Citizenship: Developing good relationships and respecting the differences between people (KS1)

Use and adapt the game from the 'Differences are great' assembly: www.assemblies.org.uk/2001/sept01_difference.html

• Stress the importance of fairness. Was the game fair? Why not?
  
  
• Can the children come up with examples of unfairness? How can we be more 'fair' to people today?
  
  
• Take examples from the children of when they might say, 'It's not fair'. Use 'before and after' role play to enact the unfair situation and then to show how it can be made more fair.

Use some of the material in the 'Mending friendships' assembly: www.assemblies.org.uk/2001/july01_friends.html

• Depending on the age and experience of the class you could use points 1 and 2. If the children are capable, describe and then ask three to enact the short scene in points 3 and 4.
  
  
• Introduce the TRUST acronym:
  
  Thinking about what has gone wrong - what had gone wrong?
  Respecting other people - how do they feel?
  Understanding other people's points of view.
  Saying sorry - so that others know we want to mend a friendship.
  Talking together - helps to keep friends together.
  
  Talk about each point together and then see how much the children can remember. Relate it to the story/drama.
  
  Can they remember the acronym and try to use it during the day?

Use the ideas in the 'Feelings: Outside hurt and inside hurt' assembly: www.assemblies.org.uk/2004/may04_feelings.php

• You could set up a first aid corner for soft toys in the classroom so that children can practise dealing with 'outside hurts', and also use helpful and comforting words to support 'outside healing' with 'inside healing'.
  
  
• Go through the poem together:

  Grazes heal, scars outside disappear,
  Soreness and bruises fade away.
  In hours, days or even weeks
  New skin grows so that
  No one knows where the hurt has been.
  
  Hurt feelings, scars inside unseen,
  The hurt remains and even grows
  For hours, days, weeks and maybe years.
  It hides in us, locked in a secret place
  To which we only have the key.

• Talk together about how you can stop people getting 'inside hurts': thinking before you speak, being kind, thinking about other people.
  
  
• How can the children help to heal 'inside hurts'? Talking and listening to each other, making friends, being helpful, looking to see if anyone is left out.

Use the game/example from the 'Long spoons' assembly: www.assemblies.org.uk/2002/jan02_spoon.html

• This well-known example demonstrates the value of working and playing together; how we need other people to get things done.
  
  
• Enjoy the game, giving several pupils the opportunity to work together, using the spoons to feed each other.
  
  
• Make a class display called 'Working together', bounded by the long spoons top and bottom. Include examples from sports teams, singing and the arts, and any activities where the children need to cooperate.

In Citizenship:-
Developing Confidence and Responsibility KS1
Preparing to play an active role as citizens KS1
Developing a healthy safer lifestyle KS1
Developing good relationships respecting differences KS1
In the media - what's the news? KS2
Children's rights - human rights KS2
Citizenship material for Secondary
Go back to Resources