Students will learn about fair trade and how producers can be helped to get a reasonable income, especially in poorer countries of the world.

QCA schemes of work Unit 10: Debating a global issue and Unit 21: People and the environment.

World map, t-shirts.

Introduction:

Show two different t-shirts to the class. Ask for their ideas about ways they are different. This exploration should move beyond appearance to start thinking about production and trade. Then ask students what the term ‘fair trade’ means and whether they have learned about it in any lessons or personal activities out of school?

Activities:

1. Write the word ‘community’ and ask students to come up with spontaneous ideas about what it means to them. This is likely to produce ideas like ‘people living together, sharing things’ and so on.



2. Write the word ‘global’ in front of ‘community’ and ask students if they think this changes their previous responses to the questions: Were you seeing ‘community’ as ‘local’? What is different if we talk about belonging to a ‘global community’?



3. Next ask students to make a diagram (on a sheet of paper or their books) with themselves at the centre labelled as ‘global citizen’: Mark all the ways you think you are – or could be – a global citizen.



4. Share ideas from the diagrams, either first in pairs or straightaway as a whole class. Points that come out of this discussion may include: that we are all global citizens because we live in the world, that a global citizen should be aware of what is happening in the world, that a global citizen should be active in trying to make the world better for her/himself and all other citizens.



5. Summarise this activity by trying to agree definitions for ‘global community’ and ‘global citizen’. Ask students to copy these definitions into their books so they can be used during further lessons on this topic.



6. After doing these activities, students can get involved in active citizenship for rights by doing their own project, as Diss High School did with a fashion show and Hampstead School by setting up a website (see Citizenship Action). Or they can visit the CBBC news page on fair trading in cocoa (see Go off on a tangent!).

1. Citizenship classes should be teaching about ‘the world as a global community’. Explain what you think this means and what sort of lessons you would like to have on it.



2. Being a citizen has an idea of listening to each other. Write a list of points showing ways you think that ‘young global citizens’ could listen to and learn from each other.