Sustainability

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Question and answer activity based on "The Children's March." (Download the Teacher's Guide here.)

Objectives
• Students will understand the concept of sustainability.
• Students will develop interview skills.

Materials
• A notebook

Framework
“Sustainability” means to hold up; to bear; to support; to provide for; to maintain; to keep going; to support the life of. What keeps people going even when the struggle seems all uphill? What keeps people from being discouraged? So discouraged they decide not to act at all? How do activists face disappointment and keep moving forward?

This lesson allows students to interview local community activists. An effective way to show students how to interview is for the teacher to model it and do an actual interview in front of the students. Invite a person who is an activist as a guest to your class, and interview him in front of the class. Next, use the following steps to help students conduct their own interviews.

Step One Planning and Setting Up the Interview
First, decide who you want to interview. Who do you know that is doing social justice work in your family or community? Who is involved in something that you are interested in doing? If you are interested in environmentalism, for instance, then interview an environmentalist or someone actively involved in the issue.

Step Two Arranging the Interview
People are delighted to be asked about their selves. And since you’re a student, many people feel it’s a kind of public service to talk with you. So don’t be nervous about calling or asking a busy person for some of her time. When you introduce yourself to arrange the interview, give a short description of your project. Keep in mind that the person you are interviewing is donating his time to you. Be sure to call ahead and arrange a specific time for the interview. Be on time. Bring all your materials and express thanks when the interview is over.

Step Three Preparing Questions in Advance
Take care in composing your questions because they are the key to a successful interview. Open-ended questions give the respondents range and flexibility and usually generate anecdotes, personal revelations and expressions of attitudes. Examples:

• I wonder if you would take a few minutes to tell me something about your early days in the movement of (social justice issue)? I’d be interested to hear about how you got started in the movement, what your aspirations were and what problems you have faced and how you deal with them.
• Tell me about a time you were (name an emotion).
• What did you do when (name an event) happened?

The best questions allow the subject to talk freely. Once in a while you may want to pose a question to clarify the conversation. An example: “Let me see if I have this right,” or “Am I correct in saying that you felt . . . ?”

Step Four Taking Notes During the Interview
Your goal is to gather information and record a few good quotations and anecdotes. It’s better to listen more than take notes. Jot down a few quotations, key words and phrases to jog your memory later. How someone says something may be as important as what they say. Notice the textures of gesture, physical appearance, verbal inflection, facial expression, dress, hairstyle, body language and anything else that makes the person an individual.

Step Five Reflecting on the Interview
After the interview, find a quiet place to reflect on it and review your notes. There is so much happening during the interview that this reflection time is important. Spend at least a half hour adding to your notes. Consider:
• What did you learn?
• What surprised you most?
• How did the interview change your attitude or understanding about the person or place?
• How would you summarize your main impressions of the person?
• How did this interview influence your plans to interview others or to reinterview this person?
• What do you want to learn from these next interviews?

Step Six Class Presentations
Present what you learned from your interview with the class.