Video Segment

Eyes on the Prize Volume 164, Chapters 1 and 2

Table of Contents

Objectives
Connecting to the Past
Setting the Context
Acquiring New Knowledge
Evaluating Information
Using What We Know
Reflecting on Our Learning
Acting on Our Learning

Objectives

• To identify the personal qualities that create a sense of efficacy and an ability to influence the world in which one lives.
• To identify the legal channels available to individuals in the United States who wish to challenge existing policies or inequities.

Connecting to the Past

Ask students to list several issues facing young people in the United States today. Record their answers on an overhead projector or chalkboard. Ask students to indicate by a show of hands which of the issues they personally feel able to affect. Write down the number of students next to each item. Ask each student to decide which issue would be the easiest one for them to work on and which one would be the most difficult. Discuss some of the reasons why.

Setting the Context

1950 Gallup Poll: Most Important Problems

Have a student read the items on the pie chart aloud in descending order of concern. Ask students if they believe that all of the important issues of 1950 were included on the Gallup list. If not, ask them what is missing. Ask why some things might not have made it onto the Gallup list. Show these additional graphs:

Life Expectancy and Family Income

Children in Poverty

Black Elected Officials.

Ask students to decide whether this information suggests any other issues that should
have been on the list of "most important problems."

Acquiring New Knowledge

Show the headline from the Montgomery Advertiser announcing the Supreme Court decision on Montgomery's bus segregation.

Ask students what avenues they have as citizens of the United States for challenging unjust situations.

Evaluating Information

Tell students that they are going to watch a video segment in which other students worked for change. Ask them to try to identify both the personal characteristics needed by these students and the legal mechanisms that were available to them, as well as those laws or policies that worked against them. Ask them to identify the obstacles that the students faced and what they did to deal with those obstacles.

Nashville Sit-ins. Describes the first two weeks of the Nashville sit-ins. The tactics, the violence, and the arrests are summarized in footage and interviews.

After viewing the video segment, discuss it with the students. Ask them what mechanisms the students used to support each other and to maintain their own commitment and courage.

If time allows, talk about the role of music in the movement. Replay the footage that shows people singing: (1) as students were arrested and (2) at the funeral of the slain civil rights worker. Ask if music ever plays a similar role today.

Using What We Know

Divide students into groups of four to six people. Distribute newsprint and marking pens to each group. Ask each group to draw a diagram, flow chart, " map," or some other visual representation that illustrates the issue that the students in the video addressed and the processes they used. Encourage them to illustrate the roadblocks the students faced and the legal avenues available, and to give some sense of the personal attitudes and skills that the students needed to effect change. When the diagrams are complete, ask each group to share their work with the class, giving a one-minute summary of the key ideas.

Reflecting on Our Learning

As a homework assignment, ask each student to refer back to one of the current issues they felt they could most successfully address. Ask them to research the legal avenues available to them as citizens for solving this problem and to develop a proposal for addressing the issue. Ask them to write a short speech to be given to other students, encouraging them to join together to work for change.

Acting on Our Learning

Have students share their current-issues speeches with each other, and help the class select one current issue the class might work on together to effect change. Class projects can evolve through which students can see the results of their work. Have them work in groups of six to eight and develop the skills necessary to successfully bring projects to fruition.

 

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