Here you will find a huge range of ideas, resources and support for teaching across different ages by human rights theme.
Our resources are written by specialist advisors, they encourage engaged classroom discussions about human rights using creative approaches to understanding truth, freedom and justice.
Here you will find a huge range of ideas, resources and support for teaching across different ages by human rights theme.
Our resources are written by specialist advisors, they encourage engaged classroom discussions about human rights using creative approaches to understanding truth, freedom and justice.
We all born free and equal.
Celebrate our right to equality by rewriting a story.
Each week we will share more bite size ideas for fun and creative ways to learn about human rights.
You can find more on our Classroom to Community blog
You’ll need
Paper and pen or a computer
What to do
Choose a story that you have read or watched. Select a supporting character and rewrite the story with them as the hero.
Where do they go? Who do they meet? How do they save the day? How is your hero different from the original one?
Share your stories with us by emailing.
Amnesty’s education work is supported by players of People’s Postcode Lottery.
We all have the right to go where we want in our own country when it is safe for us to travel.
Create a guidebook to celebrate your local area.
Each week we will share more bite size ideas for fun and creative ways to learn about human rights.
You’ll need
Paper, pens and pencils
What to do
Draw a map of your local area. Label your favourite places and things to do. Write a guidebook entry for each one. Don’t forget to include a picture.
Can you share your guidebook with someone who hasn’t been to your area?
Share your maps with us by emailing us.
Amnesty’s education work is supported by players of People’s Postcode Lottery.
We all have a duty to each other.
Write messages to show solidarity with the people in your home.
You’ll need
Paper, pens
What to do
Write poems or notes to leave around your house for the people you live with. Think about what would make people feel happy or moved and let that shape what you write. Where can you put your notes so that they will be a lovely surprise?
Share your messages with us.
Amnesty’s education work is supported by players of People’s Postcode Lottery.
We all have the right to play
Celebrate our right to play with a scavenger hunt.
Each week we will share more bite size ideas for fun and creative ways to learn about human rights.
What to do
What are your favourite things to do? Make a list of what you need for these activities. A ball? Colouring pencils? A book? A toy?
With a friend, swap lists. Look for all the things on your friend’s list. Who can find the most things?
Amnesty’s education work is supported by players of People’s Postcode Lottery.
Imagine is the theme for this year’s Refugee Week, 15-21 June, and here are three learning activities that will give your children an understanding of refugees.
How would you welcome a newcomer into your community? Do you know about the rich heritage and diversity of people who call the UK ‘home’?
As the Covid-19 pandemic separates families around the world, our local community plays an increasingly vital role in our daily lives – both as safety net and in contributing to our well-being. At this time, many of us are separated from loved ones. For refugees, this separation may have existed long before lockdown – and sadly may continue long after nations re-open their borders.
Imagine if …
… you have just moved into your home and neighbourhood. How would you feel? How would you want your new neighbours to welcome you?
GET
Paper, colour pencils
DO
Draw a map of your local area
Include favourite places you would like to share with someone new to your area
Include places they need to know about – like food shops, schools, libraries, playgrounds, doctors.
Hello Everyone
There are over 6,500 languages spoken around the world. Many of these are spoken in the UK alongside British Sign Language, English, Gaelic, Scots, Ulster Scots and Welsh.
GET
Paper, paint, colour pencils
Google translate**
DO
Research how to say hello in as many different languages as you can find. Include languages that use different alphabets.
Create a colourful poster of different ways to say hello.
Display your poster in the window.
**Freedom to choose **
People in the UK are a mixture of different nationalities and of different faiths and no faith. This can show in how we dress, where we worship, and how we live our daily lives.
GET
Google Jessica Souhami’s illustration of our freedom of belief
DO
Explore the illustration:
How many ways can you find that people are expressing their religion through what they are wearing?
Which buildings in the picture could be used for group prayer and worship?
People can choose to pray and worship privately, in small groups and in large groups. Look at the picture again, where in the picture could people choose to pray and worship?
WATCH
A range of the Class Clips to learn about some of the different religions followed here in the UK (BBC Bitesize KS1 Religious Education Class Clips)
More activities and virtual events on Refugee Week’s Imagine. Refugee Week is an annual UK-wide festival celebrating the contributions, creativity and resilience of refugees. 15-21 June 2020.
Share your artwork with us.
Amnesty’s education work is supported by players of People’s Postcode Lottery.
We all have the right to express ourselves.
Make a flutter of stories to celebrate freedom of expression.
Each week we will share more bite size ideas for fun and creative ways to learn about human rights.
You can find more on our blog
You’ll need
Paper, paint or colour pencils, scissors, string or ribbon
What to do
Draw and cut out butterfly shapes. Attach a ribbon or string.
Ask members of your family or your friends to tell you a story. It could be about themselves as children or it could be a story that a relative has told them.
Write each story onto a butterfly and hang them up.
Share your butterflies with us.
Amnesty’s education work is supported by players of People’s Postcode Lottery.
We all have the right to a family and to choose our friends.
Celebrate our right to family and friends by making a People Tree.
Each week we will share more bite size ideas for fun and creative ways to learn about human rights.
You can find more on our blog
You’ll need
Paper, paint or colour pencils
What to do
Draw a tree and put your name on the trunk.
On each branch write the name of someone who is close to you (you could include who you live with, your closest friends, members of your family). Draw leaves with the names of people they are closest to.
This tree shows how we are also connected to people beyond our family.
Share your trees with us by emailing
Amnesty’s education work is supported by players of People’s Postcode Lottery.
We all have the right to privacy.
Celebrate our right to privacy by sending secret messages.
Each week we will share more bite size ideas for fun and creative ways to learn about human rights.
You’ll need
Paper, lemon or onion juice, cotton bud or small paint brush, a light bulb
What to do
Write a secret message using the juice. Whoever receives it can reveal the message by holding it close to the hot light bulb.
Amnesty’s education work is supported by players of People’s Postcode Lottery.
We are all born free.
Make a kite to celebrate our right to freedom.
Each week we will share more bite size ideas for fun and creative ways to learn about human rights.
You’ll need
Paper, paint or colouring pencils, scissors, string or ribbon
What to do
Draw a kite shape and decorate it with a scene in which you feel free. Cut it out and add string or ribbon.
If you let your kite go, where would it travel? Who might find it? Can you write or draw a story showing what might happen?
Amnesty’s education work is supported by players of People’s Postcode Lottery.
This resource is designed to support teachers to introduce human rights to children aged 3-5. It’s the perfect starting point to engage children in discussion and raise awareness of their own rights in a fun and interactive way.
In First Steps there are five themed lesson plans each focusing on relevant articles proclaimed in the Universal Declaration of Human Rights covering feelings, relationships and belonging, choices and voices, well-being and bodies.
Activities include stories, games, music, art and photography.
Amnesty and CILIP, the library and information association, are working to develop children’s understanding of human rights through the outstanding books shortlisted for the Carnegie and Kate Greenaway Medals. All the books are also eligible for the Amnesty CILIP Honour, for illuminating, upholding or celebrating human rights. The Medals and Honour winners will be announced on 19th June.
We have created special Story Explorer resources to help adults, young people and children explore the human rights values at the heart of all the shortlisted books.
Three short films of former child soldier Ishmael Beah telling his story to an audience of secondary school students in 2008. Ishmael was 13 when he became a child solider in Sierra Leone. Watch him tell his story then use activities to develop an empathetic response on which to build knowledge and understanding of this topic.
This resource also includes a selection of extension activities that can be used as standalone lessons on the topic child soldiers, not related to Ishmael’s story. Search on Vimeo for In conversation with Ishmael Beah to find the clips.
This resource enables teachers to explore the human rights of sexual and gender minority groups with primary, secondary and FE students.
The pack consists of six activities, a list of useful organisations, a summary of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights, an information sheet on sexual orientation and gender identity and a list of curriculum links.
This activity pack can be used with the following resources
LGBTI Q&A and Teaching notes for ‘Two weeks with the Queen’ by Morris Gleitzman which can both be found by searching on our website.
Downloadable activities to accompany the award-winning book We Are All Born Free of thirty beautiful illustrations that interpret our human rights for ages 5+.
We Are All Born Free can be ordered from the Amnesty shop .
In this session students will look at what the terms refugee, asylum seeker and migrant mean. They will explore reasons why people flee their homes and look at the experience of a refugee family’s journey from war in Syria to safety in the UK, and identify refugee rights.
This is part of our set of Refugee Rights teaching resource materials.
Amnesty International UK’s Refugee Rights education pack has been written to support primary school teachers to explore refugee rights and migration with children and build a culture of understanding and welcome in their schools.
The activities in this pack introduce some key concepts, including why people flee their homes and what it is like to arrive in a new country, and promote discussion about refugee rights and migration experiences.
Students will also explore ways to make refugees feel welcome.
Each activity can be adapted to individual classrooms and is suitable for one-off lessons or can be extended into a series of lessons.
This is part of our set of Refugee Rights teaching resource materials.
Is the UK meeting its international obligations under the Refugee Convention?
In this session students will learn about the rights and protections given to people seeking asylum and refugees under the UN Refugee Convention. They will explore examples of UK asylum policy and ask whether the government is meeting its international legal obligations to refugees.
This is part of our set of Refugee Rights teaching resource materials.