Global Citizenship

The Global Citizen

Alan McDiarmid

The potential for developing the Global Citizenship agenda across Scotland is great, the involvement is patchy.   In many cases it is as strong as a school link with a southern partner.   (The British Council is encouraging such links with various forms of support).   Otherwise schools can make the most of existing curriculum opportunities to ensure young people are aware of their place in the wider world /global economy. RE, Modern Studies, Geography, English, PSD, Business Studies, Art and Music all provide very clear opportunities, but Maths, Science, Technology and PE can also contribute if the agenda can be delivered alongside other subject objectives. 

Within schools, fundraising is often seen as global citizenship, but although this can be a valuable spin off it is not really changing attitudes or encouraging critical and creative thinking, which is what is at the heart of Global Citizenship. e.g.   Young people in some schools write a Standard grade English essay perhaps on child labour - local and global - and then for their talk assessment they conduct an assembly for their peers or younger groups.   In this way they are being active, participative global citizens by informing others.  

As an introduction to global citizenship and an overall impression of the landscape the following are very useful:

Oxfam's Global Citizenship
LTS - Education for Citizenship in Scottish Schools
LTS/IDEAS - The Global Dimension
The ethos of all of these is reflected in the 5 - 14 Guidelines especially in the ‘Developing Informed Attitudes’ strand of Social Subjects and Science.   The National Priorities have included Values and Citizenship so this is firmly on the agenda for every school in Scotland.  

The opportunities have always been there for the global dimension / citizenship in all curriculum guidelines etc but it has been up to the individual teacher whether or not to explore these aspects.   Many do. How to help teachers is the key. Janis Keast of the Highland One World Group is currently working on materials aimed at primary schools to show how citizenship is part of topics ranging from water to natural disasters.   The main aim is to reassure teachers that they are already doing a great deal and to give them mechanisms for highlighting the citizenship content of their themes.   There is clearly a need for a more general global citizenship toolkit for teachers.   Such a toolkit could include definitions, key themes, sources of information, and subject specific ideas for lessons.   A toolkit for pupils could provide framework of knowledge and skills that could empower students as active global citizens.  

There is another angle of approach towards creating active global citizens.   Below the dimension of formal teaching is the underlying ethos of the school, which should provide the soil to sustain the global citizenship agenda.   A very simple thing that could be done is to raise awareness of a ‘global citizenship calendar’ that could provide a focus for class work throughout the school year.   In this respect we can learn much from Canada and the USA where school ethos is seen as much more than a written document and citizenship is woven through the life of the school in practical ways. Citizenship (and its global dimension) is often as obvious as a timetabled subject, more subtly presents itself as a poster campaign or finds voice through student and staff groupings.   Pupil Councils and teachers’ professional associations can, and sometimes do, promote the global citizenship agenda on this side of the Atlantic.   Northern Ireland shows some interesting approaches too and a key here has been partnership.  The Red Cross, working in partnership with local education authorities has developed a range of support materials based on active learning methodologies.  The following are some of the guiding principles behind these methodologies:

	teaching creates and effects the conditions for learning
	learning is mentally (and sometimes physically) active
	learning is communal and interactive as pupils learn from and with each other and as teachers learn with and from pupils
	learning involves feelings as well as thoughts -- it may become emotional especially when dealing with controversy
	teaching and learning about citizenship necessitates dialogue with and among pupils and teachers
	dialogue has to be both general and specific as it explores both abstract ideas and multiple examples
	dialogue involves exploring multiple perspectives and positions on ideas and examples in order to develop more complex understandings about what it means to be a citizen
	citizenship education is transformative so that classrooms are potential sites for creating a democratic community and culture
	citizenship has a future orientation whereby we can imagine better and more perfect local and global societies

Another distinctive feature in Northern Ireland has been the recognition of the importance of staff development.   Initial teacher training presents many opportunities to create educators who act as global citizens.   In-service training aiming at global citizenship has focused on creating a cohort of individual mentors in schools so that eventually each school will have a member of staff to foster the agenda in their particular school.   This latter approach has the advantage of harnessing existing energy and enthusiasm within schools and allows the agenda to be developed closer to the chalk face rather than seeming to be imposed from a higher level.

To sum up, where progress towards delivering the global citizenship agenda has been made, there are some common themes. These include:

	Active learning
	Staff development
	Integration across the curriculum
	Local partnerships Global partnerships
	Teachers who are conscious of their own global citizenship

Active  Citizenship Initiatives

Alford Academy Active Citizen Course  

Linda Park is developing the Active Citizenship course for implementation in 2003/04 session, principal teacher of Home Economics & Social and Vocational Skills at Alford Academy in Aberdeenshire.   As well as providing progression from Standard Grade Social & Vocational Skills, it is offered as a course option for all S5/6 students.   Delivery of Citizenship skills via a certificated course ensures that initiatives can be developed and sustained year after year.   Further details are in the Appendix.  

Educating the ‘Enterprising Global Citizen’

National In-service Programme 

Main Partners in project:

UNICEF
Bruce Wilkinson (Education Officer for Scotland)

Learning Teaching Scotland
Professor Tom Wilson (Chairman LTS)

Careers Scotland (Scottish Enterprise)
Alex Blackwood (Development Manager Enterprise in Education) 

Course Development Partners:

The design team who wrote, or added to, the course include Brian Twiddle and Linda Brownlow (Careers Scotland), Christine Twine (LTS), Iain Mills (Inverclyde), Gordon Brown (East Lothian), Finbarr Carter (Just Business), Molly McGavigan (IDEAS & WOSDEC), Linsey Crooks (Primary Teacher), Bruce Wilkinson (UNICEF), Jonathan Hart (UNICEF), Heather Jarvis (UNICEF).

Outline Plan of the in-service programme:

	Initially this course will be for primary schools and will focus on P6 and P7.   Ideally there should be at least one class teacher and one promoted teacher from each participating school.   It is envisaged that a secondary school version will be developed in the near future.
	The above course should focus on one local education authority at a time beginning with Inverclyde for the primary school version.   In Inverclyde the adviser, Ian Mills, will be asked to assist us in adapting the course to the expectations of his authority.   This will be further developed in East Lothian.
	This course will involve two full days of in-service with practical assignments following each day.   The final day will have assignments that last the rest of the term (prob. two months) and require visits from the participating organisations to assess the implementation of the programme.   The assignments will encourage professional development due to their imaginative design.   Successful implementation will result in the school being given an award. Additional visits and guidance will be added, if necessary, to insure a good standard is achieved by all.
	The course content will reflect the overlap of core interests of the three partners as well as associated topics of specialist interest.   This will be a unified course incorporating all the issues below and will be activity based.   Teachers will be given exemplars of good practice but will have to do more than merely copy this to pass their assignments.
	This course will provide an upper primary topic, which helps schools, and authorities, to move towards implementation of ‘Determined to Succeed’ by giving experience of an enterprise activity each year.    The direct relationship to 5-14 Environmental Studies National Guidelines will facilitate good curriculum planning and prevent this course being an additional burden upon what teachers must already teach.
	The result of these assignments will be that each participating school will have started, and will run, an ethical and sustainable business.   This will generate revenue that will be spent in a socially responsible way and will be an important aspect of what the course has taught. Citizenship and enterprise will therefore be combined in an ethical way that prevents unnecessary conflict that may happen if they were taught separately.

UNICEF

	United Nations Convention on the Rights of the Child
	Responsibility and Obligations needed to respect the rights of others
	Citizenship Education
	Participation
	Health
	Global Development issues such as poverty, sustainability, fair-trading, and ethics.

Careers Scotland

	Educating the entrepreneurs of tomorrow
	Understanding sustainable and ethical business practices
	International opportunities for sharing information
	Ethics in Education Business collaboration
	The entrepreneurial employee

Learning Teaching Scotland

	Examples of Active and responsible citizenship
	Integration of citizenship into existing curriculum
	Teaching essential core skills

The assignments will be different for class and promoted teachers.   Class teachers will work with their own pupils and successful completion will result in work that will have its own value for pupils, teachers, school and the wider community.   We hope to have this work recognised as C.P.D. and earn academic exemptions from other qualifications.   These assignments will build up a portfolio of evidence and involve accreditation of prior learning.

Promoted teachers will be given related assignments that initially involve helping their colleagues to achieve the above then transferring these skills to other colleagues who haven’t attended this course.

Bruce Wilkinson

Highland One World Group  

Citizenship within Environmental Studies 5 – 14

The following 10 guidelines/exemplars have been drawn up to help implement the delivery of National Priority No. 4 – Values and Citizenship.  They also address the LTS document ‘Education for Citizenship in Scotland’ which describes the capability for citizenship as:

	Knowledge and Understanding
	Skills and Competencies
	Values and Dispositions
	Creativity and Enterprise…. And they also meet many of the components of the 5 – 14 National Guidelines, in particular the strand Developing Informed Attitudes.

Whilst popular topics have been chosen, (Transport, Farming, Water, Homes and Houses, Local Study/Where I Live, Toys, Forestry, Victorians, Natural Disasters, Conservation) they are not comprehensive project plans but are merely suggestions as to how to include aspects of citizenship.   They should reassure many teachers that much is already being covered. 

All resources referred to and many more can be borrowed from:
Highland One World Group,
The Education Centre, Castle Street, Dingwall IV15 9HU
Email janis.keast@highland.gov.uk

Specific resources and useful, child-friendly web-sites are listed on each sheet but here are some general websites to support aspects of citizenship:

www.oxfam.org.uk/coolplanet
www.christianaid.org.uk
www.globalgang.org.uk
www.unicef.org.uk
www.sciaf.org.uk
www.savethechildren.org.uk
www.dep.org.uk/globalexpress  (for rapid response information series for schools) 

Topic sheets compiled by:

Clare Pendlebury, Cullicudden Primary School
Irene Straiton, Cradlehall Primary School
Janis Keast, Highland One World Group

Project funded by The Education Business Partnership & the Department for International Development Christian Aid, Oxfam, SCIAF and UNICEF fund Highland One World Group.

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