Step 3. Further preparatory work
Upon completion of steps 1 and 2, each school team will continue working on its own on the challenges, to prepare the required scenario for next academic year / module.
The following items can be of help in preparing the school for the challenge:
Pre-design of the rest of the challenges.
Session with the students: They will choose one challenge from the two/three options preselected by the teachers.
Motivation towards the context (engagement question, video, activity, etc.). For example, the teacher could start by asking the students: “Think about the neighbourhood or the school. How would you describe the environmental quality? Would you change anything?” At this point and so that the discussion does not extend beyond 5 minutes, collect the main ideas and tell them that there will be time to analyse the needs later.
Short video of students of similar age around the world working toward environment enhancement. Reinforce the idea that similar pupils are capable of diagnosing their surroundings needs and being critical.
Brainstorming of context needs: In teams, students will write down on post-it the problem/s that need to be tackled in the neighbourhood or at school. At this moment, it is important to motivate the students so that they can put all the ideas that they come up with on paper. Be very insistent that the more ideas there are, the better.
Once they have all the ideas written (in disorder), ask them to group the post-its (ideas) into categories or clouds, and they will put a title for each category.
Connect the pupils’ categories with the challenges predesigned by the teachers (probably the categories will include the challenges pre-selected by the teachers).
Challenges to deep understanding: It is important to get a deeper understanding of the challenges. A Problem Tree Analysis can be useful to think of the causes and effects, and also to reflect on the stakeholders to be potentially involved. A SWOT analysis or checklist could also be useful for scoring the different options.
Challenge selection: The pupils will vote on the challenge they want to work on.
Challenge connection with the SDGs (Sustainable Development Goals). A video to introduce the SDGs can be useful, as well as a short work in teams to define connections of the challenge and the SDGs.
Teamwork of teachers: Analyse how the different subjects can be incorporated into the chosen challenge. You can use the 5 Ws (and 1 H) questions:
What: contents of each subject (common topics, complementary topics)
When: timetable or planning (including time to meet and organise the tasks (it may be necessary to ask the school head for a common hour per week to coordinate the actions)
Where: school, streets, parks, etc.
How: organise the activities and resources.
Why: the purpose.
Who: responsible/coordinator(s).
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