Big Ideas
Big Ideas
Social justice issues are interconnected.
Individual worldviews shape and inform our understanding of social justice issues.
The causes of social injustice are complex and have lasting impacts on society.
Social justice initiatives can transform individuals and systems.
Content
Learning Standards
Content
definitions, frameworks, and interpretations of social justice
- Sample topics:
- definitions of social justice in local contexts
- equity and equality
- values, morality, ethics
- social service, social responsibility (e.g., Elizabeth Fry Society; Malala Fund)
- justice (e.g., restitution, restorative justice)
self-identity and an individual's relationship to others
- Sample topics:
- privilege and power
- diverse belief systems and worldviews of minority groups
- traditional and unceded territories of indigenous peoples
- inclusive and non-inclusive language
social justice issues
- Sample topics:
- connections between and among such issues as:
- race
- poverty
- LGBTQ rights
- status of women
- environmental and ecological justice
- peace and globalization
- disabilities
- other marginalized and vulnerable groups
- connections between and among such issues as:
social injustices in Canada and the world affecting individuals, groups, and society
- Sample topics:
- individual ideas, thoughts, beliefs, and actions
- group ideas, thoughts, beliefs, and actions:
- Roma
- women (e.g., education for girls in Afghanistan; property rights for women in the Middle East)
- decriminalization of homosexuals
- Shia and Suni minorities
- Syria
- Israel/Palestine
governmental and non-governmental organizations in issues of social justice and injustice
- Sample topics:
- international laws
- UN resolutions and declarations
- Canadian Charter of Rights and Freedoms
- human rights codes
- civil and criminal laws
- indigenous rights in Canada and globally
processes, methods, and approaches individuals, groups, and institutions use to promote social justice
- Sample topics:
- activism, advocacy, and ally-building
- dispute and conflict resolution processes and practices
- social media and technology
- schooling and education
Curricular Competency
Learning Standards
Curricular Competency
Use Social Studies inquiry processes and skills to ask questions; gather, interpret, and analyze ideas; and communicate findings and decisions
- Key skills:
- Draw conclusions about a problem, an issue, or a topic.
- Assess and defend a variety of positions on a problem, an issue, or a topic.
- Demonstrate leadership by planning, implementing, and assessing strategies to address a problem or an issue.
- Identify and clarify a problem or issue.
- Evaluate and organize collected data (e.g., in outlines, summaries, notes, timelines, charts).
- Interpret information and data from a variety of maps, graphs, and tables.
- Interpret and present data in a variety of forms (e.g., oral, written, and graphic).
- Accurately cite sources.
- Construct graphs, tables, and maps to communicate ideas and information, demonstrating appropriate use of grids, scales, legends, and contours.
Assess and compare the significance of people, places, events, or developments at particular times and places, and determine what is revealed about issues of social justice in the past and present (significance)
- Key questions:
- What factors can cause people, places, events, or developments to become more or less significant?
- What factors can make people, places, events, or developments significant to different people?
- What criteria should be used to assess the significance of people, places, events, or developments?
- Sample activities:
- Use criteria to rank the most important people, places, events, or developments in the current unit of study.
- Compare how different groups assess the significance of people, places, events, or developments.
Assess the justification for competing accounts after investigating points of contention, reliability of sources, and adequacy of evidence, including data (evidence)
- Key questions:
- What criteria should be used to assess the reliability of a source?
- How much evidence is sufficient in order to support a conclusion?
- How much about various people, places, events, or developments can be known and how much is unknowable?
- Sample activities:
- Compare and contrast multiple accounts of the same event and evaluate their usefulness as historical sources.
- Examine what sources are available and what sources are missing and evaluate how the available evidence shapes your perspective on the people, places, events, or developments studied.
Compare and contrast continuities and changes for different groups and individuals at different times and places (continuity and change)
- Key questions:
- What factors lead to changes or continuities affecting groups of people differently?
- How do gradual processes and more sudden rates of change affect people living through them? Which method of change has more of an effect on society?
- How are periods of change or continuity perceived by the people living through them? How does this compare to how they are perceived after the fact?
- Sample activity:
- Compare how different groups benefited or suffered as a result of a particular change.
Determine and assess the long- and short-term causes and consequences, and the intended and unintended consequences, of an event, legislative and judicial decision, development, policy, or movement (cause and consequence)
- Key questions:
- What is the role of chance in particular events, decisions, or developments?
- Are there events with positive long-term consequences but negative short-term consequences, or vice versa?
- Sample activities:
- Assess whether the results of a particular action were intended or unintended consequences.
- Evaluate the most important causes or consequences of various events, decisions, or developments.
Explain different perspectives on past and present people, places, issues, and events, and distinguish between worldviews of the past or present (perspective)
- Key questions:
- What sources of information can people today use to try to understand what people in different times and places believed?
- How much can we generalize about values and beliefs in a given society or time period?
- Is it fair to judge people of the past using modern values?
- Sample activity:
- Explain how the beliefs of people on different sides of the same issue influence their opinions.
Make reasoned ethical judgments about controversial actions in the past or present after considering the context and standards of right and wrong (ethical judgment)
- Key questions:
- What is the difference between implicit and explicit values?
- Why should we consider the historical, political, and social context when making ethical judgments?
- Should people of today have any responsibility for actions taken in the past?
- Can people of the past be celebrated for great achievements if they have also done things considered unethical today?
- Sample activities:
- Assess the responsibility of historical figures for an important event. Assess how much responsibility should be assigned to different people, and evaluate whether their actions were justified given the historical context.
- Examine various media sources on a topic and assess how much of the language contains implicit and explicit moral judgments.