Spaceship Santa Maria - the handbook
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This handbook includes a set of PBL tasks about sustainible development that were devolped for the Comenius Partnership Spaceship Santa Maria. Twelve different problem based tasks are described and the handbook also gives a background to the partnership itself and briefly examplifies how one can work with PBL, Problem Based Learning. This project has been funded with support from the European Commission. This publication reflects the views only of author, and the Commission cannot be held responsible for any use which may be made of the information contained therein. Partners in this Comenius Partnership have been: Kungsgårdsskolan, Ängelholm Sweden Zespol Szkol w Dobrzejewicach , Dobrzejewice, Poland OS don Mihovila Pavlinovica, Podgora, Croatia
Spaceship Santa Maria 2012. Anna Ewertowska, Anita Lasic, Christian Rydberg and Elvin Smajic
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About Spaceship Santa Maria The Santa Maria Spaceship-project is done as a part of a Comenius School Partnership between three schools in Croatia, Poland and Sweden. Primary school don Mihovila Pavlinovica is a small school with 162 pupils situated in a small town, Podgora, in the south of Croatia. Zespół Szkół in Dobrzejewice is a combination of the senior secondary school with the students from the 1st to 3rd grade and the three-year grammar school. It is situated in Dobrzejewice – a small village near Toruń. There are about 300 students altogether in both secondary and grammar school. Kungsgårdsskolan is a senior compulsory school with students from 7th to 9th grade and it is situated in Ängelholm in the southern Sweden. There are about 450 students in the school. A Comenius School Partnerships is a part of EU's Lifelong Learning Program and it enables pupils, students and staff from across Europe to work together on joint project that can focus on themes broadly linked to the pupils' curriculum and interests, and on questions of school management, teaching techniques and methodologies.
The originators of the Spaceship Santa Maria-project, from the left Elvin Smajic, Anna Ewertowska, Anita Lasic, and Christian Rydberg.
To learn more about the project Spaceship Santa Maria and the partnership itself please visit this web page: http://public.carnet.hr/santamaria/
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Why This Project? In the old days, when you cooperated with someone, you did it with someone from your hometown or at least region. The person had basically the same traditions, experiences and values as you. Today and even more so in the future, one will more and more cooperate with people from all over the world. Cooperation itself can be hard, and to do it with someone from different cultures adds another aspect to it. The ability to understand and accept that different cultures have different traditions and values can be described as cultural empathy. It is the capacity to identify with the feelings, thoughts and behavior of people from different cultures. To interact with people of other cultures, it is important to have some understanding of those cultures, and cultural empathy is important to "reading" other cultures. If you lack cultural empathy, there could be crucial misunderstandings in various situations. Some things about a culture you can learn by reading about it in a book, doing some traditional international school projects where you exchange material or maybe observing when you visit a county or a region as a tourist. Anthropologists describe this as the shell of the culture and it is things like what people eat, what they wear, how they celebrate holidays and so on. Knowledge about the shell is important of course, but in order to be successful in intercultural cooperation, one also must have experience and understanding about the core of the culture, your partners’ as well as your own. This is the deep values and moral of the culture and it explains why people sometimes do things in another way that one is used to.
To learn and get understanding of the core of cultures and to develop you cultural empathy, there is only one way – it is by face to face cooperation with partners from other cultures! Our main objective is to prepare our students for the future by letting them cooperate and solve problems face to face with students from other cultures. Of course, the teachers and the school in large will benefit from this partnership. In the rapidly changing future, schools are becoming more and more multicultural and getting ready for this is crucial. 4
To really learn about the cores of our different cultures, it is important to discuss and solve problems about things that matter. To do that, we have created a problem-based work task where the students are going to equip a fictional spaceship called Santa Maria. Santa Maria is going on a journey for 500 years to settle on a new planet in another part of the universe. The students will form a miniature international society and will have to organize themselves in an efficient way, hopefully the representative democracy, in order to decide what form of government, what economic system and laws will be applied, how they are going to get enough food and oxygen and so on. The equipping of Santa Maria concerns the same problem that we all have to deal with in order to have a sustainable future and the Spaceship is a metaphorical European Union in miniature. We have chosen to work with this theme in a broad way, since it is crucial to understand that the concept of "sustainable development" does not just include obvious things like climate change. In order for us in the EU, and the rest of the world of course, to have a bright future, it is also just as decisive to have a well-functioning government, fair economic systems, extensive welfare, openness to new technologies and inventions, cultural exchanges and so on.
We have identified twelve problem areas that the students will work with, and to guide them in this, there are detailed tutorials. First, the students will work in groups (at home) trying to solve the problems. This way we are going to apply Problem Based Learning, a student-centered instructional strategy in which students collaboratively
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solve challenging and open-ended problems and reflect on their experiences. At three summits during the partnership, then the students from all partners will met for negotiations to come up with a common solution for the problems, four at each summit. We originally met through EU Dialogue Award, which was a project group competition instigated by the Center for European Education in Germany. When this ended, we saw an opportunity to deepen our cooperation within the Lifelong Learning Program. Since we come from different parts of Europe with both differences and similarities between us, we decided that we would make an interesting composition. Sweden is an established EU country with a comparatively stable past, Poland has been through a lot of changes the last decades and is a new member in the EU and Croatia is a nation on the way into the European Union. Croatia is a Mediterranean country; Poland is located in central Europe and Sweden in the north. Croatia and Poland are Catholic while Sweden is Lutheran. Sweden and Poland have a common history back in the centuries and share the sea, while Croatia and Poland have a common history from last century. Sweden and Croatia are small countries according to population and Poland is a large one. In modern days Croatia has become a popular destination for Polish and Swedish tourist and a few decades ago, many Croats immigrated to Sweden to find employment and today many Poles come to Sweden to work. This has created a lot of stereotypes that we aim to break! We are witnessing the rapid social, economic and political changes in today's Europe. How to cope with them now and how to be actively involved in creating a better future for all? Comenius project will give our students the ideal opportunity to answer these questions and at the same time to promote intercultural dialogue. Applying problem based learning and team work, as well as giving special stress on developing key competences, we will prepare our students to reflect on the impact these changes leave on people and environment. Implementing lifelong learning strategies, we will prepare our students to develop skills, attitudes and knowledge in order to make them active citizens in tomorrow's European society. Being this a cross-curricular project, it will raise the quality of our teaching and enhance students' motivation to pursue learning.
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Problem Based Learning Since the Spaceship Santa Maria is isolated and need to be self-supported for generations, there will be various problems to solve before takeoff, for example: How is the crew going to be put together? What languages shall be used among the crew? How is the ship going to be governed? How will there be enough food, oxygen and fresh water to everybody? What religions and values will be allowed on board? What economic system will there be on the ship? What will the laws and rules be like? What shall the crew do on the leisure time? How will new technologies like intelligent robots and Genetic engineering be used? What kind educational system will be used?
The major objective for the project is to give the students’ knowledge about important questions concerning the future. The Spaceship Santa Maria is a metaphor for our world and in the work with equipping it; the students will come across the same problems as we all have to solve in order to have a sustainable future for our world. The students have tutorial in form of a check list to help them to narrow the problem. However, it is all up to the students to plan, implement and solve the current problem. Here you can read the tutorials later in this guide.
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Our Work Process This is an sketch for a work plan for equipping Spaceship Santa Maria and it describes how we did it. Of course one have to adapt the work on its own merits. We had three summits during the partnership, one in each country so this work process have been worked through three times. At each summit the students’ task were to come up with a common solution for four problem areas. See below:
The work process can be described with the chart below. Point 1 -7 is done at each partner school prior to each summit, point 8-11 during the summit (and done four times) and point 12 after the summit.
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The negotiations at the summits were organized as the chart below. Here it’s calculated with 12 participating students per partner. It could of course be altered. All the students take part in every negotiation – in one of the four they have an active role and in the others they act as a referral group.
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Working with the Problems An Example Working with PBL can seem pretty easy – just present some problems for the students and everything will work out by itself. But, on the contrary, working with PBL (as well as Case method and Storyline) requires a lot of preparatory work. Students and teachers need training before it runs smoothly. But when you are prepared and have some training in it, it is a very stimulating, effective and rewarding way of learning. Here is an example on how a class can work with the problem concearning putting together the crew for Spaceship Santa Maria. Keep in mind that this is only one example on how to work with it that is intended to inspire – every teacher must find her/his own way to work with the problems. This learning process is divided in to six phases, A to F.
A. Introduction Since this is the first problem for the students, they need to be introduced to the Spaceship Santa Maria and what it is all about. The introduction movie on the web site will be the start (https://sites.google.com/site/spaceshipsantamaria/home) and then the general work process is presented to the students so that they understand that they are supposed to agree on a suggested solution for the problem and then negotiate with students from the partner schools in order to come up with a common solution.
B. Hot chair
To get the students to start reflecting on their own over problems there are concerning the conception of the crew they do a valuation exercise called “hot chair”. Each student take one chair each and place them in a ring. One extra chair is also put in the ring. Then the teacher start reading statements and the students that agree sit still and the ones that disagree move to a new chair. At this stage the will be no discussion about the statements. Here are some ideas for statements: All women in th crew need to be pregnant when they board! All must be between 20-25 years old when they board the Santa Maria. It is important that everyone is healthy. There will be 50% females and 50 % males on board. No one outside Europe area will be allowed to be a part of the crew of the Santa Maria. Everyone must speak the same language. The crew members can’t be related to another. It is important that as many jobs as possible are represented on board. It is important that the crew members don’t have any disability. The crew members must be very well educated. Everyone in the crew must have top grades. All in the crew must have good stamina. 11
C. Arguments ad consequences
The class is divided to smaller groups and one moderator and one secretary is appointed. The group gets a table with three columns.
Statement
Arguments
Consequences
The group will then write down statements in the first column, it could be the one from Hot chair or they could come up with their own. It’s not necessary for everyone in the group to agree on the statement at this stage, but it’s better to start with statements that as many as possible in the group can agree on. After that they the write down arguments and reasons in the second column of the table - why will this statement apply on the constitution of the crew? And finally, they think of what this statement will lead to and what consequences it might have and they write down these in the third column. This phase, and also the following phase, is the critical stages when you’re working with PBL. It’s crucial for the teacher to inspire the students to come up with arguments and think of consequences on their own. It’s also very important for the teacher to act as facilitators that help the students to find knowledge about the problem area, especially when they work with even more complex problems, where the arguments probably need to be even more sound and well-considered. The teachers’ role will be to both a tutor that guides the students to where they can find answers themselves but also to be of an ordinary instructor that explains and illuminates the students and deepen their knowledge.
D. The Crew tutorial
When the groups have work with the Crew problems on their own for a while and put down some statements they will get the premade tutorial about the Crew problem. They work through it point by point and agree on the groups view on each part. If they have discovered more problems and solutions besides the one in the tutorial they add their solution to these.
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E. The class solution
The groups appoint one delegate each that will negotiate about the class common solution. They will go through the tutorial as in they did in their groups and agree on a common solution for the class. The teacher will work as moderator and help the delegate to agree. Since there aren’t any rights or wrong answers to the problems it could be ok if some delegate have some “twisted” argument, both at this stage and at the negotiations with the students from the partners, in order to have a more interesting negotiation. The cardinal aim for working with problems concerning sustainable development isn’t to give the students “the right answers” because there simply aren’t any to give, but rather to raise awareness about the problems and for the students to understand that the problems really are problems that need work to solve.
F. Presentation of the class solution
Some students of the class are appointed to make a presentation for the students at the partner schools. The presentations could be in different forms; PowerPointpresentations, homemade movie, Creaza cartoons or videos, report, newspaper. During the first five phases the main communication language has of course been the mother tongue but now it's time to translate the solutions in to English. Please note that the presentation doesn’t have to cover all the points in the tutorial instead should it broadly describe the teams’ solutions.
The Santa Maria Problems On the following pages you will find the tutorials for the twelve problems. One should note that they only are guidance to some of the key aspects of the problems to be solved on the Santa Maria. When the students work with the tutorials they will probably come across other aspects they’ll need to look further into. As a teacher, it is also possible to add, or subtract, aspects that you prefer. If you what digital copies of the tutorials, please visit the Partnerships web page. You will find the address on the last page of the handbook.
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Objectives for the students – develop their knowledge and understanding of a society with diversities, and the importance of this for relations between people, – develop the ability to reflect over international relations and international co-operation, – acquire knowledge to be able to discuss local and global issues, which are important for a sustainable society, – develop their ability to critically examine social conditions and be able to see the consequences of various alternatives, – develop their ability to reason and express their standpoint.
Tutorial N.B. This is only guidance to some of the key aspects of the problems with putting together the crew. As you work, you will probably come across other aspects you’ll need to look further into. Since the original crew will be the ancestors for both the coming generations of crew members and the future settlement on a new planet, it's of great importance to put it together carefully. What different nationalities will be in the crew? Only EU countries? Also EU application countries? From countries from rest of Europe? Crew from the whole World? Other? What personal qualities are important for the crew? Strength? Intellectual? Other physical attributes? The crew’s health status? What physical conditions should the members be in? Are there any medical conditions that the crew can’t have? What Diabetes Bad eyesight Colour blindness Hearing disorder Asthma Allergy Others
about:
What if a crew member has some illnesses in their family, like heart problems or mental disorders? What kind of professions do you need to have among the crew members? Are some more important then others? How should the division of age be among the crew? How should the division be between male and female among the crew?
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Objectives for the students - make students understand the society they belong to, - make them aware of other societies that are different, – develop their knowledge of and understanding of a society with diversities, and the importance of this for relations between people, – improve the ability to reflect over international relations and international co-operation, – acquire knowledge to be able to discuss local and global issues, which are important for a sustainable society, – develop their ability to critically examine social conditions and be able to see the consequences of various alternatives, – develop their ability to reason and to verbally express their standpoint, to debate, to persuade and convince, - improve their ability to form conclusions, judgements and inferences, to induce change of opinion in others through presentation of arguments.
Group decision making Like on Earth, there will be decisions that have to be made and they have to be made for the best of the Spaceship. The challenge of group decision is deciding what action a group should take so it's for the best of the group without harming the individuals. There are various systems designed to solve this problem. How are the important decisions going to be made on the ship? With majority decision where all the crew members get to vote? With a representative democracy where the crew elect some kind of parliament? With one leader that makes the decisions? What will the voting age be? / What will be the minimum age that a person must attain to be eligible to vote in a public election? If the ship should have some elected parliament or leaders – how often should you have elections? Will the crew members be allowed to form political parties? Should some political ideas and views be forbidden? Should it be possibile to remove some leader from office? For what reasons? (corruption!!!!)
Information on board Vast amounts of information need to be stored on board about various things. A big question is the level of accessibility to the information. It's a dilemma - if sensible information gets in the wrong hands, it could be a possible threat for both an individual and the whole ship, but on the other hand, if everyone has access to all the information, the risk of misleading and wrongful exploitation is low. What kind of information do you need to bring on the journey? Is there something you don't need to bring? Should everything be accessible for everyone? If not – what kind of information should be restricted? Should someone have access to all information? Will there be freedom of the press? Or should some things be forbidden? Racist messages? Pornographic? Slander? Will the Santa Maria receive and send information from and to the Earth? How often? At what occasions? 15
Objectives for the students – deepen their understanding of the spoken language in different situations and contexts. - insight about how a language is structured. – understanding of the importance of both a mother tongue and communication skills in foreign languages. - pros and cons about having many languages or just one common. Tutorial N.B. This is only guidance to some of the key aspects of the problems with what language will be used on the Santa Maria. As you work, you will probably come across other aspects you’ll need to look further into. According to the story in the Bible about the Tower of Babel, God, seeing what the people were doing, came down and confused their languages so that they couldn't understand each other co-work to finish their tower. As shown - a common language is vital for the success of spaceship Santa Maria. What language will be used on Santa Maria? Different ones should be allowed? Just one agreed on language will be allowed? A new language? If different language would be spoken – think about: The advantages of having different languages? The disadvantages of having different languages? If just one language – which one? Different ones? The advantages of having only one language? The disadvantages of having one language? Should it be forbidden to use other languages? If a new language should be created – think about: The advantages of having one language? The disadvantages of having only have one language? How should a new language be created? Grammar Spelling Phonetics Normal letters or other symbols 16
Objectives for the students – develop their concern and responsibility for nature. - get familiar with ecosystems and how interrelationships between organisms can be described in ecological terms, such as producers, consumers, and energy flow. get an insight into photosynthesis and combustion, as well as the importance of water for life on earth. The Santa Maria will work as an enclosed ecosystem where plants, animals, and micro-organisms interact with each other and with the environment and work together as a functional unit. The spaceships ecosystem will be a miniature of how planet Earth's ecosystem works. On Santa Maria there is a lot of work to be done and to explain it in a few words - energy is something that can do work. The Spaceship will be in space for 500 years and will go further than anyone has ever been before. Energy can be in different forms and it can changes from one form to another. Still, the amount of energy always stays the same, but unfortunately every change means that quality of the energy reduces and in the end all energy has become “useless” heat that radiates out in space. That means that the Santa Maria will need a constant flow of new energy with high quality. How to feed the crew? What will the crew eat? Only vegetarian food? Pros and cons? ● What will you need on the ship to grow plants? Also animal foodstuff? Pros and cons? ● What will you need on the ship to breed livestock and poultry? ● What kind of animal foodstuff? ▫ Meat? ▫ Eggs? ▫ Milk? How will the ship get oxygen? How will the ship get fresh water? How will the ship take care of the waste? Organic matter? Non-organic matter? What form of energy will be used? To leave the Earth's gravitation and reach Space? To drive the Spaceship forward in Space? Do you need to run the “motors” all the time in space? For the equipment on board the ship? What could you do to save energy at the Santa Maria? What equipment is necessary? What equipment is unnecessary? Should there be any production on board? Should there be any new production or recycling of utility goods? What needs to be replaced if the ship is going to be running for 500 years? What kind of materials should be used for the stuff on board to keep for centuries? Organic matter? Metals? Plastics? Rubber? Glass? Other? 17
Objectives for the students reflect over ethical, existential and religious issues affecting their lives, - develop their ability to consciously form and express ethical standpoints based on knowledge and personal experiences, - respect the intrinsic value of other people, - develop an understanding of fundamental existential and ethical outlooks and are able to use their understanding to formulate their own views, - develop an understanding of views on religious and ethical issues, as well as a fundamental ethical attitude as the basis for their own views and actions, –
Tutorial N.B. This is only guidance to some of the key aspects of the problems with putting together the crew. As you work you will probably come across other aspects you’ll need to look further into.
Religion A religion is a set of beliefs that is held by a group of people. There are many different religions, each with a different set of beliefs. The beliefs are about the world and the people in it, about how they came into being, and what their purpose is. These beliefs are often linked to "supernatural" beings such as God, a number of gods or spirits. Can a society be successful with religion - or can it exist without it? Will any specific religions be practised on board? “Old” religions from planet Earth? Which ones will be allowed? Will any religion be banned (or parts of religions)? Should a new religion be created? What important elements will there be in this new religion? Gods? Commandments? Priests? Rituals? Should religion be forbidden at all? Will one person be allowed to practise more than one religion? Will women be allowed to become priests? Will priests be allowed to get marry and have children? If there will be different religions - which measures need to be taken in order to prevent religious conflicts? 18
Ethics With or without religion there must be some common values on board and a set of moral ideas that everyone in the crew accepts and obeys. What common ethical grounds will there be on board? Lying ok? If not, how should it be punished? Greed ok? If not, how should it be punished? Egoism ok? If not, how should it be punished? Envy ok? If not, how should it be punished? Adultery, ok? If not, how should it be punished? Abortion, ok? If not, how should it be punished? Euthanasia, ok? If not, If not, how should it be punished? Torture of prisoners ok? If not, how should it be punished? Civil disobedience, ok? If not, how should it be punished? Animal testing, ok? If not, how should it be punished? Cloning people, ok? If not, how should it be punished? Gay marriages, ok? If not, how should it be punished? Corruption, ok? If not, how should it be punished? Human rights? What human rights will be respected? Are all people equal before God?
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Objectives for the students – Gain awareness of the national economy, household economy and private economy as well as get chances to discuss possible routes towards a sustainable society both locally and globally. - gain awareness of and increase their involvement in the social economy. - develop the ability to critically examine social conditions. - develop skills and confidence to argue and influence the development of the society.
Tutorial N.B. This is only guidance to some of the key aspects of the problems with putting together the crew. As you work, you will probably come across other aspects you’ll need to look further into.
Economic system There are three interdependent and mutually reinforcing pillars of sustainable development - economic development, social development and environmental protection. In order for the Santa Maria to function, there must be economic sustainability. In history there have been different views on how this can be achieved and so far no system has worked our very well. How are the wages for different jobs being determined? Same wage for everyone? Set wages according to profession? What kind of professions will have high wages? What kind of professions will have low wages? Products of market forces (supply and demand)? How will payment for goods and services be done? Money? Barter? Other system?
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Will there be equality between the sexes according to wages? Will the crewmembers have to pay for something on board? What will be for free? What kind of things will be charged for? Will it be possible for crew members to form own businesses? If so, what kind of businesses will be allowed? Which ones will not be allowed? Will there be a banking system where crew members borrow money with interest?
Welfare benefits Welfare is for giving money to people for important needs. Welfare money is given mostly by the government to help the homeless, old, sick, and disabled people (people who cannot help themselves), and also helps children. This gives of course the people social security but a too generous welfare system can also cause financial problems for governments. Will crew members with illness or disability get financial support? Same wage as before A percentage of the ordinary wage? How many %? Aid in some other way Will crew members that are taking care of their children get financial support? Same wage as ordinary? A percentage of the ordinary wage? How many %? Aid in some other way Will crew members that are too old to work get financial support? Same wage as ordinary? A percentage of the ordinary wage? How many %? Aid in some other way
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Objectives for the students For this work you should define the rules for the Santa Maria and the laws that should be applied to the society that you want to create both on board the space ship as for society on the new planet. As you know, we citizens should be aware of obligations and rights. We want you to use these issues to create a, as possible, functioning society. Work area will cover the following: · What are rules — written and unwritten rules? ·What is a crime? How should a trial work or look like? What kind of punishment should there be? How should the prison system work?
Tutorial A) Rules/Laws What is a law? What is a rule? What is a norm? Why are there laws? What different laws, rules and standards differ? What happens if you break the law? What happens if it breaks a rule or a standard (non-written law)? What are the oldest known laws in the world? Can we learn anything from those laws? Who ensures that the laws are followed by the citizens? Who decides the laws? What are the laws that are specifically made for children and young people? Do you think that some laws are more important than other laws? Would people be able to be immune to laws? The following are some issues related to your school: Are there special laws that are applied for your school? What are they? Do you have any special rules in your school? Which Ones? Who decides the rules in your school? Can students change the rules in your school? What were the rules at school in the past? What happens if somebody breaks the rules at school? Give examples! What happened if you broke the rules of the school in the past? Is everyone in your school satisfied with the existing rules? Compare your school with another school. Do you have the same rules? Rules in school past and present — is there a difference? B) Crimes What is a crime? Why do people commit crimes? Are there different reasons? C) Trial Should we have courts? When a crime has been committed, what precedes trial? Who does what? Should we have a prosecutor, police, lawyers, or what? How do things work in the courtroomthe main hearing? What different penalties and sanctions, do we have in Sweden/Poland/Croatia? Should you be able to appeal a judgment? Should trials be held in public or should they be closed for other people? Who would be involved in the trial? Should ordinary citizens be the ones that judges at trials and/or legal professionals? Who is to judge in the trial? The Jury? The Judge? Other alternatives? What would be the part of the police? Should the police be both investigating and judging criminal offense? D) Punishment What is meant by penalty? What is meant by punishment? What would “jail” mean on board the Santa Maria? What should be the Penalties for: vandalism, physical abuse, theft, robbery, narcotic E) Treatment of criminals How do you think that we should handle those who are convicted of a crime? Prison: open office, closed office, closed office of the high-security Prison leave: Probation, suspended sentence, the encumbrance What about the situation for ex criminals after prison. Should they get any care after? Difficulties after a jail time. 22
Objectives for the students – gain insight into the importance of leisure for our well-being, - develop understanding for the important role of popular culture like music, art, computer games and film play in our lives. - gain insight into the effects of addictive substances on health, be able to discuss and reflect about these questions.
Spare time How much spare time would the crew have on Santa Maria? How long working hours will they have? Work all awake time? Work 10 hours everyday? Work 8 hours per day Monday to Friday? Other alternatives? What will be possible to do in the spare time on the Spaceship? Give examples on suitable activities.
Popular culture How will films be like in the year 2052? Describe what you think! Will new films be made on board? What will they be about? Life on earth? Life on board? Science fiction? What will the art on board be like? Describe what you think! Make art to do it! What will the music on board be like? Describe what you think by crating new music! What will the computer games on board be like? Describe what you think! Will there be any censorship of popular culture on the Santa Maria? If so, what should be censored?
Addictive drugs What regulations will there be on different addictive substances? Tobacco Prohibited? Allowed at a certain age? What age? Unregulated? Alcohol
Prohibited? Allowed at a certain age? What age? Unregulated?
Narcotics Prohibited? Allowed at a certain age? What age? Unregulated? Doping Prohibited? Allowed at a certain age? What age? Unregulated? 23
Objectives for the students – develop the ability to reflect over, assess and evaluate the consequences of different technological choices by analysing the advantages and disadvantages of the impact of technology on nature, society and the living conditions of individuals, – develop the ability to incorporate their technical knowledge into their own personal views of the world and practical actions, – develop an interest in new technology and their ability and their judgement when handling technical issues. A. Robotics At the moment we live in the Information society but pretty soon we will step in to the Robot society. Robots will play a major part in our lives in, for example household, elderly care and medicine like surgeries and prosthesis. Estimations are that in the next two decades robots will be capable of replacing humans in most manufacturing and service jobs. Robots and artificial intelligence will develop rapidly and according to Moore's law (which describes the relentless exponential improvement in digital technology with uncanny accuracy) computers will have the same processing power as human brains by the year 2029, and that by 2045 artificial intelligence-enhanced robots will reach a point where it is able to improve itself. What tasks should the robots have on board Santa Maria? Will the robots follow the Three Laws of Robotics that was written by Isaac Asimov? What happens if a robot does something wrong? Who will be responsible? What will the consequences be? And for who? ● The robot? ● The owner? ● The operator? ● The robot constructor? What rights and responsibilities should an intelligent robot have? Same as the rest of the crew members or like “slaves”? ● salary? ● recreation? ● “robo-healthcare”? ● pension? ● right to vote? Should cyborgs be allowed at the ship? If so, what kind of robotic prosthesis will be allowed? B. Genetic engineering Genetic engineering is a branch of biology that has developed very fast over the last decade and will develop even faster in the future. For now it mainly focuses on making food, animals and plants better adapted to the need of humans but it will also be possible to 24
do Human genetic engineering where scientist make registering and modification of an individual's genotype. Should there be a genetic information bank of the crew members’ genes Weigh pros and cons against each other’s and make a decision. Who would get access to it? ● Doctors and scientists? ● The police? ● The leaders? ● All of the crew? Should the plants and animals on board the ship be genetically modified organisms? Yes or no? Weigh pros and cons of each and make a decision. Should you allow genetic testing of embryos? Yes or no? Weigh pros and cons of each and make a decision. When would such testing be done? ● In case of high risk of severe disabilities or disorders? ● To investigate if the child has risk for genetic illnesses in the future? ● To investigate if the child has good or bad genetic qualities? ● Other reasons? Should it be possible to do genetic engineering of embryos by replacing genes? Yes or no? Weigh pros and cons of each and make a decision. When would they be done? ● High risk of severe disabilities or disorders? ● Reduce the risk for genetic illnesses in the future? ● To enhance genetic qualities of the child? All or just some specific? ● Other reasons? Should genetic therapy be allowed - that is replacing genes in living humans? Yes or no? Weigh pros and cons of each and make a decision. When would it be used? ● To treat diseases like diabetes or colour blindness? ● To enhance qualities of a person like muscular strength, the capacity of the lungs or brain capacity? Should cloning be allowed on the ship? Yes or no? Weigh pros and cons of each and make a decision. ● Plants? ● Animals? ● Humans? C. New inventions If we go back 40 years to the past, there were no cell phones, no RollerBlades, no personal computers, no grilling machines, no Internet, no Rap music, no computer games, no iPods, no GoreTex, no flat screens, no Simpsons, no Prozac, no graffiti, no sports bra, no GPS, no Viagra, no My Little Pony, no Three-Point Shots, no Post It-notes. If you look 40 years in the future, what will it look like then? What new inventions will be invented by the year 2052? Don't think so much about the technical aspect about how the invention will function in detail, instead think rather about what problems need to be solved and what needs will have to be satisfied. Use your creativity and imagination! How realistic is your invention? Make estimation in percentage!
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Objectives for the students Students on board the space ship will receive a quality education. They will have to choose further education. This assumes that the compulsory school will work closely with the local community on board the ship. Finish school goal is that every student: • can examine different options and decide matters concerning their own future, • has an insight into local society and its work, association and cultural life, and • is aware of opportunities for further education in Sweden and in other countries. Who's responsible for the upbringing? Parents? Why are they the best? Or why are they not suitable? Specialists? What kind of specialists? How come they are suitable to raise and educate children? Everyone on board the space ship together? Describe how it would be if everyone on board should participate in the educating of the next generation! For how long should children/pupils be educated? Should they have grades/marks at school? If so, how should the grades / marks for the pupils be developed? What should the grades measure? Facts or abilities? Which facts? What kind of abilities? Levels? Should we only have classes with pupils of the same age, or should you be able to have classmates that have different ages in the same class? Please support your opinion with arguments! Should order and behaviour be graded? Please support your opinion with arguments! What should be thought? What subjects? Are there subjects that are more crucial for the spaceship and are there subjects that are not essential? Vocational training or compulsory education at the higher levels? Should they be educated for a certain profession or not? If so, at what age? Should they be educated for a certain profession or not? If so, at what age? Should every student be able to decide his/hers own choice of professions? What kind of educated people, do you think, will be essential on board the Santa Maria? What in school should the students be able to decide on? Should there be some celebration when pupils graduate? How should this graduation celebration take place? Is there is anything else about the educational system that you think we must add, so that the space ship travellers are granted a good trip and a decent society? 26
Objectives for the students Become familiar with different social care systems and be able to discuss possible routes towards a sustainable society, both locally and globally, develop the ability to discuss questions concerning health and interpersonal relationships on the basis of relevant biological knowledge and personal experiences. The goal for health systems is, of course, good health but it is also important that the system can give the population what it expects of it and that the financial contributions to the system are fair. There is a wide variety of health care systems around the world. In some places health care is based on “out-of-pocket payments” were you pay directly for the costs. Many countries have systems with different forms of insurances and others have systems where health care and other types of care are funded through taxes. Most countries' systems are actually a mix of different models. How many resources should be spent on health care? A. Health care 1. Should the entire crew have equal access to health care services on board? No difference between the members More important crew members should have priority. Who is important? Who is least important? Should persons at a certain age have some kind of priority? 2.Should health care be free of charge or fee-based? If fee-based – how much should the patient pay for? Every cost? Only pay for parts of the treatment, such as? 3. Should all diseases be treated? If not, which ones? Give examples on diseases that shouldn't be treated. What consequences would it lead to? 4.How to prevent diseases and injuries? What rules and regulations should there be on board the ship for this matter? 5. Should euthanasia, assisted suicide, be allowed on board? If yes, should it be encouraged sometimes? If a crew member is incurable ill? If a crew member is very old? If a crew member is depressed? Other reasons? B. Elderly care 1.When should a crew member retire from work? Never? At a fixed age? What age? Depending to his/hers physics status? Who will decide this? 2.Who will be responsible for the elderly care? The relatives? Elderly care homes on board? 3.Should elderly care be free of charge or fee-based? If fee-based, how much should the patient pay for? Every cost or just parts?
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Objectives for the students – develop an understanding for the relation between carrying capacity and population, - be able to discuss and reflect about alternative social structures in areas like families and upbringing, - develop knowledge about the need for genetic variation in populations.
Tutorial N.B. This is only guidance to some of the key aspects of these problems. As you work you will probably come across other aspects you’ll need to look further into. Since the Santa Maria needs to be self-sufficient during the trip so the ship has a limited carrying capacity. There for it's of great importance to control the size of the crew. The Earth has also a limited carrying capacity and how large it is depends on what life style we choose to have. If everyone on Earth would have a typical European life style the carry capacity is only 3 about billion. This number should be compared to the estimated population on Earth 2052 – at least 9 billion. Since there are more than twice as many people on Earth today it's obvious that we can't carry on like we do - the amount of fuel, water, electricity, etc. is just not enough to go around. Some people are going to be left out. Today one fifth of the people one Earth are using up the the major part of the Earth's resources. One important factor to have a sustainable future is control the world population. This question is very delicate and it holds both some dilemmas and a lot of misunderstandings. The increase of the population the coming 50 years will mostly be in Asia and Africa, but mostly because of the fact that there are comparatively fewer people at middle age and high age today and not because of that to many babies are born. To “blame the climate crises” these all of these countries are therefore wrong. Actually countries like Bangladesh, Indonesia, Egypt and Mexico are down to just above two children per family. The challenge for the future is to reduce the population growth also in the poorest of all countries so that the world population will stabilise on 9 billion. What would be the maximum population on Santa Maria during the trip? What would be the maximum population on Santa Maria during the trip?
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What would the family forms be on Santa Maria? Will the crew members be allowed to form families? Would it be “normal” families - man, woman and children? Would there be other kinds of families? Should same-sex partnerships be allowed? Who would the children be brought up by besides school? By their parents? Common upbringing by experts on the ship? Who will be allowed to have children? Everyone that want to? Just chosen crew members If so, who will decide this? What criteria would be used to choose parents? How many children would be allowed per person? Up to the individuals Depending on the population on the ship? In what way would babies be produced? Normal sexual reproduction? In test tubes to make genetic engineering easier? It's vital to always have as many crew members in “productive age”, that is not to young and not to old, as possible. What can you do about this? The Santa Maria's final goal is to settle on a new planet and start a new civilisation there. How large founder population do you think is needed to be able to do this successfully? Would there be risk of founder effects?
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Comenius Partnership is a part of the EU’s Lifelong Learning Programme and to learn more about our Comenius programs in general, visit
http://ec.europa.eu/education/lifelong-learningprogramme/comenius_en.htm
To learn more about our partnership, visit
http://public.carnet.hr/santamaria/
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