's response to the refugee crisis and the response of their community. Local refugee organizations may be contacted to gain further insight into the refugee experience. 

Locally-Focused Learning:

Includes learning experiences that take advantage of issues/elements within the local community. 

  • Satisfactory: learning is made relevant to the lives of the learners
  • Good: learning is made relevant and has a local focus
  • Very Good: learning is made relevant, local and takes place ‘outside’ , in the community 
Past, Present & Future Good

The world is experiencing a mass migration of people and this is likely to continue as climate change and other factors force people to migrate.  Potential host countries are debating what their response should be and the issue has and will dominate election debates in these countries. 

Past, Present & Future: Promotes an understanding of the past, a sense of the present, and a positive vision for the future.

Pedagogical Approaches

Principle Rating Explanation
Open-Ended Instruction Good

Students are presented with images, videos, and data along with a number of open-ended questions intended to have them learn of the refugees experience. The resource and the teacher then step back and allow the material to take the students where they choose to go. 

Open-Ended Instruction :

Lessons are structured so that multiple/complex answers are possible; students are not steered toward one 'right' answer.

Integrated Learning Good

A study of the refugee crisis will pull in a number of disciplines. What are the economic factors, the political conditions, the environmental elements that push refugees to flee their homelands? What part does the refugee crisis play in national elections? What are the ethical that should inform our response?

Integrated Learning:

Learning brings together content and skills  from more than one  subject area

  • Satisfactory: content from a number of different  subject areas is readily identifiable
  • Good:  resource is appropriate for use in more than one subject area
  • Very Good:  the lines between subjects are blurred 
Inquiry Learning Good

The resource asks students to consider a number of questions. Why do refugees flee their homes? What stories would refugees tell if asked of their experience? What are the facts and figures around displaced people and refugees? Students arrive at their own answers to these questions by looking, reading, discussing and analyzing the material presented in the resource.

Inquiry Learning:

Learning is directed by questions, problems, or challenges that students work to address.   

  • Satisfactory: Students are provided with questions/problems to solve and some direction on how to arrive at solutions.
  • Good: students, assisted by the teacher clarify the question(s) to ask and the process to follow to arrive at solutions.  Sometimes referred to as Guided Inquiry
  • Very Good:  students generate the questions and assume much of the responsibility for how to solve them.  . Sometimes referred to as self-directed learning.

 

Differentiated Instruction Very Good

Students gain an understanding of the refugee issue by exploring images, responding to videos, analyzing data and sharing their interpretations with classmates.

Differentiated Instruction:

Activities address a range of student learning styles, abilities and readiness.

  • Satisfactory:  includes a variety of instructional approaches
  • Good: addresses  the needs of visual, auditory &  kinesthetic learners
  • Very Good: also includes strategies for learners with difficulties
Experiential Learning Good

Students gain an understanding of the refugee experience by interpreting pictures, listening to refugees describe their struggles in video clips and by analyzing data  that helps understand who the refugees are, where they come from, and in what numbers.

Experiential Learning:

Authentic learning experiences are provided

  • Satisfactory: learning takes place through ‘hands-on’ experience or simulation
  • Good: learning involves direct experience in a ‘real world context’
  • Very good: learning involves ‘real world experiences’ taking place’ beyond the school walls.
Cooperative Learning Satisfactory

Each of the activities encourage students to cooperate in interpreting what they see and hear and to share their impressions and understandings.

Cooperative Learning:

Group and cooperative learning strategies are a priority.

  • Satisfactory:  students work in groups
  • Good: cooperative learning skills are explicitly taught and practiced
  • Very Good: cooperative learning skills are explicitly taught, practiced and assessed
Assessment & Evaluation Satisfactory

There are no summative evaluation strategies included in the resource and teachers would have to assess student understanding of the material by the students responses to the questions explored.

Assessment & Evaluation: Tools are provided that help students and teachers to capture formative and summative information about students' learning and performance. These tools may include reflection questions, checklists, rubrics, etc.
Peer Teaching Satisfactory

Some of the activities require students to work in groups and share their findings and perspectives.

Peer Teaching:

Provides opportunities for students to actively present their knowledge and skills to peers and/or act as teachers and mentors.

  • Satisfactory: incidental teaching that arises from cooperative learning, presentations, etc.
  • Good or Very Good: an opportunity is intentionally created to empower students to teach other students/community members. The audience is somehow reliant on the students' teaching (students are not simply ‘presenting')
Case Studies Good

Section 2 of the resource uses videos to develop empathy for the plight of refugees. One of these consists of three short animations from UNICEF that tells the story of three refugee children. In another, from World Vision, children share the story of their journey by plane, boat and walking from Iraq to reach the border of Serbia and Croatia.

Case Studies:

Relevant case studies are included.  Case studies are thorough descriptions of real events from real situations that students use to explore  concepts in an authentic context.

Locus of Control Good

Each of the three units includes open-ended questions to help students consider the implications of the pictures they are viewing, the videos they are watching and the data they are analyzing without limiting the direction of such questions. The resource also includes links to other material that encourage further investigation of the issue.

Locus of Control: Meaningful opportunities are provided for students to choose elements of program content, the medium in which they wish to work, and/or to go deeper into a chosen issue.