The Erasmus KA3 project “Teachers4Europe: setting an Agora for Democratic Culture” (T4E)

The main aim of the Erasmus+ KA3 project “Teachers4Europe: setting an Agora for Democratic Culture” (T4E) is to create a cross-border, sustainable and long-lasting teachers network promoting social and civic competences of pupils and advocating democratic values, fundamental rights, intercultural understanding and the ownership of them. For more information visit https://teachers4europe.eu/en/.

DEMOCRACY- A TRANSDISCIPLINARY LESSON

School: “Radu Vlădescu” Theoretical High School, Pătârlagele town, Buzău county, Romania;

Teachers: Mrs. Iorga Adelaida Loredana & Mrs. Frînculeasă Claudia Emilia;

Grade: 10^th Form- U;

Students’ Level: Intermediate (B1);

No. of students: 34 (23 girls/11 boys);

Time: 50 minutes;

Date: 21^st September, 2020;

Topic from the L1 Curriculum: Democracy, civism and human rights;

Title of the Lesson: “Democracy”

Main Skills covered: Integrated skills (transdisciplinary approach inspired by the key competences of the EU: communication in Romanian, English, the development of social, civic and digital skills, learning to learn etc.)

Aims : -  to create expectations, interest and involvement in the topic of the lesson;

            -  to express opinions about the topic, agreement/disagreement and giving arguments /examples to support personal views;

            - to practise cooperation and collaboration, critical thinking, creative translation and digital skills;

            - to assess the students’ knowledge and understanding of the topic.         

Anticipated problems:

- some students may not understand some tasks/words and may need extra-explanations and help;

Aids: flipchart, set of markers, laptop computer, overhead projector, the internet,  https://learningapps.org/, https://wordart.com/, https://create.kahoot.it/, https://padlet.com. 

Procedure:

1. Warm up - to create expectations about the topic, prepare and introduce the students into the atmosphere of the lesson

The teacher informs the students that they are going to have a lesson about a secret … topic and they will have to guess it. Then the students are given some hints until they guess the topic: the lesson is going to be about “one of the main values of the European Union/ a political system that allows the citizens to participate in political decision‐making/ a term which has its origins in the Greek language - combining two words: ‘demos’ meaning people and ‘kratos’ meaning power or rule etc. The teacher writes the title of the lesson, “Democracy”, on the flipchart, then draws a spidergram and asks the students to give examples of words related to this topic. Then the teacher completes the spidergram with the students’ answers: e.g. freedom, free elections, equality etc.

Interaction: T>S; Timing: 5 mins;

2. Pair work -“Which of the following quotations do you most agree with? Why? “- to practise expressing opinions and arguments

The teacher asks the students to go to https://learningapps.org/13631757 , match the sentence halves, read the 5 quotations and say which of them they most agree with and why.

a) “I may disapprove of what you say, but I will defend to the death your right to say it.” (Attributed to Voltaire, 1694-1778, French Enlightenment writer, historian and philosopher)

b) “Ask not what your country can do for you – ask what you can do for your country.” (John F. Kennedy, 1917-1963, American politician who served as the 35th president of the United States)

c) “Democracy isn’t a gift. It’s a responsibility.” (James Dalton Trumbo, 1905-1976, American screenwriter and novelist)

d) “Democracy is not the law of the majority, but protection of the minority.” (Albert Camus, 1913-1960, French philosopher, author, and journalist)

e) “There cannot be daily democracy without daily citizenship.” (Ralph Nader, born 1934-, American political activist, author, lecturer, attorney and presidential candidate)

Interaction: T>S; S>S; Timing: 10 mins;

3. Group work: to practise cooperation, collaboration, critical thinking and creative translation skills;

Working in 6 groups, the students translate the quotations from Romanian into English, then they say if the author has a positive or negative attitude towards democracy and express their agreement / disagreement not individually, but as a group (reaching a common result through negotiation, debate, compromise), and, finally, justify their choice.

1) “Democraţia este dictatura adevărului.” (Victor Martin) (=Democracy is the dictatorship of truth.)

2) “Democraţia e un mecanism prin care avem voie să alegem conducătorii pe care îi merităm.” (Alexandru Arșinel) (=Democracy is a mechanism by which we are allowed to choose the leaders we deserve.)

3) “Triumful cantităţii împotriva calităţii.” (Petre Țutea) (=The triumph of quantity over quality.)

4) “Democraţia este unitate în diversitate.” (Eugen Simion) (=Democracy is unity in diversity.)

5) “Nimeni nu va trăi niciodată într-o democraţie autentică. Democraţia nu poate să existe ca atare: e un model ideal.” (Lucian Boia) (=No one will ever live in a genuine democracy. Democracy cannot exist in reality: it is an ideal model.)

6) Democraţie este pretutindeni, dar... nu există! (Dumitru Sârghie) (Democracy is everywhere, but ... it doesn't exist!)

During the activity, the teacher answers the students’ questions, provides help, explanations and feedback if necessary.

Interaction: T>S; S>S; Timing: 15 mins;

4. Team work: to assess the students’ knowledge and understanding of the topic;

Divided into two teams, the students solve the Kahoot quiz created for this lesson. Each team will elect a representative who is going to decide, in turns, which of the 10 sentences is True or False, then give reasons why.

https://create.kahoot.it/details/democracy/953839db-90ba-4bd1-9ae5-5e8249b6c7b3

          Democracy: True/False Quiz

1 - Democracy enforces political equality.

2 - Democracy never causes instability due to change in leadership.

3 - Democracy involves multi-party elections, an opposition and free press.

4 - In a democracy, there is no political competition or power play.

5 - The decision-making process may never be delayed in a democratic system.

6 - The election procedures are quite expensive in a democracy.

7 - Democracy enables people to deal with differences and conflicts in a peaceful manner.

8 - Democracy implies more rights than responsibilities.

9 - Democracy guarantees equal status for all citizens according to their wealth and education.

10 - Democracy is a perfect form of government.

Interaction: T>S; S>S; Timing: 10 mins;

5. Follow up:  to review important information (key topic-related vocabulary);

The teacher goes back to the spidergram and asks the students to extract the words defining topics already discussed about during the lesson, then elicits new words related to the topic of democracy from the students to create a word art shape similar to the one below. https://wordart.com/edit/z8b1gs7sao9q

Interaction: T>S; Timing: 3 mins;

 Assigning homework: to encourage research, reinforce learning and peer-to-peer learning

At home, the students will have to comment upon their favourite quotation on democracy in about 50 words or visit https://padlet.com/craciunclaudia77/xocljmppte4du642 to add a comment upon the quotation assigned by the teacher and rate other comments as well:

”Democracy is not an easy form of government, because it is never final; it is a living, changing organism, with a continuous shifting and adjusting of balance between individual freedom and general order.” (Ilka Chase) 

(“Democraţia nu este o formă uşoară de guvernământ, fiindcă nu este niciodată încheiată; este un organism viu, schimbător, cu o continuă schimbare şi ajustare a balanţei dintre libertatea individuală şi ordinea de drept.”

Interaction: T>S; Timing: 2 mins