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Sample Lesson:
Conflict Resolution

QUICK DECISIONS: VIOLENCE VS. NON-VIOLENCE

Purpose: To illustrate that a non-violent response to a threatening situation usually requires more time and careful thought than a violent reaction

Time it takes: 15-20 minutes

What you need: Scenarios and even numbers of groups

How it's done:

1. Divide the large group into 2, 4 or 6 small groups depending on the size of the large group (for example, if there are 12 participants, break into 4 groups of 3).
2. Tell the groups that you will read a scenario and that they will have 10 seconds to think about it silently to themselves. At the end of the 10 seconds, they will have one minute to decide as a group what their response is to the situation.
3. Designate half of the groups to decide on what a violent reaction would be while the other half will decide on what a non-violent reaction would be (if you had 4 groups, 2 of them would represent violence and the other 2 would represent non-violence).
4. Have each group report their decisions and write down in summary what they said on the flipchart.
5. On the next scenario, have the groups switch how they will respond (if they were representing violence, they will now represent non-violence). Give them the same amount of time to think to themselves and discuss as a group as before, have them report their decisions and write down what they say. Repeat using more scenarios as time and interest allows.
6. Debrief:
• Were there any challenges in the groups with reaching a group decision? What were they and how did you overcome them?
• Regardless of what you were representing, violence or non-violence, did you have an immediate tendency towards one or the other? Which one? Why do you think that is? What could cause a person to do that?
• Are there any similarities in the responses that were given in either category? Differences?
• What was easier to come up with, a violent or non-violent decision?
• What factors influenced your ability to decide?
• Are there any examples in the world of how people have a tendency toward violence or non-violence?
• What reason, if any, would people have to act non-violently?

Note: It is not necessary to use all of these debrief questions, but it is important that the participants think about why it is so easy to act violently, and what reasons they would have to choose to take the time to respond to situations non-violently.

Scenarios-Quick Decisions: Violence versus Non-Violence

• You are sitting in class and one of your classmates walks by you and knocks your book off your desk. What would be a violent/non-violent action?
• You've found out that someone who was supposed to be your friend has been telling other people about a problem you have been dealing with, which you consider to be private. You see this person after school in the hallway and there is nobody else around. What would be a violent/non-violent action?
• You are playing basketball and get tangled up with another player, lose your balance and fall down. The other player does not fall down, but gets hold of the ball. What would be a violent/non-violent action?
• You and your friends are standing outside of a store. The store owner comes outside and tells you that she doesn't want you to hang out in front of the store. You and your friends move away, but come back after the store has closed. What would be a violent/non-violent action?
• You have applied for a job and were told by the manager that he can't hire you because another person who works there had a problem with you in the past. You know who the person is and you see him in a parking lot later that week. What would be a violent/non-violent action?
• You and your friends see a group of kids spray painting racial slurs that apply to you on a wall in your neighborhood. You and your friends are very angry and want to do something. What would be a violent/non-violent action?
• A teacher reprimands you in class in front of your friends and you are embarrassed by it. What would be a violent/non-violent action?

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