This lesson is one of two alternative core lessons (the other is Bristol Bus Boycott) to be completed after Lesson 1 and 2. It introduces an important idea of the “Pillars of Support”, which will be referred to in subsequent case study lessons. It uses a mystery activity as a way of engaging the learners with the case study. Groups are given different parts of the OTPOR story and have to piece together what happened by asking the other groups questions. For it to work it is important that that no one knows the whole story at the start of the lesson.

This lesson uses relatable, fictional scenarios to enable the learners to think about their own understanding of violent and non-violent actions before engaging with actual historical case studies. Pictures of objects which could be used in non-violent or violent actions are introduced for the learners to think of their own creative uses and consider whether their ideas are violent or non-violent. These objects can be spotted in the subsequent case studies and will be used again in the final lesson to evaluate learning. The activity is designed to be open-ended and creative rather than to directly teach how the objects could be used. “Pupils were highly enthusiastic and engaged in the content.”

This series of lessons takes learners through a participatory step by step process of thinking about issues they care about in their school or local community; choosing an issue; researching it; deciding on the change they would like to see; deciding on an action; planning, doing and evaluating the action. These lessons are designed to take place after learners have experienced some historical case studies and the contemporary case study lesson but could also stand alone as an active citizenship activity as a day event or for a school council. The ideas are based with permission on the resource Get Global! Oxfam, 2007, as well as on real life planning of actions for change. It is important that learners are given the freedom to decide for themselves whether they wish to take action or not and the kind of change they would like to see but also that they are supported by adults to ensure that they have a positive experience of change being possible or at least understand what more they need to do to achieve this.

In his Letter from a Birmingham Jail, Martin Luther King Jr. wrote, “You may well ask, ‘Why direct action? Why sit-ins, marches, etc.? Isn’t negotiation a better path?’ You are exactly right in your call for negotiation. Indeed, this is the purpose of direct action. Non-violent direct action seeks to create such a crisis and establish such tension that a community that has constantly refused to negotiate is forced to confront the issue. It seeks so to dramatise the issue that it can no longer be ignored”. The Sheffield Street Trees campaign illustrates this beautifully as direct action was used successfully not only to actually protect trees but also to bring the issue to the attention of the wider public. This led to a successful process of negotiation where different views were taken into consideration when deciding how to manage the street trees. These lessons use a fictional context using ‘Mantle of the Expert’ to introduce different perspectives and to engage learners in the Sheffield Street Trees case study which is introduced at the end. At this point it would be helpful to make a distinction between the fictional drama and what really happened. Although different perspectives and complexities are introduced through the lessons, including the contestability of the decision by some tree protectors to break the injunction by going through the barriers as ‘persons unknown’ the final outcome of the actual protests was that the protestors were vindicated in their objections. The new tree strategy that came from negotiations illustrates this and is a much more cautious and participatory approach to street tree management in Sheffield. Sheffield Council received criticism from national bodies such as the Woodland Trust and was investigated by the Forestry Commission. They issued an apology for the dawn raid on Rustlings road (that the first scenario is based on) ‘A public unreserved apology’ was recommended by the Local Government and Social Care Ombudsman . A script is provided for those teachers who are not familiar with Mantle of the Expert but this can obviously be used flexibly with those who are. Out of role curriculum activities feature throughout.