A Class Divided

I found the video of " A Class Divided" to be very interesting, in fact, intriguing.  For a teacher to come up with the plan to divide her students into two groups based on their eye color was magnificent.  You could immediately see the student's point of views of their peers change.  First, the teacher told the students that blue eyed people were smarter than the brown eyed people.  The teacher told the students that whoever had brown eyes were better than whoever had blue eyes.  She did this to show an example of segregation.  She even went as far as to say that the blue eyed students could not play on the playground during recess and the brown eyed students had a few extra minutes.  I found it interesting when one student said he felt like it was a good time to get all of his angst out against friends that he couldn't do before, just because of their eye color.  

I think that the teacher was right to carry out this experiment because it broke the idea of segregation down to a level that young students could understand.  It was a different way of learning for the students, which i think made it more interesting for them, and helped them understand the idea of segregation better.  

I think this experiment would be great to carry out in a classroom because it really opens up the eyes of the students.  I have heard of similar experiments based upon clothing color or even hair color.  I think these are all good ideas and give the students a new way to learn, while having a little bit of fun as well.   Of course, the teachers had to get the permission of the parents before carrying out these experiments.