ACGC Teach Volume 2

A PUBLICATION OF THE ALBERTA COUNCIL FOR GLOBAL COOPERATION

V O L U M E

WINTER 2012

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Educator Profile: Jennifer Lasychuk Jennifer is an innovative and passionate teacher that ACGC is delighted to have the opportunity to work with!

She is a teacher at Leduc Composite High School where she creates daily opportunities to a is g Teachin challenge her stuer dents with pracre ca g in g n le very chal tices that proon’t mote becoming a because you d r u yo global citizen. ily witness

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necessar nce. I Meeting with work or influe r Jennifer, it is e h ac te believe every easy to see her a differenthusiasm for wants to make bringing global e th in is it ence, whether op p ort u n it ies r on a o d il to her class, ch a f o fe li linking the Alg in h ac re grander scale, berta curricu-

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lum and passion for a better world.

Jennifer believes students need to be, and are capable of being, active and engaged citizens. Her dedicated work with the other teachers at Leduc

orld. out into the w

Composite strives to provide students with creative opportunities and challenges.

This past year, Leduc Composite hosted their second annual nongovernment organization (NGO) fair, created by the grade 10s. This year, the event had more than 40 booths representing various national and international NGOs. Each year, Jennifer’s grade 12s define, plan, execute and reflect on their Shake the World project, aiming for the various levels of citizen participation. Jennifer states that through these projects, most students achieve empathy and find they care, while others demonstrate the courage to act and participate in the community.

and international communities.

Whether it is volunteering in a seniors’ centre, tutoring ESL students in conversational English, or expressing their passionate opinion in the newspaper, Jennifer sees her students making a positive move to contribute to the world.

Jennifer says, “my students are reaching out and in the words of Mohandas Gandhi “shaking the world”.”

Jennifer explains that the philosophy at Leduc Composite is to provide a foundation in responsible citizenship. The goal is to engage students in the world, opening their future up to giving back to the world, creating an impact on local, national

Development in a Box—Elementary After a very successful response to Development in a Box grade 7-12, ACGC is pleased to launch Development in a Box GRADES 1-6!

Designed as a toolkit for educators, Development in a Box aids in the incorporation of global citizenship issues into the Alberta curriculum and classroom. The resources

in Development in a Box grades 1-6 include lesson plans, hands-on activities, as well as connections to local organizations working both locally and globally to address social justice issues. The themes include: Poverty, Water, Global Citizenship, Peace Studies, Environmental Sustainability and Taking Action on Global Issues. Visit acgc.ca/teach to sign your school up for a free kit today!

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Educational Opportunities!

Announcing the 2012 Change your World Youth Leadership Tour!

Schools participating in the Development in a Box program can nominate one outstanding s t u d e n t (presently enrolled in grade 9-12) to participate in this incredible opportunity.!

Women working in Yurac Yacu, Peru

Students will travel to Peru for two weeks (Approximately July 29th August 10th) to experience first hand international development work being conducted by Alberta organizations in collaboration with project partners.

ACGC is working with Sombrilla International Development Society this year to host this opportunity.

Nominations are due by March 16th and selected participations will be notified by the week of April 6th.

Upon returning to Canada, the students will work with ACGC to develop a presentation that they will share with Alberta schools—sharing their experiences and what they learned. More information is available at www.acgc.ca/teach To see some of the students’ reflections from the 2010 tour to Ethiopia visit their blog changeyourworldtour.blogspot.com/

Change 2012 —Y Your World outh L Tour is a eadership ccep nominat ting ions!

Visit acg c.ca/teac h for more info rmation! or visit ACGC’s YouTube channel to see the video that was produced with the students about their experiences in Ethiopia.

Education project in Yurac Yacu, Peru

John Humphrey Centre Ignite Change Now!: Program for Youth A ten-week program for youth for Exploration, Awareness buildSKILLS DEVELOPMENT: Dealing with conflict coning, and Skills development, leading to Engagement. structively and facilitating discussions are critical skills for The Ignite Change Now! Program is delivered each week over 10 today’s youth. This component creates skills for facilitaweeks for a minimum of two hours and works well when youth tion, conflict resolution, and public presentation in a are from diverse backgrounds enriching the experience as they peaceful space focusing on building self-esteem and confibuild bridges and common understands. This workshop builds dence. citizenship and community engagement and fosters positive reacENGAGEMENT: Finally, this component offers an awetion among diverse youth in 4 “EAS-E” steps! some opportunity for youth to put their newfound skills EXPLORATION: Through the use of art and photography, to use through service-learning. There are two ways to do youth explore issues that matter to them in the local community. this, depending on level of interest and capacity: This component sets the tone for the rest of the workshop as Collaboration: youth collaborate on a plan to adthe issues that the youth determine are most important and dress critical issues in schools i.e. racism, raising meaningful are explored in the next sessions. awareness the critical issue for their peers.

Dialogues: working with the JHC, youth deliver faciliAWARENESS BUILDING: Taking those issues Explored, this tated racism dialogues with their school peers. component engages local organizations, community members and the youth to critically reflect and dialogue about issues within a human rights framework using experiential exercises. Youth also Both streams give youth the tangible experience they need engage with issues about racism understand the impact of racism to further their careers! www.jhcentre.org/ then find common ground.

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A teacher’s gift… time Last year my principal offered me a remarkable gift…TIME! Not an extra prep or release from supervision, but one class a week with one grade nine Social Studies class “to enrich the curriculum with whatever I’d always wanted to do”.

Without hesitation, I thought of the “Development in a Box” sitting on my back counter, a kit chocker box full of engaging and enriching encounters!

To start the term off and as a way of assessing whether the students would relate to the outstanding activities in the kit, I invited speakers from ACGC and Amnesty International to make presentations to the class and had the students provide reactions and reflections on these presentations in their response journals. Both speakers were applauded for their insight and for their potential impact on the quality of life of others.

More importantly, students recognized that things that we take for granted

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By Heather S. Chorley, Social Studies Team Leader Dan Knott Junior High, Edmonton

such as clean water and freedom of expression are not enjoyed globally and that they might be able to do something to help others achieve these things.

By the end of the first month, students paired themselves up, selected one of the plethora of NGO—prepared activities, organized a schedule, and began planning, researching, preparing, and presenting lessons regarding issues facing communities in developing countries. These topics included sanitation, resource development, access to health care, education, housing, transportation, lack of infrastructure, disease (AIDS), sexism, ethnic discrimination, democratic and individual rights, and micro-financing. Soon, games, PowerPoints, panel discussions, debates, videos, spreadsheets, graphs, and posters took over the class. The student engagement was beyond belief!

What did I do? Booked computer labs, copied materials, assessed journal responses and issue papers generated from the presentations and moderated the intense dialogue that inevitably occurred as students proposed their opinions about the BEST way to help improve the quality of life of citizens in our global community.

The gift my principal offered me may have been a once in a life time opportunity, and a Social Studies teacher’s dream, but I would highly recommend that if you have time for just one of the lessons in “Development in a Box”, seize it!

Canadian Women for Women in Afghanistan Making the Right to Read a Reality in Afghanistan CW4WAfghan’s projects focus exclusively on education, from our training of teachers to running adult literacy classes. Yet, the absence of books is a serious barrier to improved literacy even where there is training available. One major initiative is to distribute books to various sites across the country.

The Afghanistan Centre at Kabul University (ACKU) works with Afghan professors to write, illustrate and publish high quality books for new readers on a variety of topics, from animal husbandry to history to poetry. This is unique in a country largely lacking a publishing industry, and where access to reading material is extremely limited. CW4WAfghan purchases the Box

Change for Children Association

Libraries from the ACKU to equip schools with their first library, as well as the village library and literacy centres.

Would your school like to partner with CW4WAfghan to help create a much needed library? A small library (210 book) costs $750.00. while a large library (500 book) is $1,500.00.

CW4WAfghan also has a free downloadable Resource Kit for Canadian Educators: Understanding Human Rights in Afghanistan: An Educators' Resource. www.cw4wafghan.ca

Tools for Schools: The World is Our Classroom

This is an online section dedicated to sharing ideas and tools created by and for teachers and students in the Change for Children community who are learning about the issues, and contributing to the solutions, in CFCA's international projects. We encourage you to use the resources, follow these examples, or come up with your own approach and champion a project in your own way. www.changeforchildren.org

Tips for your student group!

Every project relies on resources for its success and these can come in a variety of different forms. Try utilizing the resources below to enhance the great work your group is doing!

People Resources  Gather volunteers! The more people who are involved, the greater your reach.  Look for people who can assist your group by sharing their expertise, skills and knowledge. Their unique skills can take your project to the next level!  Invite people with lived experience to share their stories with your group. This may help you to better understand the issues and your role.

Connective Resources  Networking with organizations that are established is an important way to build lasting connections. Tap into the existing networks of these organizations and build alliances with individuals, communities and groups.  Connect with media sources! They’re a fantastic method of spreading your message and your work. Plus, you can stay informed about what is happening locally and globally around the issue(s) that you’re passionate about.

Material Resources  Do some research into local businesses that might be interested in sponsoring some of the work you’re doing. There’s never any harm in asking!  Grants and scholarships are available for all sorts of projects. Get on the internet and research what’s out there!

Remember, one of the greatest resources your group can develop are lasting relationships, which help to ensure that your project is well supported and sustainable in the long term.

www.acgc.ca/teach ACGC can be contacted at:

What’s your school doing?

Suite 205, 10816A-82 Avenue Edmonton, Alberta T6E 2B3 Phone: 780-988-0200 | Fax: 780-988-0211 diana@acgc.ca Follow us on:

Share your activities with us and see your school profiled in our next ACGC teach newsletter! diana@acgc.ca

ACGC Teach is published by the Alberta Council for Global Cooperation with the financial assistance of the Canadian International Development Agency

ACGC CURRENT MEMBERSHIP JAN 2012 Action International Ministries ˑ Alberta Public Interest Research Group ˑ Altamas for Peace and Development Associationˑ Association of Canadian Peacemakers International ˑ Awaso Canadian Academy Foundation ˑ Bridges of Hope International Network of Development Agencies ˑ Canada World Youth ˑ Canadian Association for Participatory Development ˑ Canadian Catholic Organization for Development and Peace ˑ Canadian Crossroads International ˑ Canadian Department of Peace Initiative ˑ Canadian Humanitarian ˑ Canadian Women for Women in Afghanistanˑ CaroCanadians Reaching Out to the World's Children Foundation ˑ CAUSE Canada ˑ CEIBA Association ˑ Centre for Affordable Water and Sanitation Technology ˑ Centre for Global Citizenship Education and Research ˑ Change for Children ˑ CHF ˑ Covenant International Ministry ˑ CUSO-VSO ˑ Engineers Without Borders- Canada ˑ Four Worlds Centre for Development Learning ˑ Ghost River Rediscovery ˑ Global Centre for Outreach Foundation ˑ Global Environmental and Outdoor Education Council ˑ Global Forum Foundation ˑ Helping Youth Through Educational Scholarships ˑ HIV Edmonton ˑ Innovative Canadians for Change ˑ John Humphrey Centre for Peace and Human Rights ˑ Keiskamma Canada Foundation ˑ Lifeline Malawi Association ˑ Light Up the World ˑ Maharashtra Seva Samiti Organization ˑ Marda Loop Justice Film Festival ˑ Mennonite Central Committee Alberta ˑ Micah Centre ˑ One Child's Village ˑ Operation Eyesight Universal ˑ Optometry Giving Sight ˑ Oxfam Canada ˑ Project Shelter Wakadogoo ˑ Racecourse Community School Fundraising Initiative ˑ Rainbow for the Future ˑ Rainbow of Hope for Children ˑ RESULTS ˑ Sahakarini Inter-World Education & Development Association ˑ Samaritan's Purse Canada ˑ Shastri Indo-Canadian Institute ˑ Somali-Canadian Education & Rural Development Organization ˑ Sombrilla Refugee Support Society ˑ STOP TB Canada ˑ The Canadian Moravian Mission Society ˑ The Human Development Foundation ˑ The Leprosy Mission Canada ˑ The Tamaraneh Society for Community Development and Support ˑ Tools for Schools Africa Foundation ˑ Trickster Theatre ˑ True Vision Ghana ˑ UEnd Foundation ˑ Unisphere Global Research Centre ˑ United Nations Association in Canada - Edmonton Branch ˑ Global Education Program, University of Alberta International ˑ Women's Empowerment International Foundation ˑ World Fit For ChildrenAlberta Chapter ˑ World University Service of Canada ˑ World Vision Canada ˑ