Arguments For and Against Giving to Charitable Organisations

This lesson is designed to build students’ competencies in the following skills:

• critical thinking
• collaboration
• communication
• community engagement
• digital literacy
• empathy
• ethical understanding
• intercultural understanding

Australian Curriculum (v9.0) content description: Year 10 English

• Evaluate the social, moral or ethical positions represented in literature (AC9E10LE04)

General capabilities:  Critical and Creative Thinking, Ethical Understanding, Intercultural Understanding, Literacy

Cross-curriculum priority:  Sustainability 

NSW Syllabus Outcomes: EN5-URB-01

Relevant parts of Year 10 achievement standards: Students develop and justify their own interpretations of texts. They explain different viewpoints, attitudes and perspectives through the development of cohesive and logical arguments. Students create a wide range of texts to articulate complex ideas. They make presentations and contribute actively to class and group discussions, building on others' ideas, solving problems, justifying opinions and developing and expanding arguments.

UN SDG 1: End poverty in all its forms everywhere 

• Target 1.a Ensure significant mobilisation of resources from a variety of sources, including through enhanced development cooperation, in order to provide adequate and predictable means for developing countries, in particular least developed countries, to implement programmes and policies to end poverty in all its dimensions

• Printed copies of Chapters 4 and 5 of The Life You Can Save OR digital access to PDF for students on devices
• Student devices to record video
• Student Worksheets

This lesson has been developed with the support of The Life You Can Save.

The Life You Can Save conducts research to identify nonprofits running highly impactful programs that address the multiple dimensions of poverty. They also help connect people who want to donate money and resources with these nonprofits to maximise the impact of their gifts. They aim to create a world where everyone has an opportunity to build a better life and where there’s no suffering or death due to extreme poverty.The Life You Can Save was founded by Melbourne-born Peter Singer, widely recognised as one of the world’s most influential contemporary philosophers, to advance the ideas in his 2009 book The Life You Can Save: Acting Now to End World Poverty (republished 2019). Since then, they’ve worked to introduce the ideas from Professor Singer’s book to new audiences, inspiring people to help others experiencing poverty around the world and empowering them to make the greatest impact possible.

Level of teacher scaffolding: Medium - the teacher will need to facilitate a discussion in the opening part of the lesson, but later, students will work more independently. Teachers may need to support students in planning and executing their video presentations, depending on their access to devices and software, as well as their experience in capturing content.

Ethical Understanding in the Australian Curriculum v9

Quick Summary: Explore how to teach the General Capability of Ethical Understanding as of version 9 of the Australian Curriculum. Learn what Ethical Understanding involves and how to incorporate ethics into your regular teaching.