I barely remember how I came up with this idea for a SocialPsych activity[1] which was new this year. The idea was for students to use the principles of persuasion covered in the chapter to convince other students to donate $1 along with them to benefit the De Marillac Academy. I envisioned it as a simple homework assignment that students could do during recess, lunch, or during their Resource Period. Here’s how I introduced the assignment to one of my classes:
In the screenshot below, you can see where I posted the original direction, asking students to bring a one-dollar bill to class. Not shown is a reply, wherein Mr Joo asks students to reply to my post with a brief explanation of what they did[2]:
There was one hiccup in the activity, which I’ll need to solve for next year. One student took it upon himself to go into another class which was in session, and ask the teacher to make an announcement. He made his pitch and then collected more than $40 from students in that class. Not only was it disruptive to the other teacher’s class, but students reported feeling manipulated into giving money. Mr Joo ended up going back to the class, apologizing to the students, and returning thir money. If we do the activity again next year, we’ll be more explicit in our directions, forbidding the disruption of classes.
In the end, our Psych students were able to drum up enough support for more than $200 in cash donations. Mr Halluck, who volunteers at the De Marillac Academy, bought a piece of student artwork for our classroom, shown below, from th De Marillac Academy fundraiser, and donate the remaining cash.
I like the activity, despite the awkwardness that it created with the interrupted class, for its practical application of principles of persuassion, and the money it raised for a local school that’s doing great work with little material support.
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But I do remember that the idea came to me in the shower, as they often do. ↩
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Mr Joo and I did pause for a moment, halfway through the activity, and worry a bit about whether we were teaching our students how to be manipulative. We even joked about training little con artists… ↩