The Housing Protest as an Expression of Civic Involvement

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The wave of protest that swept over Israel in the summer of 2011 is an excellent springboard for discussion in civics classes in the Israeli school system. In response to the protest, a curriculum entitled "The Housing Protest as an Expression of Civic Involvement" was developed by Dr. Ricki Tessler of the Hebrew University and Michal Barak of the Education Ministry's Center for Educational Technology. This project was developed in consultation with IDI and two additional non-profit organizations: Hakol Chinukh and Save Israeli Democracy. Additional information can be found below.

Curricular Units: The Housing Protest as an Expression of Civic Involvement

Goals

  • To familiarize students with the housing protest through the prism of social justice (fair distribution of state resources) and the prism of civic involvement (efforts to bring about change)
  • To enable students to understand the connection between the economic policy in recent years (neo-liberal) and the protest
  • To clarify issues of engagement, whether community engagement (charity), social engagement (belonging), or civic engagement (justice)
  • To encourage critical thinking regarding essential questions of public policy
  • To strengthen students' sense of competence to correct injustice and to bring about change

Contents:

  1. Lesson plan for a general discussion of the protest and its motives (elementary school and junior high school)
  2. Lesson plan for a discussion of the issues that the protest focused on: the welfare state and social economic policy (high school)
  3. Lesson plan for a discussion about protest as an act of to bring about social change and of the role of the citizen in a democracy (high school)