Teacher Guide
Introduction
Power League is a way of stimulating discussion among students in Key Stage 3 and Key Stage 4. You can use it with a class for a single lesson, or as a big project involving the whole school.
The league allows students to cast votes, individually, in which they choose between two competing people, ideas or things. In a discussion on technology, for example, they could vote for which they thought was more useful: mobile phones or MP3 players. In a discussion on leadership, they could vote for who ought to lead the world: Mahatma Gandhi or Bono. Each student chooses one out of a series of random pairs.
By repeatedly casting votes, the students create a league, ranked in order of the most powerful, important or influential. The results are often unexpected - students are surprised to see how their peers voted - and a good starting point for discussion. Why does this person have more power than another person? What makes this pop star more influential than that politician? How is this power used?
The league was originally designed as a playful way to explore the nature of power, and the students who used it initially voted on questions of who was more powerful, or who they would like to see have more power. But it has now been adapted so that students can vote on any subject: which is the bigger cause of global warming, for example; or which is the more important invention?
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