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The website of the Westmorland General Meeting 'Preparing for Peace' initiative

The Education Programme

A Vocabulary for Peace and War-Activity 1 Notes

Introduction

The purpose of the activity is to develop confidence in the use of key terms to describe different types of wars and peace activities.

It may be tempting during this activity to think you do not know enough to make a judgment: make it anyway, because in reality politicians and other decision-makers seldom have enough information before they have to make a decision.

1 Take 5 minutes talking in pairs and each choose a war.

   Each war is listed on a flip chart.

2 Form groups of 7 or thereabouts.

2 Distribute a set of the cards with the key terms in each group, in a similar way to

  dealing playing cards.

  Do the same with the set of cards with the definitions.

  Do the same with the set of examples. (Alternatively the examples can be left attached

  to the definition to aid identification.)

 The task is for holders of cards with key terms to question other people in the group in

 order to collect from them the corresponding definition and any examples which go with

 it.

3 When all the matching up is complete hand out to each person the sheets with the full

   set of definitions.

4 Return to the flip chart and the list of wars and ask someone to offer a term which best

  describes the war they chose.  Explore whether that is the only term which describes this

  war, and how adequately it describes it.

  Ask whether any of the peace activities could have been effective in preventing

  the war or hastening its conclusion.

  Cover as many wars as there is time available, but opt for depth of discussion rather

  than quantity.

5 If homework is required the task could be to research more information about the

  chosen war, the terms which describe the kind of war it was, and the peace activities

  which could have been deployed at different stages.

Definitions