Students first explore, in small groups, the labor, agribusiness, environment and human rights issues protested throughout the first week of December 1999 during the WTO meeting in Seattle. Students then develop questions about their assigned issues and the impact of world trade in general, interview people at related local businesses and industries, and write newspaper articles which incorporate all of the learning experiences from this lesson. Review the Academic Content Standards related to this lesson. Assess how world trade affects businesses and industries in their city. Develop interview questions about the impact of world trade on three local businesses.
Students then share their responses.
List the businesses and industries that students mention on the board for use in a later activity. Students then use the Internet to answer this research question about their assigned topic. Each group should gather as many examples as possible, making sure that they understand how each example relates to the World Trade Organization's trade objectives and rules. After research is complete, each group should share their findings with the class. Referring to the list created on the board from the initial journal exercise as a starting point, each group selects three local businesses and industries that are in some way involved with or related to their assigned topic.