In June 1992, The United Nations Conference on Environment and Development was held in Rio de Janeiro, Brazil and produced the Rio Declaration. At the same time, The Voice of Children International Campaign, a Norwegian youth organisation, conducted a Children’s Hearing allowing youth to question and appeal to world leaders to consider children’s viewpoints on the important issues being discussed. The first Children’s Hearing took place in Norway in 1990 following the World Commission on Environment and Development. This hearing brought ten Norwegian children before a panel of national figures, including the Norwegian Prime Minister Gro Harlem Brundtland, to express the feelings, opinions, questions and concerns of youth throughout the country in relation to the environment and development.

(Skills)
• Demonstrate a co-operative approach to learning
• Practice active listening
• Develop an ability to participate and express their opinions

(Attitudes)
• Gain ecological awareness and appreciation for Earth as a living system
• Display care for others and the planet

Step 2: Organise students into small groups. The appropriate group size should be determined by the teacher but should ideally be between two and four students per group. Try to make sure that groups are as diverse as possible and gender-balanced (containing an equal number of boys and girls).

Step 3: Hand out one copy of the Children’s Appeal to World Leaders to each group. If copies are not available, an overhead projector can be used to illuminate the Appeal for the whole class. Another option is to write the Appeal on paper or a blackboard placed in a location that can be seen by all.

Step 4: Read the Appeal together as a whole class. Small discussions may arise, but try to save discussion until after the activity. However, any clarifications, such as on the meaning of words, should be addressed before the small group activity.

Step 5: Once the Appeal has been read, ask the groups to discuss together and choose one point from the Appeal that they feel strongly about. Explain that they will be working as a group to create a poster expressing what they think is important about the point they chose. In order to learn more about the content of the Appeal, each group should be encouraged to choose a different point. Groups should be given a specific amount of time to complete the work, depending on how much time is available. (This activity could be limited to one half hour or it could be extended over several class periods. In either case, students should be given a sense of how much time they have to complete the activity.)

Also let the groups know that they should decide among themselves, before they finish, how they will present their poster to the class. For instance, they may want each member of the group to talk about a different part of the poster. Remind students to practice active listening and to try to really hear what the other members of their group have to say. It is very important that the voice of all students be heard, just like the class is hearing the voice of the students who created the Appeal. If at any point they are not clear what is being said in the group, they should respectfully ask the person speaking to clarify. (This type of communication may take some practice and should always be modelled by the teacher.)

Step 6: Monitor small group activity and help out where needed. Give students at least a ten-minute warning before the activity will end. Remind them to prepare how they will present their poster, who will speak, in what order, etc. Everyone is encouraged to speak, but no student should be forced to do so.

Step 7: Co-ordinate the presentations (or ask a student to do so). Encourage questions for the groups after they have presented their work.

Step 8: After all groups have presented and all questions have been discussed, place the posters gallery-style on the walls of the classroom. They will now serve as reminders of the themes discussed and can be referred to at any other time as needed.

Step 9: Assess the activity with the students. See below.

Adapted from Smith, David C. and Terrance R. Carson, Educating for a Peaceful Future, Toronto: Kagan and Woo Limited, 1998, pages 231-237.

Checking In: What did we learn?
Sit in a circle and ask students to share one or two things they learned in this activity. The teacher should also share something she or he learned in the activity. The teacher may want to follow up with a summary of the ideas presented by the students. These responses can then be tied back to the teacher’s learning objectives. Sharing learning objectives with students invites them into the teaching process and may help them take more responsibility for their own learning. The teacher’s openness will hopefully encourage students to trust and share in the learning environment. This process of "checking-in" after an activity reinforces the idea that teachers and students are in the learning journey together.

Dialogue Sheet
Another way to get feedback about an activity or to assess whether learning objectives have been met is to use a "Dialogue Sheet". A Dialogue Sheet should distributed after each activity or in particular cases. The following is a sample Dialogue Sheet:

2.

3.

THANK YOU.