Democracy Debate 2020
Lesson: PSHE and citizenship
Class: Y6 Year: 2020 - 2021
Every year during Democracy Week, the Local Authority organises a Junior Democracy Debate for representatives from year six classes throughout all the primary schools in St Helens
This year, they still wanted to help give the opportunity to primary aged children to learn about democracy and have the opportunity to debate.
This week, our Year 6 class have taken part in this activity - led by their Rights-Respecting Schools Ambassadors. They were given 10 topics to think about and choose the 4 which they were the most interested in. The following were chosen:
1.Leisure and culture Art, sport and music are great for mental and physical health. Lots of services which give young people an opportunity to take part in leisure and culture are at risk of closing.
2. Improve places to go and things to do for young people Young people should be involved in deciding what youth activities and services should be available.
3. Access to technology and broadband for learning More learning is happening online but not all young people have access to the right technology and broadband. If learning becomes a mixture of classroom and online then all young people need access technology and broadband.
4. Homelessness COVID-19 might make renting and owning a home less secure, so plans should be in place and money available to ensure nobody becomes homeless.
Each group spent time discussing the key issues around each topic then presented to their classmates - who asked them questions. Each child then cast a vote as to the topic that they felt mattered the most to them - this was homelessness. The children discussed some points and had some interesting ideas - it was impressive to hear them link their discussions to the rights of the child and human rights.
The RRS Ambassadors will feed this back at their next meeting and this will be a focus for discussion and actions moving forward. The results were also sent to the Town Hall, who will collate the results and feedback from all schools across the LA.
