Group items matching

in title, tags, annotations or url

What factors influence whether or not teachers trained in peace education actually teach about peace?

It involves getting the adult students to express their concerns about violence in their lives, presenting an analysis of different peace strategies, and arguing that teaching about alternatives to violence is an effective way to deal with the threats of violence both in schools and in the broader community.

The objectives of the course are to explore the role of violence in the lives of students, to consider the effect of violence upon educational practices, to examine how peace education can help deal with violence, and to provide examples of peace education activities and curricular ideas.

Having tried and failed to get support from official channels (embassies, NGOs such as Amnesty International, even the European Parliament), he turned to social networking. The week before he was due to start his studies, Ayman posted an article on his blog called “I have a dream” recounting his difficulties with the Israeli authorities in trying to leave Gaza. “It was non-accusatory,” he explains”. I was just asking for the basic right to pursue an education.” He ended the article with the sentence: “I am appealing and calling lawyers, politicians, journalists and all activists for human rights to join the fight for me and my right to the education that I have always dreamed of.” 

“Social networking helped me realize my right to education,” Ayman claims. Following the international mobilization Ayman finally received his permission to travel. He arrived in Spain one week late for class. At the Jaume I University, he is taking several courses on aspects of human rights education, peace education and conflict transformation.  “It is a very healthy environment where I am also being educated in mulitculturality,” he says. “Thanks to these courses I have became more aware about different conflicts taking place around the world.” Ayman also shared first-hand experience with people who have lived in conflict situations. “It assured me that conflicts are the same everywhere, and that humanity is humanity wherever we are.”  

Many undergraduates are struggling to show their natural flair after being ordered to write in a highly-structured way to pass exams, it was claimed. Robert Tombs, professor of history at St John's College, Cambridge, warned that students were “drilled into writing” in a formulaic manner between the age of 11 and 18, leaving them unable to articulate their ideas on degree courses.

A study last year suggested that almost half of employers were being forced to provide remedial lessons in the three-Rs because teenagers finish compulsory education lacking good levels of English and maths.

Speaking at the seminar in central London, Prof Tombs said many undergraduates had been taught to write essays at school simply to pass tests. "One of the things that one notices in student essays is how much damage has been done by the imposition of artificial structures for essay writing,” he said.

Africa’s educational systems are suffering from growing pains.  More students than ever are enrolling in school, but the supply of teachers and infrastructure have not kept up with demand. Educators say about 80 percent of African students are completing primary school -- thanks in part to the push to meet the UN’s Millennium Development Goals. They call for universal primary education by the 2015. John Daniel, the president and CEO of the intergovernmental organization the Commonwealth of Learning, says success is bringing more challenges. SCOPESecondary school students at KwaMhlanga High School in Mpumalanga, South Africa. “The African countries achieved in 10 years what it took many developed countries 100 years to do two centuries ago," he said, "and they don’t have many resources left over to do secondary.”

“Girls who have secondary education … have on average worldwide one-point-eight fewer children than girls who don’t," he said. "That’s a difference of two or three billion to the population of the world by 2050. There is [one educational researcher, Joel Cohen] who says therefore girls’ education is best way of stopping population growth and climate change.”

The Commonwealth of Learning proposes open schools, using new technologies and new ways to meet the needs of school aged children, drop-outs, mothers who want to learn at home and working adults. He said the schools cut costs and save time by using new technologies, including cell phones. Secondary school curricula can be created and shared among schools without costly intellectual property rights.