Teachers Guide: A Lesson Plan for Deepening Mutual Respect and Understanding
The Day’s Theme: How to deepen mutual respect and understanding across lines of faith and culture.
Objectives: To take concrete steps towards building a more diverse community. By the end of this lesson students will:
- Reflect on how to engage Muslims in their local community
- Identify actions steps that can implement lessons learned during these sessions
- Computer
- LED projector with screen and sound capability, depending on the size of your group
- Newsprint and markers
Preparation and Procedure:
1. To prepare for this session, watch Land Called Paradise and Soul Mechanic on ChangeTheStory.net. Also, review the contacting change makers and the service projects pages on ChangeTheStory.net for ideas as to how to bring the principles learned in your time together from theory to practice.
2. Learn about a significant new report, released in September 2008 that points to strategies for building bridges between Muslims and non-Muslims at the national and international levels.
3. Finally, go to Dialogues for Peace to learn how to host a living room dialogue in your community. Write down ideas and resources and be prepared to share them with the class.
4. Before the class gathers, write on newsprint “E Pluibus Unum,” which means “Out of Many, One” and which is the motto of the United States.
5. As students enter the room, invite them to write one word on the newsprint that best describes this phrase to them.
6. Once all have gathered, discuss the various words on the newsprint. In what ways do their lives reflect this motto? How have we as a society fallen short of this challenge? What are some of the lessons learned in this class that address the underlying meaning of this motto?
7. Then watch Soul Mechanic. How does Mahmood shatter stereotypes? How does he express his faith in action? How to others react to him? What emotions does this video evoke in the viewer?
8. On newsprint, invite members of the class to offer ways that they can translate the principles they have learned during these past four sessions into concrete action. Offer some ideas from your research but let the students take the lead. As ideas emerge, ask for volunteers to get together at a future time to implement an action plan.
9. Allow five minutes at the end of your class. Thank everyone for their participation and conclude your time together by watching, Land Called Paradise.
