What is conflict?
Brainstorm the different types of conflict you’ve encountered before.
- Conflict is a disagreement between 2 or more people
- Conflict is a normal part of life – 2 people can’t agree on everything all the time
- Conflict isn’t always negative – there can be positive results
- It is our reaction to conflict that can create problems
- It’s important to learn to resolve conflicts in a positive way
What sort of social conflict do you have to deal with?
Please brainstorm on the whiteboard with your class types of social conflict or conflict scenarios you’ve dealt with before or may deal with in the future
Some possible examples:
- Disagreement about an idea – how to do something, how to play something, where to go together, how you feel about someone, types of friendships
- Exclusion from a group, party or activity
- Gossip – such as spreading rumours about a person
- Verbal abuse – such as personal remarks and calling names
- Unwanted physical social contact – there may be examples that do not fit into these categories
Write a story on a social conflict you’ve had.
Write about a scenario or situation where you have had to deal with conflict with friends. This situation should be one that did not get resolved or ended poorly. The names of people in your story could be Ted, Billy, Sarah, Bob – please don’t use real names. This story is anonymous. We will collect your story to plan for our next lesson on conflict resolution.
How did you handle the conflict?
Consider the following ideas:
- Avoid
- Confront
- Ignore
- Problem solve
- Build and blow up
- Communicate
- Tell a friend
- Identify which type of approach to conflict you used from the above list.
- Has this method of dealing with conflict worked for you in the past?
- Identify whether this was a passive, aggressive or assertive approach to conflict.
- List the pro’s and con’s for this approach to dealing with this social conflict.