Hi, all! So I feel like I'm a logical person to start this off, and after an awesome lesson last week, I was looking forward to sharing :)
So my kids are reading an awesome play called The Visit by Fredreich Durrenmatt, which deals with a scorned woman wanting revenge on a town that exiled her 45 years ago. This led to a discussion with my seniors of the difference between justice and revenge. For HW, they had to share their thoughts on the difference between justice and revenge, and then respond to two articles about the death of Osama Bin Laden, explaining whether they thought his murder was a matter of revenge or justice.
The next day in class, the students came up with wonderfully insightful lists of qualities of justice and revenge -- it was clear the two were completely different concepts, though the kids said that we often commit acts of revenge and call them justice (like the woman in the play). However, when asked to apply their definitions to Bin Laden, they were really uncomfortable calling that act vengeance. They were determined for it to be "right," and they felt like "right" had to be "just." It was a really awesome discussion...
Anyway, to extend that, next week I'm having people from Communities for Restorative Justice come to my classes to talk to them about restorative justice practices (http://www.c4rj.com/). I'm hoping it will be an interesting introduction to an alternate way of restoring community.
I want my kids, then, to do some kind of personal writing piece around this topic. Maybe thinking about a time they were hurt, and how they responded? I don't know, but I'm thinking maybe one of you all have an idea :)
Anyway, I hope all is well... I hope we can use this blog to keep in touch and share thoughts/ideas!!
xoxo,
Laura
Love it! What a great way to tie real life into the play. I like your assignment. You could also add how they would have corrected/restored a person that they had hurt in the past to make it even more personal. Then identify a school or community problem and give restorative justice type alternatives to how the problems are dealt with. Anyway, awesome ideas and I love the blog!
ReplyDeleteooo I love the idea of thinking about community issues... like we could ask the principal for common disciplinary issues within the school, and brainstorm ways to respond using these practices, as opposed to the traditional response of suspension... ewwww I love it!
ReplyDeleteI need to flesh out the writing assignment... I'll share it when I'm done! :)
Hi Laura,
ReplyDeleteI love this blog!! Your lesson sounds great! What a difficult topic, and such a thin line between justice and revenge, at least superficially. You had a good approach in exposing the students to different views on the topic. Along those lines, philosophers on these issues such as Socrates and Plato could be explored. Another idea to make it international could be how would other cultures examine this topic, and may be even Gandhi, the Jains, etc. May be different groups could explore it from different cultural views.....now I feel like doing this lesson in my class!! I am teaching 10 weeks of ethics in Econ again, so as i write this, I am getting ideas!!
Thanks again for getting this started...miss you all!! Tazeen.
Thanks for your thoughts, guys :) Tazeen, if you know what works by Socrates and Plato, let me know!
ReplyDeleteOn a related note, my kids are watching "Long Night's Journey Into Day" next week... and I think a colleague is showing her kids, too! I'll have to let you guys know how it goes. I'm debating if the scene where you see the dead bodies on screen in court is too much -- I might just fast forward through that part? But the mothers' reactions were so powerful that I'm debating if it's worth it...