Teaching sequence

Work through this resource material in the following sequence:

5 minutes

Tune In: What's the big deal?

20 minutes

Find Out: What problems do people face today?

30 minutes

Take Action: Finding your mission

5 minutes

Reflection

Learning intentions

Students will...

explore social issues affecting communities locally and globally
rank social issues as individuals and vote for a class social cause.

Success criteria

Students can...

identify social issues affecting all levels of society
justify their thoughts on the importance of different social issues.

Tune In: What's the big deal?

Step 1

Explain to students that in this lesson they will be exploring social issues in more depth to understand which issues affect people locally and which issues affect people globally. From there, the class is going to determine which of the issues they collectively think is most important and focus on that as the mission for their social enterprise. Before getting too carried away, ask the class to give a definition of a social issue. In lesson one of this unit, a social issue was defined as "problems affecting many people in society through limiting access to something needed to thrive in life".

Step 2

Hand out the What's the Big Deal? worksheet to students in pairs. Explain that each circle, starting with "Me" and working outward to "My World", represents a layer of society. Tell the class that the issues they will discuss today affect different levels of society, from those likely affecting people they know or are aware of within their local community, to those that affect us all globally. While watching the following video, ask students to consider which of the circles they would place each issue and encourage students to keep in mind that an issue affecting someone at a national level may also affect someone at a personal level, even though it might not be obvious.

Find Out: What problems do people face today?

Step 1

Play the following clip:

What are the world's biggest problems? (youtube.com/watch?v=hLEfzROang0)

Step 2

Briefly, ask students to offer where they placed each issue on their sheet and why. Were there any issues that were placed on the inner circles?

Step 3

Pose the question and Think, Pair, Share ‘What problems do people face today?’ and ask students to add as many examples as they can to each circle on the sheet.

Step 4

Once each pair has filled in as many examples as they can in the time you have allowed, ask each group to share their thinking with the class and record each issue presented on the corresponding circle or heading on the board. As you do this, ask students with the same issues listed if they agree or disagree with the chosen placement within the societal circles of other groups. For extra inspiration, you can refer to the UN's Sustainable Development Goals (referred to in the video).

Take Action: Finding your mission

Step 1

In this next activity, the students will be ranking social issues by importance to them as individuals and then voting on the mission of the class's social enterprise. This activity has the potential to really grow and extend the students' abilities to think critically and use all the persuasive techniques they've picked up from their English or Literature studies if you wish to really get into the debate with your class.

Hand out the Diamond of Importance worksheet to each student and ask them to choose nine issues and rank them from most to least important. The most important issues will be placed at the top of the diamond and the least important will be at the bottom of the diamond. For each issue, ask students to write a brief note on why they ranked it as they did so that they can refer to their justifications later on.

Step 2

Now for the fun part: voting for the class cause! Explain to students that they will now vote for the issue which will form the core of the mission behind their social enterprise.

For the more technically-inclined teacher, you may choose to tally votes via online tools such as Google Forms or Mentimeter. For a greater sense of drama, you may choose to take the low-tech alternative and have students cast their vote via writing the cause on a slip of paper and placing it in a hat or a ballot box. This allows for students to be more active in the process and allows for an interesting diversion into voting processes, such as ensuring no fraud takes place.

Learning opportunity: Where the vote is tied, ask proponents for both causes to make a case in favour of their mission and then have the class re-cast their vote for only those two issues based on the points made by both sets of advocates.

Step 3

Once the votes are counted and the result is in, congratulate students on making an informed, democratic choice (something that is not possible for some countries or societies). Now that the class has a cause, they can start to plan what they are going to do in their mission to address this cause, the planning starts in the next lesson.

Learning extension: Students could be tasked with creating a presentation to make a case for a cause they wish to champion. This could be an in-person presentation or a video recording.

Reflection

Step 1

Having learned about global and local issues, ask students to consider the following and record their thoughts on the back of their Diamond of Importance worksheet.

1. What did you learn about the world or your community that you didn’t know beforehand?

2. What skills did you bring to these activities?

3. Are there any issues you would now consider acting on outside of school?

Creating a Social Enterprise - Finding Your Social Mission

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