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Where do the world’s refugees go?

  • 20 min
  • 11-16 years
  • HUMAN RIGHTS, DIVERSITY, PEACE & CONFLICT, INTERDEPENDENCE

What do I want to find out?

Pupils’ knowledge and understanding about the inequalities in the global distribution of population, wealth and refugees, and their attitudes to these inequalities. Explore awareness of bias in the media and pupils’ critical thinking skills.

What do I need?

  • A set of 20 small cards or pieces of paper for each group (the size of a credit card). These cards represent the world’s wealth, population and refugees. Each represents 5% of the total.
  • A map of the world for each group.

What do I do?

  • With pupils in small groups, ask them to place the cards on the continents to reflect actual distribution.
  • Ask: If your 20 cards represented the world’s population, where in the world would they be?
  • If your 20 cards represented all the world’s wealth, where in the world would it be?
  • If your 20 cards represented all the refugees in the world, where in the world would they be seeking safety? (as opposed to where the refugees originate from)
  • Ask pupils to explain their reasons for their choices.

How do I analyse the results?

Compare the pupils responses with the most accurate data possible. These figures are from 2014.

Topic

Asia

Europe

North America

Africa

S & C America and the Caribbean

People

12

2

2

2

2

Wealth

2

6

8

2

2

Refugees

8

4

0

6

2

Note to what extent the pupils’ responses are inaccurate and if they are mostly accurate or inaccurate about certain continents. Do pupils overestimate the population of Africa and underestimate the population of Asia?

Observe to what extent pupils are certain of their responses, and how able they are to justify their choices. Do they have well formed and researched opinions, or are they simply repeating information they’ve heard elsewhere. Check for stereotyped responses in their answers, or influence from the media.

Record responses to refugees and note any reasons given for inaccuracies.

Note whether pupils acknowledge inequalities in wealth. Do they believe it is inevitable or that change is possible?

How do I measure the change?

  • Even after a relatively short teaching intervention, you can repeat the activity exactly, as long as you have not provided pupils with the correct answers.

    Note any increase in accuracy of pupils’ responses. However, it is more important to observe whether they are better able to justify their responses, challenge one another and discuss the related issues.

    Show pupils the correct figures for each heading and ask them to focus on which they found most surprising and why.

    You can also use the activity What do you think about migrants?  to measure change in similar attitudes, critical thinking and awareness of bias in the media.