Wednesday 7 May 2014

Israel and Palestine Conflict: Timeline

As part of our awareness day for second year students on the conflict in Israel and Palestine, we created a timeline of key event in the conflict and asked students to line up in chronological order. This was our result although unfortunately we are missing one photo! 
 
Displaying photo8.jpg

1897-1930s

Displaying photo7.jpg

1948- 1967

Displaying photo6.jpg

1993- 2010

Displaying photo9.jpg

Our Awareness Day

       Displaying photo4.jpg

        On 2nd May, we had an awareness day in Mount Temple for the second years about Israel and Palestine as before the Schools Across Borders program, we had never known about the conflict so we wanted to pass on the knowledge we had gotten. Firstly, pairs from our class went to each 2nd year form and gave a presentation to them about Israel and Palestine, finishing off with a quiz.We then all gathered in Mount Temple Hall. Our YAP class had been split into groups and each group was given an activity to complete.

Displaying photo4.jpg

Fact Game

       One activity was located on the stage. Myself and Darragh formed a circle with 20 2nd years and we had a foam ball. I started by saying one fact I learned today about Israel and Palestine, then threw the ball to someone else in the circle. They then had to state another fact or piece of information they had learned from the powerpoint, and pass the ball. However if someone dropped the ball, they would have to recite all the information said before them.


        The aim of this was repetition, so that when they left they would have a better chance of remembering what they had learned. I was also really fun, because the longer the ball hadn’t been dropped, the more facts that were said, so no one wanted to have to say all of them.


Displaying photo3.jpgDisplaying photo2.jpgDisplaying photo1.jpg

The Art Station

        After each 2nd year class was given our presentation on Israel and Palestine, they were brought down to the hall in groups of twenty or so, to take part in the various activity stations. The main aim of these stations were to educate the 2nd years on Global issues and create a fun, hands on environment for them to learn about what we’ve been doing over the past few weeks.

       One of the activities was set up on the floor of the hall. A long sheet of paper was laid across the length of the hall and groups of 4 or 5 2nd years were brought over to sit around it. Markers, crayons, and pencils were provided in cups for the 2nd years to take and draw on the paper with. We told them to draw what being a global citizen means to them, and what they think of when they hear ‘Global issues’, ‘Global citizenship’. The activity was a success as they had some really creative ideas and it was apparent that they had learn a great deal from all of the other stations. Below are some of the things written on the sheet.
Displaying image.jpeg








Displaying image.jpeg


Displaying image.jpeg

Painting Masks

       Another activity provided to the 2nd years was painting or drawing on masks. This activity involved providing the 2nd years with masks and asking them to draw on the masks what global citizenship means to them.We split them into groups and told them to design the mask in sections with the general theme of "global citizenship". This was really successful and helped us see what their opinions were on global citizenship.
Displaying photo1.jpg

Face Painting


       To raise awareness we painted the second year’s faces using red, blue, yellow and green. We took them in groups of fifteen and we just did two simple stripes on each side of their faces. We painted their faces because people who didn’t hear the talk would ask why their faces are painted and they would then tell them about conflict in the West Bank and The Gaza Strip. Most of the second years really enjoyed this.




Petition Signing

        During the time in the hall, two TY students took ten second years at a time down to the computer room. We brought five in and left five outside. The five in the computer room, with the help of a TY student, signed a petition about the Gaza strip to send to Eamon Gilmore, Minister of Foreign Affairs and Trade. Meanwhile, the TY student standing outside with the five waiting students briefly explained the petition and what they’d be doing.

       Once all five had signed the petition, the TY in the computer room would send them back up to the hall with the other TY, who would then collect ten more and bring them down to the computer room. The five second years who had been waiting would go in and sign the petition in the meantime.


T       he petition signing was a great success. Overall, we got around twenty signatures, and we would have gotten more if there hadn’t been such a time constraint. You can sign our petition here:http://www.schoolsacrossborders.org/palestine/


Displaying photo5.jpg

Trip to Ghana!

       In February, a group of people from our year went to Ghana on an educational trip. While there, they experienced a cultural exchange and learned about the people and their views on important topics. Over in Ghana, they saw a few things which reminded them of the Youth Action Project and global citizenship which you can see below.
Displaying photo1.jpg


Displaying photo4.jpg

Skyping With Bosnians

        A few weeks ago our class had planned to skype a class from Bosnia and talk a little bit to them about the work they were doing and what things were like over with them. Unfortunately however, there was a mix up in the timewe had arranged as the hour had gone back for the spring equinox and we ended up missing our available time slot with them and most of the class left to go to their next class.

      A few of us stayed back after class though to get a chance to talk to them and we finally got through to them. Luck was not on our side though as our internet was too slow to actually skype them on video.

      We decided to just message them on skype and ask them our questions through a live chat. Although the internet was a bit slow we found this worked well. We asked them about their school and what they hoped to do in the future. We found out that their education system is different to ours, with students taking classes like pediatrics and even gynacology. They asked us some questions too and overall it was very interesting to talk live to this class in particular because they were the same class that we had sent our surveys too.

      We talked for about forty minutes before we had to leave for our next class, but it was definitely worth our while as we were able to understand that they're normal teenagers just like us and that they shouldn't be stereotyped just because their country has had some troubles in the past.

Displaying photo3.jpg

The people in our class that were Skyping with the Bosnians.


Displaying DSCN0154.JPG

The Bosnians we were Skyping with.

Tuesday 6 May 2014

Political context to Ukrainian conflict:


This map illustrates very effectively the political divide that was present in Ukraine prior to the recent conflict. The Blue parts of the map indicate where the majority vote was with Yanukovych, a pro-Russian leader of state, who was the most recent elected president of Ukraine. The yellow indicates majority support for Tymoshenko, who was a more progressive leader. 
Note also the almost perfect geographical consistency of votes, with the East of Ukraine, the side closer to Russia, is majority Yanukovych, while the West, closer to Europe, is majority Tymoshenko.


Our Petition

       As part of our NGO, we have been distributing a petition written to our Minister Eamon Gilmore (Minister for Foreign Affairs & Trade) about Ireland's stance on the Palestinian and Israeli conflict. Along with St Dominic's school, we are trying to get to 500 signatories and would hugely appreciate your help. Below is a link to the webpage where you can read our petition as well as signing it. We would really like to raise awareness about the current situation and would hugely appreciate your help so get sharing, tweeting, blogging, etc about it!

Our Petition: http://www.schoolsacrossborders.org/palestine/       
           



     

World affairs update in video:


Here are some videos we researched about current affairs and issues from countries around the world:

VENEZUELA: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Ddc7fLeDXoo

NIGERIA:        https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TFs4Ug6eSZY
                        https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7U5U9U7A82o

UKRAINE:      https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-QP6sM5VnUQ


We will keep you updated with more material as these stories develop in the near future.

Our NGO: Mount Temple Youth Action Project

       As a part of the Schools Across Borders program, we were asked to form our own NGO. An NGO is a Non-Governmental Organisation which means we get no funding from the State. Below is our list of staff and their roles in our NGO.

Chair People: Tariq Awad
                   : Hazel English

Treasurer: Lucy Hattaway

Secretaries: Lydia McCann
                 : Aifric Prior- Beliere

Press Officers: Lochlann Atack                           
                            
: Hazel Doyle
                     : Amy- May O'Shea
                     : Ciara Shevlin

        Next we had to decide on what our logo would be for our NGO and as a class, we discussed what kind of things we thought it should represent and the things it would need aesthetically. 

 




We chose this logo as we felt it represented what we wanted for our NGO: to raise awareness of global citizenship and inform others of the troubles worldwide. 

                         
                           


     

Making Awareness Day Posters


       We've been preparing for the Awareness Day that we will hold for 2nd Years after Easter. Some of our class have been making posters for the awareness day. 



Making our "YAP" poster.


We also worked on the surveys as well as posters about Israel and Palestine.



We made a timeline of the Palestine and Israel conflict.



Friday 11 April 2014

Making Awareness Day Posters



We've been preparing for the Awareness Day that we will hold for 1st and 2nd Years after Easter. Some of our class have been making posters.


Displaying photo4.jpg


Displaying photo3.jpg

Displaying photo2.jpg

Displaying photo1.jpg

Thursday 10 April 2014

Palestine

Displaying Mount Temple School-SAB 014 copy.jpg





2 weeks ago,Fatin Al Tamimi ,who is part of the Palestinian community living in Ireland,came to speak to our class about Palestine and the conflict between Palestinians and Israelis.

Fatin told us that the European Jewish colonization of Palestine began about a century ago and in 1948,the state of Israel was formed. That year,750,000 Palestinian refugees were removed from former Palestinian territories. 

As of 2010,there were 7.1 million Palestinian refugees. 6.6 million of whom are living outside of the occupied Palestinian territories. Often, 3 generations of Palestinian families are refugees. An area in the occupied territories called the West Bank has some refugees camps. Fatin told us about her own family, her parents live in Jordan and she holds a Jordanian passport. However,her sister lives in the Gaza Strip with her Palestinian husband. Fatin has never met her nieces and nephews who cannot get a passport because they are Palestinian and it is extremely difficult for her sister,who also holds a Jordanian passport, to travel to and from the Gaza Strip.

We also spoke to Akef, who was born in Ireland to Palestinian parents. He spoke about what it was like for Palestinian children and teenagers growing up in the occupied Palestinian territories.

This is a video that Akef,shared with us:
 https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=js-m5DdG1kA

It shows the difficult journey that Palestinian children have to do to go to school


We all found Fatin's visit very interesting




Wednesday 9 April 2014

Bosnian Survey

Our class wrote a survey which we sent to students in Bosnia. We didn't know much about Bosnia except that there was some kind of conflict there during the 90's . In the survey, we asked questions about school in Bosnia and asked what they know about Ireland.

 Mount Temple Comprehensive Schools Across Borders Questionnaire

Q1. What age were you when you started school?
We started school when we were 6 years old.

Q2. What age will you be when you finish school?
We will be 19.

Q3. What types of subjects and exams are you doing?
We are coming from different schools so it is different for us.

Q4. What facilities does your school have?
We have cabinets, space for PE, reading room, kitchen, art studio, radio.

Q5. How do you get to and from school? How long does it take?
Luka, Nemanja, Milica: we use a bus
Mladen: On the bike
Ivana and Ena: by foot

Q6. What job/s would you be interested in doing after school?
Milica: to work in Library
Luka: some interesting internship
Ena and Nemanja: volunteering
Ivana: cooking and I go to school of foreign languages


Q7. What type of music do you listen to?
Ivana: Irish, traditional music
Luka and Milica: everything
Nemanja: everything but metal music
Ena: Indy rock
Mladen: jazz, blues

 Q8. What social networking sites do you use?
Facebook, twiter, youtube, google +, tumblr

Q9. What sports do you play?
Nemanja: football
Ena: pilates, aerobic
Mladen: fencing/sword play

Q10. Do you ever hear about Ireland in the media? What impression has it given you?
We learn about it in school, it looks green and beautiful. Also we hear about in media but not too often.

Q11. What impression do you think the media put out about your country? Would you like to change this impression?
People still think here is war, that there are no roads, that we are separatist, I general people have very negative picture.

Q12. How are teenagers viewed in your country?
“Children without a clue”, “We should only go to school”

Q13. Do you feel women and men have equal rights in your country?
Situation could be better, but it is moving in that direction. 

Monday 7 April 2014

Update on Russian/ Crimean Crisis



This is a recent news bulletin from Vice News detailing the current conflict in the Crimean Peninsula. Vice provides regular and accurate updates via their YouTube channel on a number of current political and ethnic conflicts around the world such as Venezuela.

Did You Know?


Our Logo:


This is our logo, this logo encapsulates in a simple rendering of the world, what society is for us.

Wednesday 2 April 2014

CONCERN TALK : SYRIA




Recently,someone from our class organised for a speaker to come. On the 13th of March, Liam Bernard from Concern came to our school to talk to us about Syria. We all had a varying degree of knowledge about the conflict and wanted to know more.

Firstly we learned about Concern:



It is a neutral, non-political organisation 
    It has operations in 25 countries , with 70% being in Sub - Saharan Africa
          • They work on the humanity imperative, dealing with people as humans rather than judging them by their religious views etc.
          • Concern have 190 staff in Ireland 
          • 89.9% of their expenditure is on development while 10% goes on fundraising and administrative costs.
          • They mainly work on health, education and emergencies




    Concern's work in Syria:

    Concern have been working in Syria for the past 3 years, mostly with Syrian refugees who have fled to Lebanon. 9 million people need assistance.

    Concern have set up a sanitation programme in one town but have only been able to access the town twice in a month. 24 people were killed in an attack. 

    Since the beginning of the conflict, some people have only received aid once because they often need to apply for access and rely on village elders in some towns. Humanitarian vehicles are very obvious making it harder for them to access towns.

    Concern has been working on housing Syrian refugees in Lebanon through turning unused buildings into family homes .This provides Syrians refugees a safe, rent-free place to live. Concern have also been providing clean water and purification tablets and building sewage systems. Concern's work also benefits the locals in Lebanon.





    TRÓCAIRE TALK: PALESTINE AND ISRAEL

    On the 20th of March, we had a speaker from Trócaire come in to talk about the conflict between Palestine and Israel as arranged by someone in the class. Shane came in and spoke to us about living in Palestine as he had first hand experience of this and also about the conflict that has been going on for years now. Here's what he told us:

    • Despite most maps only showing Israel, Palestine is in fact its own country.
    • There is a long running dispute between the Palestinians and the Israelis as it is the Israelis belief that Palestine's land should belong to Israel. 
    • This conflict goes all the way back to the late 1800s but is mainly caused by the UN's Partition Plan which gave 55% of Palestinian land to "a Jewish state". 
    • Since 1947, Israel has slowly but surely been taking over more and more Palestinian land each year and Shane showed us a video that Trócaire made to highlight the land that has been taken forcibly.
    • The conflict is ongoing and at this time, it looks like a resolution is not close to fruition.
    • Due to Palestine not being recognised as a "real" country, citizens cannot obtain passports therefore cannot leave the country. 

      Shane then showed us a video produced by Trócaire on the topic of Stolen Land.


  • After a chat and discussion, we went over to school hall and talked about the conflict together and our views. Shane asked us to throw a ball around and to say the first thing that came to our mind when we heard the words "Palestine" and "Israel". It was upsetting to hear that the first thought that most of us had was something that related to the conflicts and we talked about how we would feel if we thought that was all our own country was associated with. 

    We sat down in a circle and each picked a picture. We had to hold the picture to the group and individually, we told the group of what we thought was going on in the picture. We then found out what actually was going on in the pictures. Lastly, we worked on a timeline of the conflict. 
    After the talk, we all felt like we'd learned a lot and we could see the conflict from both sides. 
    Thank you to Shane and all at Trócaire for their help and information! 






  • Wednesday 19 March 2014

    An Introduction to the Mount Temple Youth Action Project


    Mount Temple Comprehensive School is a mixed school in North County Dublin in Clontarf. There are around 800 students in our school and we are a non-uniform school.There is a huge emphasis on tolerance, appreciation of diversity and respect for others in accordance to our school ethos of "
    All of us are different, all of us are equal." 

    Mount Temple run a hugely successful TY programme with around 150 students and the Youth Action Project is one of many modules offered in our school. There is a group of over 20 of us who have been working this year on learning about global citizenship and social injustice around the world. This year, we have been working with Schools Across Borders which is an organisation working towards raising awareness amongst young people about 
    global injustice and inequality issues worldwide.

    This blog is where we will post any progress reports and updates on what we've been doing such as our upcoming awareness day where we plan to put on a play as well as other activities and setting up our own non-governmental organisation (NGO). We will also be posting about events happening worldwide which we find interesting or wish to raise awareness about as well as discussing our beliefs and ideas.

    We look forward to working on this blog further and hope you enjoy it as much as we will!