Human Nature refers to the distinct way humans act, think, and feel naturally. But human nature could simply be an excuse to our actions because we don’t know if there truly are fixed characteristics, what these natural characteristics are, and what causes them.
In Humanities this unit we are reading Lord Of The Flies by William Golding. This novel is a great representation of our human nature and how it affects us. Are human nature is something that could bring us together or tear us apart.
Our project for this unit is The Great Debate Podcast. Two teams of around 4 students will be debating against eachother about a statement that ties in to what we have been learning this term.
To start things of interesting our teacher got us to pick the teams! Knowing us as a class this wasn’t going to go down well so there were a few rules.
- There will be around 5 groups.
- Each group has to be co-ed, that is at least one male and one female in each group
- Every student must agree on the groups that are created
- Every group should have a variety of people who have different strengths and weaknesses
- Write down the groups on a sheet of paper, with every student’s name in class listed on the sheet.
- The class will submit a written explanation of their choices.
- Every student will sign their name on the back of the sheet,
verifying that they agree with the groups selected.
We were all very nervous for this experiment, but in the end we had 6 good groups that most people were happy with.
Afterwards we reflected on how everyone reacted differently to this experiment and if it was an example of human nature.
My group ended up being Lucas, Claire and Aiden. I was happy with this group because we all had different skills and I knew we would work well together.
The First thing we did as a team was make a team name. We decided on the New York Islanders because it relates to the LOTF (Lord Of The Flies) and us because most of us like hockey.
In our teams we were able to get points by being on time to class, cleaning garbage, having our iPad charged and more.
As we continued to read the Lord Of The Flies we did 3 team quizzes on the novel. These helped me understand the novel better and motivated me to finish the chapter. If your team got 10/10 on a quiz you could get a 100 points!
I enjoyed reading the Lord Of The Flies because the more I read the more I realized how the boys were acting on there human nature. The group of boys became separated because of this and turned on each other near the end of the novel. The boys acted on there human nature differently and some characters personalities change by the end of the novel.
We created a character chart about this.
As we were finishing the LOTF we were also preparing for our debate. My team was on the con side of the statement be it resolved it is in our human nature to put ourselves above others
We learned and practiced debating by doing activities and watching videos.
One of the first things we practiced was impromptu speeches. A few brave students volunteered to do practice there speaking skills in front of the class. As they gave a speech about some topic like there favourite sport we watched for these things:
A very helpful video we watched was the 7 Secrets Of Great Speakers.
As we watched this video we took notes.
We also prepared for our debate by following these Steps To Success
1) Complete concept chart: the concept charts should not have random information but be about concepts we have learned.
2) Consider your strongest arguments: use these in statements
3) Establish your opening statement – Each team will have a 3 minute opening statement. This is when you must clearly state your position and your strongest argument of why you are right.
3) Consider their rebuttals and prepare yourselves for their arguments and your counter arguments – Following the opening statements will be a 2 minute rebuttal. You must listen carefully to their arguments and prove them wrong with specific evidence.
4) Practice, Practice, Practice! – make sure you know what you’re talking amd your group is on the same page. Organize who will say what, and have visual cues that encourage others to speak.
We did the the first two steps in a shared doc.
We created our statements and arguments on a more organized pages document
I felt pretty confident going in to my debate because my group had prepared and practiced a lot together aswell as we were the last group to go so I was able to learn from others mistakes.
We set the debate up by having the con side on the right, the student moderator in the middle, and the pro side on the left. We also had the audience facing the front.
Our debate went almost exactly as planned. My team did a good job of making sure everyone had a chance to speak and I thought made a lot of great points. After the debate the students and teachers get to vote for there side. Our group won because the teachers votes were worth 3 points and we got both of there votes.
You can listen to our debate here:
After the debate I felt much more confident in public speaking. Even though it can be terrifying the more you will practice the better you will get.
In the spirit of debates we also looked at a lot of politics this term. One of the first things we learned about was the different types of governments
Each of our teams got one type of government to research.
My group researched anarchy and then presented what we found out.
We also learned about Canada’s government and electoral system. We created mind map of the hierarchy of the Provincial and Federal levels.
Finally while we were learning about LOTF, politics and preparing for our debate we also create 2 concept paragraphs. At th3 beginning of this unit we brainstormed what fits into these big concepts:
Power and Authority
Humanity and Inhumanity
Violence and Destruction
Human nature
Civilization and Savagery
Individualism and Community
For my concept paragraphs I chose human nature
and violence and destruction
For my first concept paragraph my thesis was:
We have become divided because people want to gain as much power as they can.
My second concept paragraph thesis was:
War can bring honour to soldiers and countries, but can also corrupt them.
Reflection
I really enjoyed this unit because I found all the concepts we learned about very interesting. I found it easy to make connections to current events and things that we learned this year in my writing which is something I struggle with. I also learned a lot about politics and more than ever want to learn more about my government and things like the pipeline. Finally I am glad to have read LOTF because I learned about the affects human nature can have on us and that we shouldn’t take our community for granite.