A4P Day Two: The Basics

What happens when two girls play a simple game of "knock, knock" and it ends in tears? If it is in Arts for Peace, it becomes a teaching point. It came about like this before the class began:

Knock, knock.
Whose there?
Jo.
Jo who?
Jo (yo) mama!
Don't you be talkin' bout my mama. I'll kill you.

This single incident was the perfect opportunity to demonstrate the principles of peacemaking. Dr. Nix-Early--with the help of the offender, the offended, and several witnesses who volunteered to help--engaged the students in a process of looking at perceptions, feelings, gathering viewpoints, alternative brainstorming, forgiving, and moving on. This was done in front of the entire class. Peace-making and peace-breaking strategies were reviewed.

Insulting one's mother, or any relative for that matter, is salient in any culture. A threat to kill can be just as offensive. This is especially true for young people who may have experienced death in their own neighborhood.

From this intense moment the students began to review the theme song and record their own song on the process of peace-making (video below).

The students studied Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr.'s definition of a peace-maker: : A peacemaker is someone who has sought to teach, to transform, to make friends, to heal, to defeat injustice or to choose love instead of hate. They then created the human sculptures that symbolized the concepts of the definition.



The day concluded with the basic story for the week: Rattlesnake Day (the core lessons for peace-making told in the form of a animal fairytale). From this story dance, drama, music and visual arts are creating a collaborative presentation of peace-making that includes the conflict resolution styles of shark (competition), teddy bear (smoothing), fox (compromise), turtle (avoidance) and owl (collaboration) and how a conflict can be resolved.

Tomorrow, arts classes begin.