Guidlines for Deaf Schools by FSSA

Guidelines for Deaf Schools
Written by FSSA Editorial Team
Wednesday, 10 May 2006
Working at a Deaf school? Children interested into the protest? Here are some ideas and topics of discussion that can be related to the Gallaudet protest and the updates that come.

• Ways to peacefully disagree
• First amendment
• Fairness
• Respect
• What is an Ally?
• What mean to take responsibility?

Quotes to discuss

• "Peace is not the absence of conflict but the presence of Justice" Martin Luther King Jr.
• "Violence is anything that denies human integrity, and leads to hopelessness and helplessness." Martin Luther King Jr.

Activity ideas

• Create a mural of your diverse community
• Poetry writing about social justice, community, self
• Role playing conflict resolution and peaceful disagreements
• Create signs and posters for a rally about first amendment rights
• Create a commercial about freedom of speech, first amendment, diversity, what is deaf, how to voice your opinion
• Develop a collective text (all write together)
• Collage
• Develop a Bill of Rights
• Create a comic strip
• Analyze a piece of literature or text from class for racial, class, social bias and or stereotypes
• Review the Deaf Child's Bill of Rights (www.nad.org/deafchildrights) what would you change, what do you agree with? How would you revise it? If you agree with it how could you work to get it recognized in your area?
• Organize a "Day of Respect" at your school,
• Brainstorm ways to show respect
• Make a class "I Am" book (see Alma Flor Ada and F. Isabel Campoy's book Authors in the Classroom)
• Draw a picture of, tell a story about or write a description of someone who is a strong ally.
• Create a story or book about "how it is and how it could be"

Resources
• www.rethinkingschools.com
• Ada, A. F. and Campoy, F. I. (2004). Authors in the Classroom: A Transformative Education Process. Boston: Pearson publishers (www.ablongman.com )

Children's books for discussion

• Swimmy by Leo Lionni• The Red Comb by Fernando Pico
• The Streets are Free by Kurusa