Poverty 2 Prosperity - Challenge Pack

What are these Challenge Packs all about? Approach The methodology behind the Challenge Packs is enquiry-based, allowing pupils to engage with subjects they may have deemed inaccessible, complex or ‘too far removed’ to be concerned with. An enquiry-based approach therefore identifies barriers and creates the potential to remove them; as the teaching and learning is not based on knowledge, but on values and skills. In this sense the teacher, or facilitator, is not dictating facts and asking questions that have a definitive ‘yes/no’ answer, but he/she is allowing pupils to formulate their own questions about subjects and attempt to answer them by listening to other view points, and by critically examining what evidence they have to make a decision. Many of the activities, within the lessons and those offered as extension activities offer themselves as a stimulus for Philosophy for Children . P4C sessions can improve pupils’ abilities to think creatively, critically, caringly and collaboratively. Essentially, pupils ‘learn to learn’ through P4C, by making their learning meaningful and intrinsically desirable, rather than extrinsically motivated. P4C is a powerful, varied, challenging and thorough methodology, which can reinvigorate the teaching and learning experience. A typical session begins with a stimulus, and pupils raise philosophical questions - open questions that can have lots of answers - that the stimulus makes them think about. Pupils vote for the question that they would most like to talk about and this becomes the focus for the enquiry. During the enquiry, the teacher helps the group explore the philosophical concepts underlying the question and uses Socratic questioning to encourage deeper exploration of the ideas presented. During the development of these Challenge Packs there has been much thought and deliberation as to the images used, case studies highlighted and activities themselves, so that stereotypes of, for example, ‘Poverty’ and ‘Africa’ are not reinforced but are challenged. The aim is not merely to present facts about poverty and development because facts soon lose their ‘shock’ factor or emotional charge, and the issues can be written off as ‘over there’, ‘nothing to do with me’. Instead, the images and exemplars have been chosen to spark curiosity, engage pupils by tackling things from a different and new angle, get them to think beyond the literal and look past their existing pre-conceptions and stereotypes. There is enough flexibility in the Challenge Packs for teachers to operate within the framework whilst being able to substitute images or exemplars that have more local relevance, are more current or more appropriate for the specific learning needs of the pupils. Citizenship-rich schools A school that is ‘Citizenship-rich’ is a school with active citizens who are locally and globally aware. These Challenge Packs endeavour to highlight the need for active citizens in any community and how actions and behaviours from one person or one group of people affect others around them, be that directly or indirectly. P2P encourages Citizenship in the school curriculum, culture and community. ‘Schools are well placed to become a focal point for the local community and to foster better relationships between diverse communities. The introduction of the duty on schools to promote community cohesion recognises the good work that many schools are already doing to encourage community cohesion’. (Children’s Plan, DCSF, December 2007) 9