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Hi, there.
My name is Mr. Robertson and I love RE.
Today's lesson is all about humanism around the world.
And it comes and our big inquiry question, humanists, how can you lead a happy and meaningful life? And in this lesson, we're going to look in the UK and outwards to another part of the world to see what humanists do there, and how that can help us understand humanism a bit better.
So by the end of this lesson, you will be able to explain how humanists campaign internationally to make the world a happier and better place.
I've got three key words for you in this lesson and I'm gonna ask you to repeat those words back to me and then we're gonna talk about what they mean.
So our first word is responsibility.
Fabulous.
Our second word is action, and our third word is campaign.
So by responsibility in this lesson, we mean looking after something or someone and making sure things are done properly.
By action we mean doing something on purpose to make a change.
And by a campaign, we mean a planned activity towards a shared goal.
You're gonna see those words in action throughout this lesson and I know you're gonna understand them really well by the end of it.
So we're asking two questions in this lesson, and our first question is this, how do humanists try to build a better world? Let's go.
So this lesson uses some of the tools of social science, and Alex is gonna help us understand what we mean by that.
He says, "Social scientists are interested in how people live and how context like where they live or when they lived affects this.
We can better understand people's worldviews by looking at photographs and analysing data.
We can survey or interview people to find out more about their worldview." So how are we gonna use that in this lesson then? Well, in this lesson, we're gonna look at a case study of how humanists take action and campaign to make a better world.
Let's start with this photograph.
I wonder what might be going on in this photograph.
Why don't you take a minute to look carefully at what you can see? What's the message, who might be holding it, and what might they be doing? I can see the words, "Climate is changing! What about you?" It looks a little bit like there are some schoolchildren, and they're holding this placard up, and it's asking a question about what people are doing to take action 'cause we know that the climate crisis is causing changes to our climate.
So perhaps they're part of a campaign to raise awareness.
Lucas and Aisha are discussing how they try to make a better world.
Lucas says, "I think we all have a responsibility to take care of our planet.
We can all take some action to help." Aisha says, "I agree.
In my family, we are trying a meat free Monday to eat less meat.
I'm really enjoying trying different foods." Can you think of anything that either you or your school are doing to make a better world? And that might be helping the planet, that might be helping other people as well.
Lucas is gonna talk to Elijah.
Elijah has a humanist worldview.
Lucas says, "Hey Elijah, as a humanist, have you taken any action to make the world a better place?" Elijah says, "Yes, definitely.
You can see from my t-shirt that I care about the planet.
I've been involved in a campaign in Devon to help clean up the coast." Hmm, that sounds interesting, Elijah.
Let's find out some more.
We can see a photograph there of Elijah and he's with his friend.
Elijah talks a little bit more about his campaign.
He says, "I live near to the coast.
Each weekend a friend and I take a bag and remove some plastic from along the beach.
There's so much left behind on sunny days." Have you ever been to the beach? Have you ever seen all the waste that can be left everywhere? Maybe you've done something like Elijah as well and tried to pick some of it up.
If you have, isn't that brilliant? "As a humanist", he says, "I think we all have a responsibility to take action for nature.
We are all connected to nature.
I can't be happy if I think that nature is not happy." So Elijah helping us think a little bit more about his worldview there.
So he feels a responsibility, he wants to take action and he does that because he feels very connected to nature.
Let's think a little bit about that.
I've got a question for you here.
Why does Elijah take action with his beach clean? Is A, he feels connected to nature.
B, he's hoping to get rewarded.
C, he doesn't like dirty beaches.
Pause the video and have a think.
Excellent, it's A, isn't it? He doesn't do it because he wants to be rewarded.
He doesn't like dirty beaches.
But he said his main reason for taking action was this idea of being connected to nature.
Brilliant, if you got that right.
Lucas wants to know more about humanist campaigns.
"Do humanists only take action in the UK or Europe? Are there humanists in other parts of the world?" That's a really great question Lucas.
Elijah says, "Yes, there are humanists all over the world.
Different humanists will take action in different ways.
But let me share a campaign that means a lot to me." Oh, I'm really excited about finding out what this campaign is Elijah.
Oh, I can see a map here, and we've got part of the map expanded.
The question is, do you know where in the world this is? Can you locate the United Kingdom? Can you see it there in the middle? Do we know what continent that is? What country it might be? "The Philippines is a country in Southeast Asia.
It has a population of 140 million people.
Wow, that's a lot of people isn't? The majority of people hold a religious worldview.
Most people are Christian or Muslim, however, there are humanists as well.
Let me introduce you to Maria.
She's going to tell you about a campaign she was involved in." Here's Maria.
She says, "Hi, I'm Maria.
I have a humanist worldview.
I'm a member of an organisation called the Humanist Alliance Philippines International, also known as HAPI.
Look at the image on my t-shirt.
Does it remind you of anything?" Well, I can see her t-shirt expanded there as well.
Can you see there? In some ways it looks a bit like a flower, doesn't it? We've also got five symbols as well.
She says, "HAPI uses the 'happy human', which is the international symbol of humanism." Look, I put the happy human symbol at the bottom and we can see how the HAPI symbol uses both.
We believe that human beings can take action together to solve problems in our country and the world.
Let's just check our understanding so far.
Got a true or false question for you.
All humanists live in Europe or America? Is that true or false? Pause the video and have a think.
Excellent.
It's false, isn't it? But why is it false? Well, there are humanists throughout the world.
For example, we've been looking at the case study of the Philippines and that's in Asia.
So we find humanists all over the world, not just in Europe or America.
Elijah's asking some more, he says, "What did the campaign involve? What did you actually do?" Maria says, "The Philippines is a country of over 2000 inhabited islands." That's incredible, isn't it? 2000 islands.
"We know that our coasts are precious resources.
The focus of our campaign was simple but important.
Pick up rubbish from the coast to help keep our sea and beaches clean.
We started at 5:00 PM walking along the beaches in Ilijan, my hometown in the Philippines.
I walked along the beach and helped to remove the rubbish from the coast such as plastic bottles and leftover wrappers from meals that hadn't been cleared up properly." Brilliant work, Maria.
"That's so amazing, Maria", says, Elijah, "It's like what I do in the UK.
Why did you want to support HAPI with this campaign?" Maria says, "For me it was about protecting our ocean.
We have hawksbill turtles, which land on the beach to lay eggs.
They might eat the plastic litter and choke or their babies might die.
I feel a deep connection with nature and so wanted to take action.
I also wanted my local area to be clean for all the humans who live there." Wow, Maria.
And isn't it interesting how both of them have got a real passion for cleaning the sea? Let's check our understanding again.
Who's correctly understood why Maria was involved in the campaign with HAPI? Lucas says, "The campaign was to improve the environment to make it better for humans to live in." Aisha says, The campaign was to improve the environment to make it better for humans and marine life." Which of them is correct? Pause the video and have a think.
Excellent, it's Aisha, isn't it? The campaign was about making better for humans and marine life, particularly the Hawksbill turtles.
So well done if you got that right.
Okay, now we've learned a little bit about it, I've got a task for you.
So, I'd like you to write a report about this amazing campaign that was carried out by members of HAPI in the Philippines.
And I'd like you to make sure that your report answers these questions.
Who are HAPI and where are they located? You might want to say what those initials stand for.
You might want to draw a picture of the logo perhaps and have this information going around it.
What did the campaign involve? What was the aim of it? What were they trying to do? Why did the campaign take place? So, why did Maria even, why were they trying to do it, what they were doing? And finally, what made Maria as a humanist take action? Why did she? What motivated her to actually take action? You can do this report however you like.
You might want to record it, you might want to write it down.
You might want to do it as a diagram.
It's totally up to you, but I really look forward to seeing what you come up with.
What a lot of amazing work you've done.
You could have presented this in so many different ways, but I've written it like this and you might want to look at this and see if you've got some similar ideas in your answer.
So who are HAPI and where are they located? Well, it stands for the Humanist Alliance Philippines International.
That's an organisation of humanists based in the Philippines in Southeast Asia.
The campaign evolved collecting litter from the beaches, going out at 5:00 PM she said, didn't she? Along the shoreline and picking up all the stuff that's been left behind.
And why did they do it? Well, they wanted to protect marine life because as we said, hawksbill turtles use that area and they also wanted to improve it for the humans as well.
And what made Maria as a humanist take action? Well, she felt a deep connection to nature and she felt that humans should have a responsibility to make the world a better place.
And because of those beliefs, she volunteered her time to go and do this.
If you've managed to put some information about the campaign, then that's brilliant, so well done.
The second question in our lesson is this.
How can you lead a happy and meaningful life? Lucas and Aisha are discussing humanism.
Lucas says, "I love the fact that humanists like Elijah in the UK, and Maria in the Philippines are both working to protect the oceans." Aisha says, "Yes, it's great to see humanists living out their beliefs and trying to lead a happy and meaningful life." I wonder if you can remember three things about humanism.
Maybe it's something you've picked up in this lesson, maybe it's something you know from your wider knowledge.
Or I can definitely hear, you know quite a bit humanism, don't you? That's brilliant.
We're going to look at different humanists and they're going to summarise some important ideas that they have about leading a happy and meaningful life.
We've got Elijah, Diane, Nell and Neil.
Neil says, "We learned from the story of the two wolves that humanists believe good and bad are naturally within us." He's talking about the story of the two wolves and the idea that human nature has good and bad.
Neil says, "To me, 'feeding the good wolf', means trying my best to always treat people with kindness, respect, and fairness." Diane says, "The happy human is a symbol for humanists.
That there is one life and we should make the most of it." She says, "The idea of one life makes me want to make the most of my time on earth and to find happiness.
We have one life, we should live it well." And that's the whole idea of a happy human stretching up trying to make the most of the one life.
Let's check our understanding.
Believing in one life means humanists feel life has no purpose.
Is that true or false? Think about what Diane just told us.
Pause the video.
Have a think.
Excellent.
It's false, isn't it? Why? Because humanists, like Diane said, that believing in one life makes 'em want to make the most of their time on earth.
Look at that beautiful book there.
We can see lots of different illustrations of life, can't we? From jellyfish into lizards and reptiles, dinosaurs, mammals and human beings.
A humanist worldview looks to reason and evidence to explain the origins of humans and the world.
Nell says "To me, humans are very much part of nature.
We are not special or different from the rest of it." And that illustration shows that, doesn't it? This idea that humans evolved over time from other animals part of nature.
Another thing we want to think about is this.
Making good or ethical decisions are important to humanists.
They look to humans rather than God to decide what is right.
Elijah says, "I use my empathy to think how another person might feel.
I try to think of the consequences of my actions." So Elijah's saying when he tries to make a big decision, he thinks about how the other person might feel.
He uses his empathy to put himself in their shoes and then he tries to think about the consequences of what he's going to do.
Let's check our understanding again.
Who is wrong? Lucas says, "Humanists only care about humans." Aisha says, "Humanists care about both humans and the natural world." Pause the video.
Have a think.
Excellent, it's Lucas, isn't it? Humanists care about humans and the natural world.
We've seen Elijah and Maria and other humanists telling us about the whole of humanity, the whole of the natural world and why they think it's all important.
I've got a final task for you here.
You can see a set of images, that all the images that the different humanist characters told us about.
These images connect to important beliefs that make up a humanist worldview.
I wonder if you could use them to make a link to how humanists believe you can lead a happy and meaningful life without God.
So could you, for each image, think about what does it say about a particular humanist belief and how does that help humanists lead a happy and meaningful life? You might be able to make some connections between the images, so you might want to draw lines between them and discuss them.
You might want to cut out the different images and rearrange them and put them together and talk a little bit about how they linked this idea of leading a happy and meaningful life.
I don't mind how you do it, but just think carefully about these images and what they connect to we know about humanist beliefs.
And I'm really looking forward to seeing what you come up with.
Oh, you've come up with loads of exciting things, haven't you? So you might have said some ideas like this.
The story of the two wolves links to the belief that human nature has good and bad in it naturally.
Humanists might try to feed the good wolf and act with kindness to others to make them happy.
We've got the happy human symbol, which is the symbol of humanism.
And that connects to the belief that there's no God or afterlife.
Humanist belief in making the most of the one life you have, and if you do that, you can lead a meaningful life.
The book of evolution connected to the belief that humanists believed the universe was not created by God, but they looked to evidence and science to explain that humans evolved and they believed that humans have natural origins.
The thinking picture helped us understand how humans make ethical decisions, and they do that by using reason and empathy.
They try to make others happy and think about the consequences of what they do.
And finally, the symbol of from the Philippines organisation is the idea about humanists trying to take action to make the world a better place.
And organisations like HAPI clean up beaches and try to protect both humans and animals.
And so they try to lead a meaningful life by taking responsibility and looking after the planet.
If you've managed to make some connections with that and come up with some big humanist beliefs, then that's brilliant and I really think you've done a fantastic job.
Let's summarise our learning today.
We've learned that humanists believe that all humans can take action towards making the world a better place.
We've learned that humanists can be found around the world, for example, the work of HAPI in the Philippines.
And we've also learned that humanists influence the world today, taking action small and large depending on the situation.
Hope you've enjoyed this lesson today.
I hope you've learned a little bit more about humanism and it around the world, and I hope it makes you think about actions that you might be able to take in your area, however small, to make the world a better place.
I look forward to seeing you in another lesson soon.
Thank you.