This article is from page 32 of the 2010-01-26 edition of The Clare People. OCR mistakes are to be expected so download the original SWF or the rendered page 32 JPG
FIRST year students from Mary Im- maculate Secondary School in Lis- doonvarna have been chosen to take part in a pilot EU project to explore the European Charter of Human Rights.
The Mind Mosaic project, which is being trialed by the Léargas group in just 13 Irish schools, aims at helping
secondary school children to come up with their own opinions about the charter. The school which does the best will win the chance to see their ideas turned into a giant mosaic by a professional artist.
‘The idea is to develop the kids un- derstanding of the European Charter of Human Rights. The charter itself is quite technical so what we have been working on is finding ways of
helping them to understand the char- ter and how it impacts on their own life,” said teacher Shane Slattery. “Over the weeks they are being asked to try and understand what the charter is about and put it into their own words. The next step is to take the words of the charter and then come back with their own ideas about it. So they might draw a picture about what freedom means to them
or write a poem about equality.”
More than 300 children are tak- ing part in the project across five EU countries. If the students in Lisdoon- varna find the course acceptable, it may be rolled out to every EU sec- ondary school in the coming years.
“We have been compiling all the work here on the display wall in- cluding the pictures and poems that the children have made. The idea 1s then that, if it’s good enough, some- one will come along and construct a physical mosaic from their work,” continued Mr Slattery.
“We have a lot of work done al- ready. Right now we are taking all of our rough work and putting them together for the mosaic. The kids re- ally like it – it’s very hands-on from their point of view. They can have discussion and really get involved in it, rather than just reading about it in a text book.
“Our job after this is also to as- sess this as an educational tool. Some parts of it are quite difficult for them to understand, like some of the words, because it is essentially a legal document.
‘“[ have been keeping a record of the progress and when we are finished I will compile a report on how we have got on with the project as a class.”