Page - 86 - in Reflective Cosmopolitanism - Educating towards inclusive communities through Philosophical Enquiry

86 REfLECTIvE COsMOPOLITANIsM Exercise: Looking for alternatives. Criteria 1. You are going on a trip with your friend and his father. Before you leave, your friend’s father asks you what route you want to follow. If you take the motorway, the trip will be shorter but the views will not be very nice. If you take a secondary road, it will take longer but the views will be more beautiful. What do you prefer? What criteria did you use in choosing? Is it difficult to change your mind if your friend prefers the other option? 2. You are going to eat at your friend’s. Her father asks you if you would prefer piz- za, chicken, or the remains of last night’s roast salmon. Your friend says that she prefers the chicken but her father says that, since you are the guest, you should choose. What do you choose? What criteria have you used? 3. At school, you are given the choice of studying two extra weekly hours of French as a second language or having those two extra hours to catch up on your class work. One of your classmates, who you are always with, decides to go to French. What do you choose? What criteria did you use? 4. You are going on a school trip to visit a city that has three main sights: a guided visit to the cathedral (which is one of the most beautiful in the country), a moun- tain route where you can see the local plants and animals (which are rare in other parts), and a visit to the toy museum (which has more than twenty rooms where you can actually play with all the toys). What do you choose to do? What criteria did you use? Exercise: Looking for alternatives to everyday situations The group is asked to look for alternatives in the situations we describe. The alter- natives they come up with are written down, and the group then analyzes which are feasible and which are not. We can then vote to choose the best two options and discuss the reasons for choosing them and the criteria used in choosing one over the others. 1. A school trip to the mountains was scheduled for today but temperatures were freezing last night and now the roads are blocked. How can we spend the day? 2. Your best friend has invited you to her birthday party but she has said that she does not want guests to buy her presents. She would prefer guests to make the presents. What do you give her? (If the children do not come up with this idea, you could ask about the present being an afternoon playing games at home or a trip to countryside, etc.). 3. You play on a volleyball team that trains every Saturday at school. You normally walk to practice because it is only a fifteen minute walk. Today, when you got to the gymnasium, you notice that you have left your sports shoes at home and you only have the school shoes you are wearing. What do you do? 4. You are going to meet some friends at home. You had planned on listening to some music, maybe dancing a little and watching a film on your computer. However, soon after your friends arrive, there is a black out and the battery on your compu- ter has run out. How do you organize the afternoon?