Ways to Work for Peace

in the Classroom

The year 2000 is the ELCA year of Education for Nonviolence. Children and young people in the United States and around the world have not been spared the pain and suffering of violence right at home and in school as well as the horrors of war. The schools and centers of the ELCA have a wonderful opportunity to participate in the Peace Education effort for the benefit of the children and families with whom we are in ministry.

This series of activities is geared at the preschool or elementary classroom. It provides ways to work with the children in your class at sharing peace in their classroom. Read through the suggestions and resources to find the ones that best suit your classroom situation. You and your students can both benefit from working at peace together.

    1. Explore the lives of peacemakers such as Jesus, Johnny Appleseed, Martin Luther King Jr., or Jane Addams by reading to the children about their lives. You could then create a big book with class stories of these peacemakers. The book should end with each of the children in the class being a peacemaker and showing what they can do to be a peacemaker. Add these child pages to your Peace Big Book.
    2. Read Best Friends by Steven Kellogg or Feelings by Aliki. These are great books to start a discussion about feelings and how to deal with them. Children need to know that feelings are okay even bad feelings. Discuss the different feelings in the books and record them in a feelings word bank. Encourage the children to talk, write, or draw about a feeling that they have had (good or bad). Make sure that you stress the excellent opportunity to talk to your children about war and discover their feelings about why wars happen. It also opens an opportunity to importance of making sure we care about others feelings too.
    3. The Butter Battle Book by Dr. Suess. This is an excellent book about the nature of war. The Zooks and the Yooks each butter their bread on a different side and this causes an arms race and finally a confrontation between the two sides. Everyone is left wondering who will drop the first bomb. This book creates a perfect time to discuss that people don't always get along. Take this opportunity to discuss some of the ways that countries don't always get along. This book also opens discussions about issues within a country that can cause an almost war like atmosphere such as the issue of race relations.
    4. Use ideas from the publication Let's Talk About Living In A World With Violenceby James Garbarino. It is available from the Erikson Institute, 420 North Wabash Ave., Chicago, IL 60611. This book is part of a continuing research project by the Erikson Institute focused on families and children learning to cope with the impact of violence on their lives.
    5. Create with your class a word bank for each of the following areas:
      What are words that make your think about violence?
      What are the feelings that you have when someone is violent towards you?
      Who can you talk to about violence?
      After the children have made their word banks would be a good time to have a counselor, social worker, or psychologist come and talk with the children about violence and how it effects them. The word banks would be a good starting point for how the children feel about violence in their lives.
    6. Create a Peace wall in your classroom. Collect various sized boxes and cover them with plain colored paper. Have the children cut out pictures of people from around the world and glue them to the boxes. Use them as building blocks of peace in your classroom by creating a wall of people.
    7. Talk to your children about how they will be God's peacemakers in the future. Talk about how it will one day be their responsibility to bring and keep peace in God's world. Create with your class peace poles to help them remember what God wants them to do. Use paper covered carpet roles. Christmas tree stand work to keep them upright. Let the children decorate the poles with symbols and words of peace. This should be used as a cooperative activity. The group should also experience the peaceful process of working and making decisions with one another. Use the poles as discussion starters.
    8. Discuss with your children the beatitudes found in Matthew 5:1-12. The purpose of this lesson is to show the children that there is hope in the world. That they have a calling from God to help the poor and oppressed to a better life through Christ. This will also give them hope for themselves as disciples of Christ.
    9. Research the Native American Mandala Design. Talk with the children about how this design was used by Native Americans to remind us that we all live in harmony with God's creation. Help each of the children create their own Mandala Design. Get them talking about how their design will help them to remember to live in peace with all of God's creation.
    10. Teach your children the song Shalom. Use the following actions and consider sharing this song of peace with your congregation at a Sunday worship service.
      Shalom my friends - Partners bring palms together in front of their chest as if in prayer.
      Shalom my friends - Repeat the action above.
      Shalom - Keeping palms together , move hands up an outward to form a complete circle.
      Shalom - Each partner brings their hands back to a folded position in front of their chest.
      May peace be with you - Partners bow head, hands, and upper bodies towards each other.
      May peace be with you - Repeat the action above.
      Shalom - Each person repeats the circular movement from above.
      Shalom - Cross hands over chest, touching fingertips to opposite shoulders.
    11. Create with your class a peace quilt. Use muslin squares sized according to the number of children in your class. You can use puffy paints, fabric crayons or permanent markers. Encourage the children to express their feelings about peace in their peace square. Find a parent to sew the quilt together. You can also use construction paper and tie it together with ribbon or yarn.
    12. Play with your class the Broken Squares simulation. This will help the children in your class cooperate to group solve a problem. It helps students see how they work together in a group to solve a problem. The simulation can be found in Peace - A Thematic Unit by Teacher Created Materials - Primary edition, 1994.