''Have You Ever?''
''Peace is its own reward.''
Mahatma Gandhi
It stands to reason that peacebuilding is a lengthy and active process, and it requires ongoing effort and action. In that sense, English classes are at the heart of peacebuilding as they seem to be a place that enables the students to
- participate in peacebuilding both individually and collectively,
- develop critical thinking skills,
- use negotiation to manage conflict,
- build relationships,
- communicate effectively,
- etc.
Therefore, it is essential that EFL/ESL teachers arrange their classrooms in an organized way and frame suitable conversations with students to contribute to peace. To accomplish these goals, teachers must prepare appropriate materials, activities, lesson plans, and use various teaching strategies and approaches.
Considering this explanation, I am here to define one of the activities I've chosen for peacebuilding by explaining the underlying reasons.
First off, I used an activity similar to ''Have You Ever?'' activity for pedagogical purposes. As I noted before, I am currently working as a part-time teacher in a private language school. In this school, I also teach English, based on four core skills (Listening, Speaking, Reading & Writing), to high school students. In each unit, the students internalize the grammar pattern through the help of contextualized sentences. Following this schedule, we touched upon a grammatical subject entitled ''Present Perfect Tense'' about two weeks ago. To practice this structure, I used an activity called ''Find Someone Who!'' which is quite similar to ''Have You Ever?''. In my activity, I distributed one activity handout to each learner. Then, the students stood and found different classmates to interview. When a classmate answered ''Yes'', the interviewer wrote the classmate’s name and recorded additional information. For example:
A: Have you ever cried during a sad movie?
B: Yes, I have.
A: (writes classmate’s name in the box) What was the movie about?
B: It was about a boy and a dog called Lassie.
A: (writes this information in the box)
As a wrap-up activity, I had my learners sit down in pairs or groups of three and share the information they collected. Finally, I elicited any especially interesting information my learners discovered.
When it comes to social justice goals, (as stated on the website) this activity aimed to help the students explore the value of knowing and appreciating similarities and differences within a group. I would also use ''Have you ever?'' activity to reinforce the same grammatical structure. Apart from the educational side, this activity would encourage the students to make connections to their lives. As Pillai (2007) lists, these types of activities would help shy students to strike a conversation by:
- developing communication skills and team building,
- breaking cultural barriers among students,
- promoting a sense of trust and friendship among them,
- encouraging and preparing them to learn by stimulating their minds or their bodies.
Furthermore, the students would experience and learn different perspectives as a result of the interviews. The process of dialogue would contribute significantly to the classroom climate, prompting an open mind, and developing active listening skills. By using this interactive activity, I could encourage students to make decisions about how they would act when faced with a crashing opinion.
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