Grade levels: All
Learning areas: Human and Social Sciences; Economic and Management Sciences; Literacy, Language and Communications; Technology; Life Orientation.
Description: We are part of the world’s newest and most exciting democracy, and need citizens who are engaged, thinking, responsible and oriented to action. The lesson is focused on democracy development and asks each person to think about what they would do to improve something in their school, their community, or in the nation under the theme – If I were the Presidentä.
Outcomes: Learners will:
1. Develop an understanding of important aspects of democracy
2. Experience ways that their own participation can help to strengthen democracy in their community and as a citizen of South Africa.
3. Discover that what they think can matter, and see that they have value because their ideas have value.
4. Demonstrate and further develop their skills in the following areas: critical thinking, quantification, analysis, collaboration, writing, debate, convincing presentation.
5. Become aware of how to use the Internet to gather information from all over the world, and how their ideas can get to the outside world through publication on the Internet and in the media
Total classroom time: Approximately 4 lessons of 40 minutes each – flexible, depending on class schedules and timetable
1. Class discussion. Time allocation: 20 minutes
1.1. Hold a class discussion on what students understand democracy to mean:
1.2. Assign each learner to write an essay of 100 – 200 words on a problem they see in the country and good way to solve it. Examples can be handed out such as those attached to this teacher’s guide, or better ones the teacher may think will mean more to the students. Alternatively, learners can submit a picture or even a few words that expresses their idea.
If the teacher feels the learners are not ready to work on their own, it may be appropriate to have learners brainstorm ideas together.
2. Individual student presentations. Time allocation: 40 minutes
Ask each student to give a one minute presentation of the idea they have written about. Because time is limited, it is not necessary to start a discussion of each idea.
3. Group work. Time allocation: 40 minutes
3.1. Next the teacher should form three groups to work on three ideas and develop them further. These can come from three individual ideas, or from groups of learners who may have had similar ideas.
3.2. An optional step here is to give each team a week to use the Internet to research important information concerning the idea. They might do this to quantify the problem or investigate others who have developed solutions to this problem in other communities or countries, or to research important aspects of the solution they propose.
4. Team presentations. Time allocation: 30 minutes
4.1. Next each team can make a 10 minute presentation on their idea, and suggest a revised written description of the idea for the class to submit to the national If I were the Presidentä Program. The class can then decide together to submit one, two or all three ideas.
5. Submit ideas on the Internet. Time allocation: 10 minutes
5.1. Next they must submit the ideas on the website. The ideas can be written off-line in a word processing program, and imported to the application form as a text file to minimise online costs.