Shiloh Middle School Character Education Lesson
Contact - Megan Sheely
Focus: Justice and Fairness
Lesson:
1. Begin your session by playing a relay game – only you should know that it is
part of the lesson topic.
2. To play the game:
a. Organize students into two teams – boys vs. girls, brown eyes vs. blue
eyes, white shirts vs. colored shirts – whatever will work for your
group.
b. Students will be racing to fill a cup with M&Ms. They should pick up
one piece of candy with a spoon and travel (around desks, across the
room and back…whatever will work in your classroom) and return to
the start where the empty cup and the next “runner” will be waiting.
They need to get back in line, because each student should “run”
multiple times. Please make sure that students are safe when
competing (if they shouldn’t run, please make that a rule).
c. After 1-2 people from each team have finished their runs, stop the
game and announce a change in the rules. This change must make the
game unfair for one group of students. For example, if there are more
girls than boys, give the girls an extra advantage. You can make one
team walk backwards, or hop on one foot. You could also allow one
team to pick up multiple candies at a time.
d. Students may (and should) start to complain that the new rule is
unfair. Ignore them.
e. Continue the relay, and change the rules a second and third time.
Again, make sure that the new rule(s) create an unfair advantage for
one team.
f. Stop playing when everyone is complaining about how the rules aren’t
fair or when one team wins.
3. Discuss the students’ reactions to the game:
a. How did it feel to play the game?
b. What was it like to be on a team with special privileges? What was it
like to be on the other team?
c. Does it make a difference if the rules of a game are fair for everyone?
Why or why not?
d. Does it make a difference if the rules aren’t fair for some people? Why
or why not?
e. Do situations that seem unfair happen at school? If so, when/what are
they?
f. Are there circumstances in school where “the rules” need to be
changed for some people? Is that fair? Why or why not?
4. The next part of the lesson is on tolerance and acceptance, since those were
part of the article from last session.
5. We will be watching a clip of a larger Frontline TV special, called “ A Class
Divided.” Give your student some background knowledge (below), as we will
be watching the “Day 2” clip. The background info explains her lesson and
the clip will pick up where this description ends.
On the day after Martin Luther King Jr. was murdered in April 1968, Jane Elliott's third
graders from the small, all-white town of Riceville, Iowa, came to class confused and
upset. They recently had made King their "Hero of the Month," and they couldn't
understand why someone would kill him. So Elliott decided to teach her class a daring
lesson in the meaning of discrimination. She wanted to show her pupils what
discrimination feels like, and what it can do to people.
Elliott divided her class by eye color -- those with blue eyes and those with brown. On
the first day, the blue-eyed children were told they were smarter, nicer, neater, and better
than those with brown eyes. Throughout the day, Elliott praised them and allowed them
privileges such as a taking a longer recess and being first in the lunch line. In contrast, the
brown-eyed children had to wear collars around their necks and their behavior and
performance were criticized and ridiculed by Elliott. On the second day, the roles were
reversed and the blue-eyed children were made to feel inferior while the brown eyes were
designated the dominant group.
(copied from http://www.pbs.org/wgbh/pages/frontline/shows/divided/etc/synopsis.html)
6. After watching the clip, discuss students’ reactions to the experiment. Below
are some questions, if you need them.
a. How do these videos relate to “acceptance & tolerance”?
b. What did you learn from watching the clip?
c. How can you integrate those lessons into life at Shiloh?
d. How does justice, fairness, tolerance, and acceptance relate to PRIDE?