Notre Dame Virtual School                                                 ERADICATE EXTREME POVERTY AND HUNGER - MILLENNIUM DEVELOPMENT GOAL #1 INTRODUCTION Nearly 1 billion people live on less than $1.00 per day - yes, $1.00 per day.  In such a prosperous world, how can this be?  Today, the world has enough money, resources, and technology to end hunger and poverty over the next few years.  With a target date for all the Millennium Development Goals (MDGs) of 2015, we can work together to eliminate hunger and poverty. The Notre Dame Virtual School and the Sisters of Notre Dame are working together to help you understand what we can all do to eradicate poverty and hunger.  “In fidelity to St. Julie’s preference for the poor in the most abandoned places, we choose to stand with poor people as they struggle for adequate means for human life and dignity.” WEBSITES (Excerpts from the websites appear below) RECOMMENDED RESOURCES FOR TEACHERS http://www.undp.org/MDG "The MDGs are still achievable if we act now. This will require inclusive sound governance, increased public investment, economic growth, enhanced productive capacity, and the creation of decent work." United Nations Secretary General Ban Ki-moon. This site provides a Toolkit section where you can download files for classroom use. http://www.un.org/Pubs/CyberSchoolBus/   Great resource for teachers.  There are seven units for the teacher to follow, including and introduction to food and health.  Good material for teacher-student interaction.  In addition, there are links to many sites for free material. www.endpoverty2015.org   This site gives teachers lots of reference resources about the "whys" of poverty and hunger.  One area of focus is about food security and what needs to done.  It talks about management approaches to land, soil and water conservation. Great resource for grades 7 and above. http://www.globaldimension.org         When going to this site, click onto KIDZ ZONE - this is a website specifically designed for children exploring the MDGs.  The site contains photographs, real life stories, games and activities.  The material is very colorful.  You can also click directly onto MDG site.  Lots of good teacher information. http://www.worldforworld.org   This site has one whole section on the Millennium Development Goals. Information on current news, websites, and teacher resources. PROJECTS and Resources http://www.un.org/cyberschoolbus/poverty2000/index.asp The United Nations Cyberschool Bus has developed a Poverty Curriculum for Teachers.  The curriculum is designed for grades 5-12.  There are seven units: Introduction Food Health Housing Education Work and Economic Security Conclusion Each section has an explanation, class activities, community involvement, and a menu of internet sites that offer solutions to the topics.   Examples of programs and services that are helping people around the world are on the site.   http://www.feedingminds.org/                 Another site with excellent teacher resources and activities for students.       This site is an international classroom with resources to study the problems of malnutrition and insecurity.  There are lesson plans for teachers, resources and activities for the students. http://www.lilmdgs.org/home.php                Here there are projects, ongoing current events, and activities.  Many of the activities are displayed in color, and are easy to understand with lots of pictures.  The whole sites theme is to inspire young people to help achieve the MDG’s goals. [Link]http://www.unicef.org This UNICEF site provides teachers with many resources directly related to the Millennium Development Goals.  This site helps to track progress toward the commitments to the goals.   [Link]www.fao.org/wfd2007/index_wfd2007/en/ The Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations celebrates World Food Day each year on 16 October, the day on which the Organization was founded in 1945. The World Food Day and TeleFood theme for 2007 is "The Right to Food".  They suggest students participate in a common activity of making a white bracelet to be worn during the month of October to acknowledge poverty and hunger. Education Project: The Sisters of Notre Dame from across the congregation have constructed a prayer-study-action program. Each section includes references to source, websites, and further information about the goal and what others around the world are doing to reach it. [Link]http://notredameonlinenews.wikispaces.com/UNMDG The pdf file on MDG #1 can be found in this Unit. SUGGESTED ACTIVITY: World Food Day October 16 [Link] http://www.feedingminds.org http://www.feedingminds.org/info/info_main.htm This site provides information on World Food Day, October 16.  Students all over the world can use these lessons to gain a better understanding of hunger and malnutrition.  Teachers can then submit lessons generated in their specific classes for use by other teachers around the world on subsequent World Food Days.  New ideas, activities and lessons from around the world will be collected and distributed each year.   Suggested activity: How about asking the students to spend no more than $7.00 for the week of World Hunger Day - the equivalent to $1.00 per day that over 500 million children are faced with every week.  Then involve students in a discussion about what they discovered.