Human Rights Month Classroom Activities

What are human rights? It’s a question more and more kids are starting to ask as they see adults around them sporting “women’s rights are human rights” t-shirts and hear people on the news talking more and more about social justice issues. December presents a perfect time to talk about this challenging topic with our students and bring some relevant activities for kids into the classroom — after all, it’s Universal Human Rights Month. Add these activities to your social-emotional lessons or perhaps a social studies lesson.

Educating kids about human rights is a way of protecting the fundamental freedoms many of us take for granted every day. Knowledge of human rights and the laws that protect all people gives the students the skills they need to promote, defend and apply human rights in daily life. We’ve put together activities designed to educate, inform, enlighten, and embolden kids from 5 to 15. There are a variety of activities you can do with the class which will give them a firmer grasp of what human rights are, why they are important, and how to personally uphold and fight for what they represent.

1. The Universal Declaration of Human Rights. A basis for any discussion of human rights, the Universal Declaration of Human Rights was developed by the United Nations as a common standard of achievements for all peoples and all nations. In this activity, the students use the Create Magical Fruits Template to decorate unique fruit shapes to add to a Human Rights Magical Fruit Tree. Fruit trees typically produce only one kind of fruit, but a magical tree might produce a variety of unique and diverse fruits, much like the unique and diverse peoples of our earth.

• Use classroom craft supplies to create a wall display of a tree complete with multiple branches and leaves.
• The students are to decide as a class, the human rights that they think all people need to live in dignity and justice.
• From the list, assign one human right to each student (or teams of students) to be included as part of their magical fruit design.
• When the designs are complete and the human right is written on the fruit, it can be added to the tree.
• As a follow-up activity, the class can match the fruits with articles of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights and write the number of the article next to each magical fruit.

2. The Matching Game. There are 30 different articles in the Universal Declaration of Human Rights and it can often be difficult to understand how these articles relate to real-world events and situations. Have the students watch the Amnesty International clip What Are Human Rights? As a class, discuss the themes contained in the video. Use a mind-map on the board to record information relevant to human rights. Then split the class into groups of 3 or 4 and distribute the matching game cards. The students must then match the scenarios with the applicable articles of the declaration. Once each group has matched all the cards with an article, discuss the responses. As a follow-up activity, have the students create their own cards to find ways to link the articles to everyday activities in their lives.

3. Classroom Peace Prize. The idea of being a peace advocate is important for all students and is something which should be encouraged, recognised and rewarded in the classroom. In this activity, each student is to prepare an acceptance speech for a Classroom Peace Prize to be presented at a mock awards ceremony. The students can pick from one of the following award categories to base their acceptance speech on.

• Altruism: showing selfless concern for others
• Care: desires to help people
• Compassion: feeling and showing sympathy and concern for others
• Consideration: thinking of others
• Faithfulness: being loyal
• Impartiality: treating all persons equally; fair and just
• Kindness: thoughtful, caring
• Politeness: exhibiting good manners
• Sincerity: being totally honest

In this activity, the students will take part in a mock awards ceremony in which each class member is a winner. Explain to the students that each individual is capable of showing at least one of the above personality traits. Give the class some time to discuss and finally choose the trait which is most suited to them. Have the students plan, draft and edit their speeches. Explain to the class the rules to follow when someone is presenting to the class and have each student present their speeches in front of everyone. Present the awards once all students have completed their speeches.

This article originally appeared here.

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