Peace is part of lesson plan for Newark pupils
School honored with Peacemaker Among Us award
At the Newark Center for Creative Learning, studies include living in peace.
And when it comes to harmony, the school must be doing something right. Pacem in Terris, the Wilmington-based organization that promotes peace, recently selected the school as a recipient of its Peacemaker Among Us award, making it only the second such school to be so honored since the organization was started 43 years ago.
“Resolving conflicts peacefully has always been a part of how they view children,” said Sally Milbury-Steen, executive director of Pacem in Terris, which is Latin for “Peace on Earth.” “They see it as a life skill. It's really been an integral part of the school.”
The organization presented the first such award to Wilmington Friends School’s lower school in 1997, she said.
A large photo of Mahatma Gandhi, who practiced passive resistance to great effect in India, greets visitors as they enter NCCL, an independent school for kindergarten to eighth grade. The Pacem in Terris award certificate is displayed nearby at the front entrance. Just around the corner in the school’s library, 11 students in grades 5 through 8 worked earlier this month on conflict-resolution exercises, including role-playing.
Teacher Kate Kerrane went over ground rules with the students for the conflict-mediation sessions, then broke the children into smaller groups to resolve a pre-scripted dispute through role-playing. The children later will work with other students to show them what they have learned, she said.
“It’s trying to understand someone else’s point of view,” she said of the training.
Kerrane said the award from Pacem in Terris was appreciated.
“I was really pleased to be acknowledged for the work we’re doing,” she said. “That’s part of our philosophy, to have children who are empathetic with each other in a positive way.”
The school also works with children on anti-bullying, encouraging them to have respect for others and to become involved in the community and world. Practicing that philosophy, children at the school raised about $1,000 to go toward a fund to build a school in war-torn Afghanistan during a Pennies for Peace program, Kerrane said.
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