Lesson 2

1. Listening comprehension

Watch the video and answer these questions:

• Where is Malala from?
• What did she start doing when she was 11?
• She was in hospital. What happened?
• What is she doing now?

2. Word search

Read these quotes by Malala. Then find the words in bold in the word puzzle.

1.“One child, one teacher, one book, and one pen, can change the world.”

2.“When the whole world is silent, even one voice becomes powerful.”

3. “Let us make our future now, and let us make our dreams tomorrow's reality.”

4. “I think that the best way to solve problems and to fight is through dialogue, is through peaceful way, but for me the best way to fight against terrorism and extremism is just simple thing: educate the next generation.”

5. “I truly believe the only way we can create global peace is through not only educating our minds, but our hearts and our souls.”

6. “I have the right of education. I have the right to play. I have the right to sing. I have the right to talk. I have the right to go to market. I have the right to speak up.”

3. Human rights defenders

In groups of 3-4, match the name with the photo and a short biography of people who have fought for human rights. You have to match the name with the photo and the description.
Stress that they do not have to understand everything, just find the important facts.

Question: All of these people were awarded the Nobel Peace Prize except one. Who?

Nelson Mandela

Son of a tribe chief in South Africa, he became involved in a political group that opposed the white minority regime. But their activities were prohibited and they started to support using arms. 

He was arrested and sentenced to life imprisonment. He stayed in prison from 1964 to 1990, when he became a rallying point for South Africa's oppressed, and the world's most famous political prisoner.

He and President de Klerk did much to dismantle the institutions of apartheid, and shared the Nobel Peace Prize in 1993.

Adapted from: Nobel Prize and History Nelson Mandela









Rigoberta Menchú

She grew up in Guatemala, a country marked by extreme violence. She fought for women’s rights and for better conditions for farm workers. Several members of her own family were killed by the army because they opposed the regime.

She had to flee to Mexico in the early 1980s, where she contacted European groups that were working for human rights in Latin America. Later, she helped reach peace agreement between the government and the guerrilla organizations.

She became a UN Ambassador for the world's indigenous peoples.

Adapted from: Nobel Prize


 
 

Martin Luther King Jr.

He dreamt that all inhabitants of the United States would be judged by their personal qualities and not by the color of their skin. In 1955 he began his struggle against the racial discrimination in the southern states.

He agreed with Gandhi's philosophy of nonviolence. In 1963, he gave his famous "I have a dream" speech. The following year, a law prohibited all racial discrimination.

But he had many opponents – some powerful and some anonymous. In April 1968 he was murdered by a white racist.

Adapted from: Nobel Prize


 

Mahatma Gandhi

He was born in India into a privileged caste and he was fortunate to receive an education.

In 1893, he went to work in South Africa and he became aware of the injustice of the ‘apartheid’ system (which segregated the black and the white).

He believed that non-violent civil protest can achieve a real political attitude. When he returned to India in 1916, he fought to achieve India’s independence from the British Empire. Many people opposed his peaceful ways and he was finally murdered.

Adapted from History Gandhi

 

Mother Teresa

At the age of twelve, the Catholic Albanian girl Agnes Gonxha Bojaxhiu heard a call. God asked her to devote her life to Him. She became a nun and was sent to Calcutta in India to be a teacher. She changed her name.

In India she received a second call from God: to help the poor and live among them. She founded a new sisterhood, Missionaries of Charity. She and her helpers built homes for orphans, nursing homes for lepers and hospices for the terminally ill in Calcutta.

Adapted from: Nobel Prize

Malala Yousafzai

When she was a child in Pakistan, the Taliban began attacking girls' schools. She became an advocate for girls' education, and in 2009 she began blogging for the BBC about living under the Taliban's threats to deny her an education. That resulted in the Taliban issuing a death threat against her.

In 2012 she was shot in the head, but she survived, and has continued to speak out on the importance of education. In 2014 she became the youngest person to receive the Nobel Peace Prize.

Adapted from: Biography Malala

4. Activity for homework 

You have to find another example of how the social networks can change a situation. It can be a blog, a group who raise awareness through Twitter... In the last few years there have been many cases.


You can see other activities for the motivation stage, created by our classmates, here and here.

Activities created by Álvaro Arrabal Esgueva and Noemí Alonso Cid.