Peacemaker pop quiz. World Peace Australia.

Non-violence, find peace - World Peace Society of Australia

Peacemaker pop quiz

Objective

A beginning-of-the-semester exercise to help students orient themselves in their world and familiarize themselves with vocabulary like conflict, violence and non-violence which they will be using throughout the semester.

Activity

The exercise begins with a pop quiz over prominent figures in the world. (I usually promise and automatic A to the students who get all ten answers correct, as an incentive.) On a piece of paper, students write their answers to the following prompts:

Who are:
1. Ronald Regan
2. Donald Bradman
3. Arnold Schwarzenegger
4. Kylie Minogue
5. Lara Croft
6. Mahatma Gandhi
7.Martin Luther King, Jr
8. Mother Teresa
9. Nelson Mandela
10. Yitzhak Rabin

After reading all the names, ask the students to identify each person. The first five should be easy. The last five get tougher. You may use these suggested people or substitute your own favorite famous characters in this list. (For more ideas you can visit peace heroes to learn more about people dedicated to peacemaking.)

The following questions are helpful to ask after reading and debriefing the answers to this list:
1. Why are the first five people very familiar to us?
2. What contributions to our world do they have in common?
3. Why are we unfamiliar with the last five people on the list?
4. Are their contributions less important?
5. Why have nonviolent leaders been written out of history?
6. Create your own.

Extensions

Following a discussion of these questions, consider reading aloud in class "If We Listen Well" by Edward Guinan from the Solutions to Violence textbook.

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