Do The Right Thing

Resource Ideas

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Description

Students have the opportunity to reflect on how they would handle difficult choices in life. How they would repspond to the choice of cheating or not cheating in a lottery or on an assignment? What are their beliefs about saving the environment, hunting for sport, or racism? These are just a few of the issues that can be raised in this unit.

Formats may include developing and expressing their opinions, presenting a stage play, and planning a group project.

Major Integrated Resource (MIR)

• Crossroads 9 available from Nelson Publishing Company

• Students against racism : the 1993 national Milton Acorn Festival anti-racism
  poetry competition / [cover and illustrations P. John Burden]. -- Winsloe,
  P.E.I. : Alternative Press, c1993.
  100 p.
  • RN 1-88541
• Environment. Junior. Kit #1 [kit] / compiled by Curriculum Materials. -- [S.l.
  : s.n.], c1986-1996.
  26 books (various titles), 2 videocassettes, 2 posters.
  • Contains some fictional material to support this topic.
    Grade level: Jr.
    Contents: Acid rain -- Ahmek -- Believe it or not, there's some good news
    here (videocassette) -- Big burn -- Cities in crisis -- The climate
    crisis -- Earth, ecology, environment -- Garbage! -- Global warming --
    Global warming : the threat of earth's changing climate -- Great northern
    forest (videocassette) -- Green future -- Gypsyworld -- The living soil :
    land use and society -- The living soil : a renewable resource -- Miracle
    at Willowcreek -- Our changing landscape -- Our ecological footprint --
    Out to learn -- Recycling metal -- Renewable energy -- Save our planet --
    The science of the environment -- Speak to the Earth -- Toxic wastes --
    Waste away -- The waste crisis.

Web Resources

• Equality Today - A youth-led e-zine that examines multiculturalism and anti-racism issues.
• EnviroLink - This Web site provides a comprehensive listing of current environmental organizationsw committed to promoting a sustainable society.
• Teen Issues - These web sites sites are about common issues that teens face, such as drinking and driving, gangs, television influences, and suicide. Read statistics about each of these issues and tips on how to cope. There is also information about conflict resolution and links to eThemes Resources on AIDS/HIV, drugs, smoking, and peer pressure.
• Peer Pressure - These sites focus on teaching older students how to combat peer pressure. Read examples of peer pressure and help students discover ways to deal with it. Includes topics such as pressure to try drugs, alcohol, and other risky situations. There is a link to an eTheme Resource on character education.
• Cheating - A printable story for kids about cheating, what happens when you cheat, and how to help a friend or yourself stop cheating.
• When the Going Gets Rough - Students reflect on what strategies they have used--and with what degree of success--when confronted with frustration or difficulty in an assignment, project, or activity.
• Finding Common Ground - Students will work in groups to find "win-win" solutions to common middle school problems.
• Comic Makeovers: Examining Race, Class, Ethnicity, and Gender in the Media - Students explore representations of race, class, ethnicity, and gender by analyzing comics over a two-week period and then re-envisioning them with a "comic character makeover." This activity leads to greater awareness of the stereotypes in the media and urges students to form more realistic visions as they perform their makeovers.

Related Novel Sets Available from the Curriculum Materials Centre

• Circling Vultures by Sylvia Sikundar - In this novel, 15-year-old Jason leaves Canada to revisit Africa and his childhood friend, Peter, only to realize the country has changed. Their friendship is tested when Peter's father, Kyondo, is suspected of poaching. Themes include poaching, justice, the law, and killing wild animals for trophies.
• Losing Joe's Place by Gordon Korman - Jason and his two friends move into Jason's brother's apartment and manage to wreak havoc in it during one funny and memorable summer.
• The Drowning of Stephan Jones by Bette Greene - A young gay man is pushed into a river and drowned as a result of an attack by a Bible-quoting high school senior.
• The Wave by Todd Strasser - The story begins when a schoolteacher, Mr. Ross, shows a Nazi movie and the class asks many questions he is unable to answer. In trying to address their questions, he conducts an experiment with his class that goes terribly wrong.
• Summer of My German Soldier by Bette Greene - When German prisoners of war are brought to her Arkansas town during World War II, twelve-year-old Patty, a Jewish girl, befriends one of them and must deal with the consequences of that friendship
• The Chocolate War by Robert Cormier - A high school freshman discovers the devastating consequences of refusing to join in the school's annual fund raising drive and arousing the wrath of the school bullies.

Do you have a lesson plan, resource or web site you would like to contribute to this page? Contact us at: Online Learning Centre

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