Defining Human Rights

In this lesson we will consider what we actually mean when we talk about human rights. Are human rights simply things like the right to freedom and the right to religious belief and practice or are thye more wide ranging than that?

We will also consider the development of human rights throughout human history through the creation of a human rights timeline that explores some of the key milestones in the construction of human rights as a concept.
Your first activity is to create a definition of human rights in no more than 140 characters (including spaces and punctuation).You can be as imaginative as you need with the language you use.

We can see, from watching the video, that the development of human rights was not something that happened over night. Equally, the development of human rights did not start with the UN Declaration of Human Rights as some might assume. As a group we are going to create a timeline of human rights that we can add to and develop as we explore this unit. To do this we are going to split ourselves up into 7 equal groups to explore the following milestones in human rights development. Each group will produce a single sheet poster that presents a particular human rights milestone from the following list.

The Cyrus Cylinder (539 BC)
Magna Carta (1215 CE)
Petition of Right (1628 CE)
United States Declaration of Independence (1776)
US Constitution (1787) and Bill of Rights (1791)
Declaration of the Rights of Man and of the Citizen (1789)
The First Geneva Convention (1864)

Obviously, you will need to carry out your own research in order to complete your poster but you are strongly advised to check out this website hereto provide a starting point for your research. These posters do not need to be super detailed but should provide a clear summary of the key points that can be referred to by others throughout the unit.