Over the summer, Nii Armah Sowah and I created a lesson plan for a brave space activity that supports productive dialogue and helps to cultivate brave spaces in our classrooms. This resource is open source and can be used in any educational or organizational setting—online conferencing or in-person—to put anti-racism and equity into action. We developed this over the years as co-teachers of Performance and Community Engagement through the University of Colorado Department of Theatre & Dance. This lesson plan is included in our online platform associated with our class under our “toolbox” tab through BuffsCreate.
In this lesson, we recommend a useful tool for teaching with technology, Padlet, which allows students to co-author their responses to various prompts. We offer free use of this lesson plan to anyone who might find it useful for supporting productive dialogue about anti-racism and other relevant social issues with respect and courage. This lesson plan supports an instructor in facilitating the co-creation of a class’s own guidelines for critical engagement on challenging issues. In alignment with Universal Design for Learning, we will soon have a version of the reading that accompanies this lesson plan—"From Safe Spaces to Brave Spaces”—that is fully accessible. We are working with Anna Reid in the Digital Accessibility Office to get the reading ready and posted soon to our BuffsCreate site. Ensuring all course materials, such as reading assignments, are accessible minimizes barriers to learning and reduces the need for individual accommodations and helps to ensure that all students have an equal opportunity to participate. We offer this open educational resource to the public domain as a part of CU’s initiative to support free use and repurposing of information produced by this public institution.
Download the "From Safe Spaces to Brave Spaces" lesson plan (.doc)
