Lesson video

Hello everybody.

My name's Mrs Baker and I'm taking you through lesson two of how we can make a difference in society.

And today we're going to be focusing on how we find out about our investigations, so, and I hope you've got a nice, quiet place to work.

And I hope if you were learning on your phone groups, turn off your apps and all the notifications things like that so you can focus on what we're doing today.

I'll meet you in just a moment and tell you what equipment you'll need for today's lesson.

See you in a minute.

Welcome back everybody.

So today we're learning about how to investigate which topic that we would like to use for our active citizenship project.

Clearly, we're going to need these thinking brains because as I've said in the past, this is all about your interests and what you would like to do.

So about today we'll be thinking about what you might be interested in and the kind of research that you need to do.

You'll also need to bring with you something to write on and something to write with.

So if you don't quite have those things to hand then you may go off and pause the video now and collect them.

It might also be a good idea to keep all of your notes and ideas from this unit about active citizenship and how we make a difference in society in one folder, because sometimes you will need to refer back to them as you are planning your own project.

So if you can, if you've got one notebook or one folder or paperclip to keep everything together might be a really good idea to start doing that as we go into lesson two.

And if you can find lesson one.

Okay then, so those of you that are ready, let's start the lesson.

Those of you that need to pause the video to collect something to write with or on, please do so and I'll see you just in a minute.

So, here we go to start our lesson.

We're going to have look at what your citizenship interests may be and the themes of the course that you are studying, and what you actually need to do for your active citizenship projects, how you might choose a topic and then how to make sure it links to the theme.

Because if we, when I spoke to you last, and then if you've been part of that, you remember I did say if you're doing a GCSE and citizenship studies, it's really very important that your chosen topic links to one of the specification themes, say something that you're learning in your course and we're going to talk about more how to make sure that happens.

So let's move on.

Task one then everybody, is to think about what your citizenship interests are.

So nice mind map for me of what your interests may be.

You could perhaps think about local groups and international groups and if I just move myself a little bit here, Oh, there we go, you can see about the idea of national projects as well.

So you could break up your citizenship interests in that way when you're making notes of them, or you could break them up in any other way that you would like to, okay? I've given you a couple of starter points there if you need them, but literally I can't tell you if you've got it right or wrong.

It's absolutely up to you.

It's all about what you think is important for you.

So it could be something to do with people voice, it could be something to do with in your local community, it could be something that you seen internationally that you're worried about, some kind of global problem, some political problem, whatever it is that you're interested in but get them all written down and see what you can work with, okay? So, let's pause the video now and then I will be back with you in a moment.

Okay everybody, so those who they're the back thank you.

I hope you've got a nice big list of all the ideas and things that you are interested in.

So, now what we're going to do is have a look at the themes that run through your GCSE citizenship studies.

However, if you're not doing GCSE, you'll probably find that most of the course that you're doing fits in with one of these specifications or certainly areas in which you will have learnt about topics fit into these categories here.

So if you are on an AQA course, they break their course down into the idea of citizenship skills, methods in Britain and then skills, processes, and methods.

That's learning about how you do citizenship.

Then the main topics that you could link your action projects around would be life in modern Britain, rights and responsibilities, politics and participation and active citizenship.

Well, that's what you're doing.

So really you're left with the three in the middle.

Edexcel then students, your areas are living together in the UK, democracy at work in the UK, law and justice, power and influence and same E there is taking action citizenship.

So you are just doing that.

So you're left with the option of A, B, C, or D to do your projects around.

And then for OCR, you have section one, rights, the law and legal system in England and Wales, section two, democracy and government and section three, the UK and the wider world.

So these are actually really broad themes for you all to look at and I'm sure we can find something exciting for you that you would all enjoy doing fitting in around these themes.

Okay, so, Although the exam boards have different names for these sections, they can break down to the big issues you have, we'll be learning about, okay? Really we can look at them as in anything to do with politics, democracy and the government.

So any active system should be around those topics.

You can do law and justice.

So if you've got any interest in anything to do with law and justice, you can do a project on that.

Rights.

So anything to do with rights, whether that's human's rights, clinton's rights, rights being abused, anything to do with rights, you can do a project around that.

And Britain's relationship with the rest of the world.

Again, anything that you're interested in probably about change, making something better, you can do a project around that.

So these big sections or themes can be broken down into smaller topics, and then you can investigate them.

So you might want to make a note of these big things now and start to think, well, have any of my interests or do any of my interests fit in within those themes? So I'll just give you a moment if you need to make a note of those.

And of course remember you can come back to this video whenever you need to.

Okay? Right.

Let's cover a little move on that, see where we going next.

So, what do we need to do then? What we need to do for this method is no matter which board you're following, GCSE citizenship studies insist on part of the courses that you complete this active citizenship project, in a real out-of-the classroom environment.

And you have to show these things because this is written by the Department of Education.

You have to show, you understand the range of methods and approaches that can be used by governments, organisations, groups and individuals to address citizenship issues in society, including practical citizenship actions.

You have to be able to formulate citizenship enquiries, identify and sequence research questions.

You can also analyse citizenship ideas, issues and debates, and you have to be able to present your own and other viewpoints and represent the views of others in relation to citizenship issues, and causes, situations and concepts.

So there's three big outcomes there that the examples have to look for when they're marking your work.

And we talk about how you prove these things as you go through in just a moment.

So, each of these elements will come across in the different sections of your active citizenship projects.

You don't have to worry about showing those all at once.

So lots of them relate back to those skills we investigated just last lesson in lesson one, and we'll return to these skills throughout the lesson because we'll keep building on them and thinking about how important they are to you.

But the most important part of your Access Citizenship topic projects is choosing your correct topic.

It's really important because it needs to be something that you're interested in and something that works within your specification.

So, once you're interested in it, I mean how it works, then you're going to really be excited by it and want to carry on.

That's why it's such an important choice.

So, choosing a topic then.

By choosing a strong topic for your active citizenship project, you're already making a successful start.

Teachers may make suggestions with which topics to work our focus on.

Remember they are the experts with lots of experience, so be grateful for their help.

I know sometimes some people get frustrated that they want to do one thing and the teacher might say, "that's not going to work", but honestly guys, listen to what your teacher says.

They probably have helped a lot of students over the years with this work and they know if the topic is going to work for you.

For those of you that are having to select your own topic, we're going to have a look now about how you can make a good decision.

And even when you are selecting your own topic please make sure you speak to your teacher at school about how this is going to work and get their opinion on it too, because they're the ones that are going to be talking to you about your exam practise and how to write about the citizenship project in your exam.

So it's really important that they understand and support your idea.

So, remember the skills the examination board will be looking for on.

You can plan a practical citizenship action aimed at delivering a benefit or change for a particular community or wider society.

So let's take a think together about what this means.

You can see that I've highlighted there some of the key things we need to consider.

So you have to plan something and that means you don't just rush off and start an action, get up one morning and say, "I know what I'm going to do, I'm going to organise not much about something." You have to do a little bit of a plan for us.

And your action has to be looking at a benefit or change, okay? So you've got to have that firm goal that we talked about at the first lesson, that idea of knowing exactly what you want to do and that it's going to be a benefit or a change.

And the last part is for a particular community or wider society.

So you can't go, "well I'm going to change everything for the whole world", because as much as you'd probably like to, it's not going to happen in the time that you have allowed or the amount of skills and ability that we've got.

I know that probably any active citizenship that I did now wouldn't have an impact on the whole world, but if I plan something really carefully, it could have a really big impact on my local community or if I research the particular community that I wanted to help, I could certainly have a big impact on that.

So knowing who your audience is and knowing who you want to help, having that big goal, just like these case studies we looked at last time is really important.

So let's have a look here then.

Choosing your topic.

You can come up with a range of issues meanwhile to support.

And then you need to think about planning these practical actions, the benefits or change you'd like to give, and who you're going to be helping.

So I've come up with an example here to see how it's done.

So imagine you want to do something about racism at school.

You could organise a petition to say that people aren't happy with a racist behaviour or racist language within the school.

What benefit or change would that make? Well, it would raise awareness about the issue and it would gain supports and what community it will be helping.

Will it be helping all of those that could be experiencing racism within the school? Okay.

So it's a very focused outcome.

So let's have a look at homelessness then.

What could we do about homelessness? Well, you could write letters to the local council to raise your concerns about the fact, perhaps that there are people without a home in your area, and this was to show support for those people and you would be advocating for their rights, because everyone has that right to a home and an adequate standard of living and if you're living on the streets, you haven't got that.

What community or society will you be helping? Will be helping those rough sleepers living on the streets in your local community? So again, very small and focused area of those that you wanted to help.

Imagine you want to do something broader around human rights.

What practical planning actions could you come up with then? Well, one idea you could have here is to support a case from Amnesty International or a similar human rights organisation.

So find out somebody that they're campaigning for, advocate the rights for others, increase pressure on government, write to the government to say they need to do something about that.

Raise awareness, get more people involved in writing these letters.

And individuals that will be helped are those being denied their human rights.

So if you have a look at this very simple table, you can see that's a straightforward way of just coming up with some basic ideas that the main theme of the issues that you would like to support and linking them with any ideas that you've got of some things that you could do, thinking about the benefits and the changes and what group in society you are helping.

Good So, what I'd like you to do is make a copy of the chart that I've just showed you.

And then, using your examples from your mind mapping in the interest that you have, complete the chart with any ideas that you have, okay? So those issues that you came up with in your mind map at the start of the lesson, add those down in the first column and from there, work your way across and see if you can come up with some ideas that would fill each other for the other columns, especially thinking about the group or society that you're trying to help and any ways in which you could do that.

So pause your video now and press play again when you're ready.

Well done, everybody.

I'm hoping that you've come up with at least one way in which you think you could plan an activity around your issues, and think about the people that you would be helping.

So remember we talked about our skills last lesson and how that different people would have different skills, but we need to develop them all the way through.

Let's just have a little reminder of what those skills are.

Here they come.

So we talk about communication, critical thinking, analysis, evaluation, research, teamwork, confidence, resilience, creative reasoned arguments, decision-making, representing the views of others.

So what I'd like you to do now is add another column to the chart that you've just completed, and write in the skills that you think you would use for each of your ideas.

So from the skills that you have here, and in another colour showing the skills that you would use for each of your activities.

So for example, if there's something where you would use teamwork in one of your activities, is there something where you're holding a meeting with someone, which you need to be very confident with that meeting? Is there an activity where you are representing the views by being a spokesperson?, in which case I'd representing the views of others.

And if you could think of any other skills, then that you'll be using through this action, then add those skills lists as well.

So pause the video now and complete this task.

Well done everyone.

So let's have a look at how you may have gone about this.

So if we look at our top line, our racism at school option, we said okay, we can do a petition and we can raise awareness and help those who were experiencing racism.

So what kind of skills do we use here? Well, number one, we're going to need to communicate with people to talk about what the issue is and ask them to sign our petition.

Number two, we're going to have to talk with quite a lot of confidence to get people to sign our petition, and number three, teamwork's going to be good because we're going to get more signatures on that petition if we get other people to help us.

So there's three clear skills that we are working on whilst doing that project.

Okay, next looking at the idea of helping our rough sleepers and we were going to try letter write here and convince the council that they need to do something for the rough sleepers.

So what skills do we use here? Well, communication again because obviously we need to express our views to the local council.

But we can't just say to the local council.

Well, you should do something about these rough sleepers, it's not fair.

You have to give a reasoned argument.

You have to give them evidence.

So, within that column there, we've got our reasoned arguments.

And we could probably add in research as well, couldn't sway because you won't be able to give a reasoned argument without carrying out your research.

And then within our human rights column here then, we said we could support a big campaign from an organisation like Amnesty International.

And what are we going to need to do here was similarly, great forward communication, coming up with reasoned arguments and research to find out who we're going to help.

So there's a range of different skills that you've had to mean, have to use.

But there's something really important about this that we need to understand.

And that is, that when we are doing our planning and when we are doing our skills these two things are very closely linked.

So thinking about what action that you would like to take and thinking about how you're going to plan your citizenship action, you are going to have to think about what skills you have or what skills you have a new team.

Because those two things work very closely together.

It would be unfortunate if you drew up a great plan with lots of action and then realise actually, you didn't have the necessary skills to do that.

So when we plan, we have to plan with our skills in mind and the different kinds of activities will actually require different kinds of skills.

So it's something very important that you need to think about that.

So, how do we link them to our specification? This is a really important part and of our course as we know, and it's all about looking at these big things, okay? So the exam boards have different names for them but we know they boil down to this idea of politics and democracy and the government, law and justice, rights, and Britain's relationship with the rest of the world.

These big sections of things as we know, can be broken down into those smaller sections.

So if we think back to the examples I gave, obviously the human rights one fits into the rights section, but it could also fit into Britain's relationship with the rest of the world.

If we were asking Britain to talk to other countries leaders about how they were treating their citizens and whether they were getting their human rights, that's the section that we may say you know, you need to improve your relationships with a different country.

So it may overlap into two of the areas.

If we're talking about our idea about racism within the school, then again, that is a rights issue.

So it fits nicely there, and surprise surprise, homelessness is also a rights issue.

So what I found through my years of working in the assistantship classroom is that a lot of the topics that you guys are going to come up with are going to be connected to rights in some ways.

And if they're not connected to rights, you'll probably find that they're connected to politics, in another way or connected to rights and politics.

So there is some strong connections here and your teachers will help to make those clear to you I'm sure, if you're struggling to find them.

Okay, so over to you for a small activity now.

So final column please, for you guys to compete on that chart.

Writing which thing you think your topic links to, and remember it can link to more than one and come back to me when you finish.

Well done everybody, so as I said previously, if we have a look at my examples, racism at school is rights and also because racism is a legal issue, it can also fit in within law and justice.

Homelessness, we've got rights and also the government, local government and national government can get involved there.

You could choose to contact national government about who homelessness or local government about homelessness and human rights.

So we've got rights and the association with Britain and the wider world.

I hope you've managed to find these links with your own topics.

If you haven't, do contact your teachers and I'm sure they'll help you find them as well.

Okay, so we're pretty much at the end of our lesson now and you can see that we've gone through exploring what your citizenship interests are, the themes of your course, which you can break down into these big key areas, what you need to do, choosing a topic and linking back to of themes.

So we've achieved what we set out to.

So, time now, for me to just get you thinking about the very end of our lesson.

So a takeaway task for you.

You can research one topic that would fit into each of the themes the GCSE specification examination boards use.

So take those broad topics that I gave you and maybe find one which interests you the most whether that's to do with law and justice, whether that's to do with Britain with the rest of the world, whether it's that politics, democracy and government, or whether they have to do with rights.

Start thinking about where your interests really lie.

Next task then, would be to talk with your class or people you would like to work with about citizenship actions you could take on these topics.

It's a really good idea to communicate as soon as you can with people that you might want to have in your team.

And because if you know that you're working along the same ideas, you could start to share your topic or ideas, start to share your questions at any research that you do and that will be really important as we move on through these lessons.

So, that brings us to the end of lesson two.

Well done everybody.

I hope you're now feeling really confident about being able to find a topic that you're interested in and knowing if you're doing the GCSE, that it fits in with a specification, so that you'll be able to answer questions on it when it becomes time for the exam.

It will be wonderful for you to share your work today with your teachers, so they know exactly what you'll be working onto and we hear, I could love to hear about your ideas and what you're so passionate about.

So if you'd like your parents to take a photograph or your guardian or an adult near you to take a photograph of your work or the ideas that you have and share them to us by tagging in, @OakNational and #LearnwithOak.

We'd love to know the kind of citizenship actions you are starting to plan.

So this is the second lesson in a series of six, and I look forward to working with you over the next four lessons, to help you get these wonderful citizenship actions ready to go.

One last thing for you to do before we leave today then, and that is to complete the exit quiz, so we can see exactly what you've learned from today's lesson.

And until I see you again, take care everybody.

Bye-bye.