Power League

Teacher Guide

Lesson ideas with leagues

To get you started, there are five leagues already on the Power League website (http://www.powerleague.org.uk). You can copy them for your own use, or make your own from scratch.

Here are some suggestions for using the publicly available leagues:

World Power League

League question:
"Who do you wish had the most power?"

People listed in the league include:
Michael Moore, Bill Gates, Davina McCall, Warren Buffet, Ché Guevara, Mohamed Al Fayed, Satoru Iwata and many more.

Lesson idea:
You can use the league to explore different kinds of power: social, political, cultural, economic and spiritual, for example. Which kinds of power is it better to have? Which kind of power enables you to influence the most people?

Students can also think about why different students prioritise different forms of power, and justify their opinions. It's a good way of understanding that other people's choices may be underpinned by different sets of values.

Lesson idea:
Pupils evaluate the league, the processes of gaining influence, how people become role-models, and the role of different kinds of power in society. Some people gain power through the political process, for example; others gain it through using the media successfully, while others gain power by creating and running businesses.

Students could think about how they themselves might develop power or influence.

Lesson idea:
Students discuss the limits of particular kinds of power. Can we choose who has power over us? How?

Important inventions

League question:
"Which do you think is the most important invention?"

League items include:
Antibiotics, the wheel, cars, mobile phones, paper, television, nuclear power and many more.

Lesson idea:
Discuss what makes an invention important. Is it the ability to save lives, or the ability to improve the quality of life? Is it something that brings a small benefit to a lot of people or a large benefit to a few people?

What are the hidden or unexpected benefits that an invention might bring? For example, the benefits of antibiotics are obvious, but the benefits of television, which students might see mainly as an entertainment medium, less so. Yet television has a role to play in putting us in touch with the rest of the world, spreading ideas and alerting us to issues we might otherwise be unaware of.

Is 'important' the same as 'good'? An invention might be hugely influential, but its influence could be destructive as well as benign.

Lesson idea:
Discuss different kinds of invention: medical, technical, scientific, cultural or engineering, for example. Which kinds of invention are most important? If you lived three/four/five hundred years ago, what answer might you have given to the question then? Which inventions have lasted a long time, and which might be shortlived?

New School

League question:
"If you were redesigning your school, which issues/factors would be most important to you?"

League items include:
After–school social space, comfortable furniture, big library, garden, new teachers, glass roof and walls, skate park, swimming pool and much more.

Lesson idea:
Discuss what makes school a good place to be. Is it the quality of teaching, the availability of good educational resources, or comfortable surroundings? Ask students to justify their choices.

Ask students to think about all the people who might use a school (teachers, students, parents, dinner ladies, adult education students) and why they might have different priorities. How can you accommodate the needs of all those people? Whose views are the most important? What might influence the decisions of the architects who design the school?

Climate Change

League question:
"What do you think is the biggest cause of climate change?"

League items include:
Air travel, deforestation, trade inequalities, consumer culture, solar winds, and many more.

Lesson idea:
Start the lesson with a series of votes on different pairs to rank the items in order.

Then put students into pairs or small groups to research the evidence on climate change. Ask each group to research a particular cause, such as deforestation or air travel.

Ask one student from each group to present their case to the rest of the class.

Most evil

League question:
"Who do you think is the most evil?"

League items include:
Bart Simpson, Batman, Boo Radley, Fitzwilliam Darcy, Lady Macbeth, Piggy, Darth Vader.

Lesson idea:
In an English literature class, this could be used to discuss how evil is represented in books, television and film. What metaphors are used? What rhetorical devices? Are there any purely evil characters or do they have some redeeming features? Which characters go on a moral journey (from good to evil, or vice versa), and which stay the same?

Lesson idea:
In an RE class, the league could be used as a starting point for a discussion on evil. What do we mean by evil? Is there universal agreement on what constitutes evil, or is it culturally and historically relative? Are people born evil or do they become evil? Are people able to control behaviour through free will or is their behaviour determined by their genes or their social circumstances?

Next: Lesson plans