UnMASKing_Module One Lesson 4

Overview

Students begin this lesson by becoming aware of what “schooling” involves and the different material standards of education already existing throughout the world. The lesson then considers how the pandemic has required distance learning and the kind of supports needed by students, with attention to vulnerable groups. Students then analyze a case example from New Zealand to learn how one government moved teaching online.

Grade Level

8th-12th Grades

Essential questions the lesson will address:

● What are the conditions within and across societies that support and impede the right to education?

● How can governments ensure the right to education during a crisis such as the pandemic?

● What are the special challenges that vulnerable youth and children face in terms of access to quality education, both during the pandemic and during regular times?

Learning Outcomes

Students will be able to:

● Identify some of the key ingredients to operating a schooling system.

● Explain the nature and sources of disparities in the quality of education across different schooling systems, and how these are exacerbated during times of crisis like the pandemic.

● Analyze and list the kinds of supports that governments can provide to ensure quality education during a pandemic, especially for vulnerable children and youth.

Common Core State Standards

● CCSS.ELA-LITERACY.CCRA.SL.1

● CCSS.ELA-LITERACY.CCRA.R.7

● CCSS.ELA-LITERACY.RH.9-10.2

● CCSS.ELA-LITERACY.CCRA.R.2

● CCSS.ELA-LITERACY.CCRA.SL.2

unMASKing Curriculum Glossary

● Digital Learning: learning using electronic media, such as the Internet (edapp.com).

● Distance Learning: a method of study where teachers and students to not meet in a classroom but use the Internet, e-mail, mail, etc. to have class (Merriam-Webster).

● Quality Education: According to UNICEF, a quality education is defined by five elements: the learner's outside experiences, learning environment, content of education, learning processes, and education outcomes. Learners must be healthy, well-nourished and supported by their families and communities. The learning environment should be safe, healthy and stimulating. Appropriate education content is relevant to the learner and presented in a well-managed classroom. Learning outcomes should meet promote participation in society. All five of the factors must be present for learners to receive a quality education (reference.com).

● Vulnerable Groups: Groups that experience a higher risk of poverty and social exclusion than the general population (equavet).

● Indigenous Peoples: Indigenous peoples, also known as first peoples, aboriginal peoples or native peoples, are ethnic groups who are the original settlers of a given region (Wikipedia).

Formative Assessment Strategies

The teacher can make note of…

● Class-wide identification of the ingredients necessary for schooling.

● Small group presentations of group work.

● Class-wide discussion around lessons to be learned from the pandemic about access to quality education.

● Individual student participation in group work and in whole class discussions.

● Students’ homework, in which learners research or journal about lessons from the pandemic about the right to education.

Materials for Instructor

● Access to Internet and a screen to show the video and images in the beginning of the lesson

● Pandemic Curriculum Glossary Board (Physical or Virtual)

● Whiteboard/Blackboard and chalk/marker

Materials for Students

● Handout: New Zealand – Distance Learning in the Schooling Sector

● Handout: Questions for Group Activity

● UnMASKing journals

LESSON PLAN

I.  Video with discussion on the ingredients of schooling (10 min.)

Begin the lesson by saying that the class will be focusing on how the pandemic has affected some students’ learning in schools in different parts of the world.

Show UNESCO’s 1:29 minute video “UNESCO – Debating the Futures of ED Video #1 – What needs to be learned at school?” April 27, 2020 https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fo_Q3ZJApXM

Show the image of a classroom in the East Pacific. Ask the students:

Now show an image of a U.S. classroom and ask students:

Ask the students to briefly brainstorm what are the things required for schools to function? (Probe for material ingredients – e.g., teachers, textbooks and learning materials, computers, lunchroom, a school building, gym.)  

Write these things on the whiteboard/blackboard and ask the students to think if these ingredients are the same in every school in the world. What kinds of ways might these be different? (Probe/suggest number of teachers in a school, classroom size, the number and quality of the textbooks, access to computers, quality of the school building, having access to a gym, etc.)

II.  Discussion on pandemic effects on learning (20 min.)

Step One (5 minutes)

Tell students that the right to education has been recognized as a right guaranteed since the United Nations was first established. It was mentioned in the Universal Declaration of Human Rights (UDHR), which students studied in Lesson 2.

Since then, many other UN treaties have recognized the right to education and affirmed that it must be available without discrimination to all children and youth in a country. It must also be of good quality. Special care must be taken to ensure that all members of society can go to school and enjoy a high-quality education, especially persons who may be vulnerable, such as migrants, refugees, girls and Indigenous Peoples.

The pandemic has influenced how students are learning – both by not being able to be on the school campus and also when they are in school.

Step Two (10 minutes)

Ask the students to ‘pair share’ on the following questions for 5 minutes:

● How did your learning change when you were not able to come to school physically?

● Thinking about the two photos that were shown at the beginning of class, what do you think happened to student learning if they were not able to come to the school campus? Were they able to study at home?

● What kinds of supports are needed for students to be able to study from home? 

Debrief on the questions above, inviting students to volunteer their answers. (Probe for access to a computer/the Internet, a quiet place to study, help from a parent, ability to concentrate when they are on their own.) 

Make a running list on the board or flip chart paper of necessary supports mentioned by students in response to the final question. Then ask: what do you think is the role of the government in this situation?

Wrap up by pointing out that these differences in opportunities are related to the amount of resources available for schooling, whether through resources from the government, families, civil society organizations or outside organizations.

Step Three (5 minutes)

(optional section) Ask students to read out loud the following text/show slides from the Education International article from April 29, 2020.

● The COVID-19 has resulted in schools shut all across the world. Globally, over 1.2 billion children are out of the classroom.

● As a result, education has changed dramatically, with the distinctive rise of e-learning, whereby teaching is undertaken remotely and on digital platforms.

● Research suggests that online learning has been shown to increase retention of information, and take less time, meaning the changes coronavirus have caused might be here to stay.

There are, however, challenges to overcome. Some students without reliable internet access and/or technology struggle to participate in digital learning. For example, whilst 95% of students in Switzerland, Norway, and Austria have a computer to use for their schoolwork, only 34% in Indonesia do, according to OECD data.

In the US, there is a significant gap between those from privileged and disadvantaged backgrounds: whilst virtually all 15-year-olds from a privileged background said they had a computer to work on, nearly 25% of those from disadvantaged backgrounds did not.

(end of optional section)

Explain that the students will now look at one country example of how access to education was promoted in New Zealand. New Zealand is a country located in the southwestern Pacific Ocean, near Australia. Special attention was paid to the needs of Indigenous people, the Maori.

 Break the students into small groups of no more than four students and pass out the Handout: New Zealand – Distance Learning in the Schooling Sector and Handout: Questions for Group Activity.

III. Case study analysis (20 minutes)

The students review the case study and then answer the following questions.  A scribe in each group should record the group’s responses. (These questions are in the Handout: Questions for Group Activity.)

● What role has the government played in guaranteeing the right to education?

● Which vulnerable groups in New Zealand society are recognized in the distance learning policy?

● What do you think the government has done well? What gaps do you see?

Debrief on the small group work, using the question prompts. 

IV.  Concluding discussion (5 min.)

The lesson concludes with an open discussion on:

● What lessons can we learn from the pandemic about access to quality education?

● Are the right to health and the right to education at odds with one another during the pandemic?

V. Homework

Option 1. Students can research how the right to education has been affected in their own community during the pandemic and write a brief essay (2-3 pages) on what they find. News sources should be referenced. Some prompts that might be used:

● How has access to education been affected? (How do we know?) Is it more severe for some learners than others rather than others? Why?

● How has quality of education been affected? (How do we know?)  Is it more severe for some rather than others? Why?

● What role has the government played in guaranteeing the right to education? What did they do well?

● What roles have civil society organizations played in guaranteeing the right to education?

● What actions have ordinary people - including students and their families – done to ensure access to quality education?

● What lessons can we learn from the pandemic about access to quality education?

● What has the pandemic meant for you and your right to education?

Option 2. Students can write in their unMASKing, reflecting on the lesson using the following prompts:

● What lessons can we learn from the pandemic about access to quality education?

● What has the pandemic meant for you and your right to education?