Lesson Plan 3

Title: 1965 to 2008 The Fight for Justice Continues

Grade: 8

Time Requirement: 80 minutes

Objectives

• Students will be able to describe the plight of migrant farm workers in the United States.
• Students will understand why people organize unions.
• Students will understand how the organization of farmworkers aligned with Robert F. Kennedy's social justice issue of the rights of workers to a fair wage.
• Students will be able to describe how one person or a group of people can effect change throughout non-violent means.

New York State Learning Standards:

• Social Studies Standard 1: History of the United States and New York state KI 1, PI 2-3
• Social Studies Standard 5: Civics, Citizenship and Government KI 2, PI 5; KI 3, PI 2
• English Language Arts Standard 1: Information and Understanding Grade 8 Reading, PI 2, 6, 10; Grade 8 Writing, PI 4, 7-8
• English Language Arts Standard 3: Critical Analysis and Evaluation Grade 8 Writing, PI 1

SOCIAL STUDIES CORE CURRICULUM

• Grade 8: United States and New York state History
• Unit 11, Section I C. Civil rights movement placed focus on equality and democracy (p. 87)
• Unit 11, Section II D. Old and new problems addressed (p. 88)

SKILLS

• Thinking skills – comparing and contrasting ideas; drawing inferences and making conclusions; evaluating
• Research and writing skills – interpreting information; analyzing information; supporting a position
• Sequencing and chronology skills – placing events in chronological order; creating timelines; understanding the concepts of time, continuity and change
• Graph and image analysis skills – drawing conclusions

CONCEPTS

• Change
• Civic values
• Citizenship
• Human rights
• Justice
• Power

Materials: Download and print:

• Biography of Cesar Chavez www.americaslibrary.gov/cgi-bin/page.cgi/aa/chavez
• Student/Farmworkers Alliance www.sfalliance.org/about.html

Technology Requirement:

Computer access, Internet access, LCD projector

Background:

In September 1965, Cesar Chavez and 1,200 families joined in a strike against major table and wine grape growers in the Delano, Calif., area. They were striking for better wages and working conditions. Chavez led a successful five-year boycott that brought millions of supporters to the United Farm Workers (UFW), gathering support from unions, students, church groups and consumers. Chavez's UFW adhered to the principals of non-violence practiced by Mahatma Gandhi and Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. The 1965 strikers took a pledge of non-violence and Chavez conducted a fast in 1968 to reaffirm the UFW's commitment to non-violence. Robert F. Kennedy called Chavez, "one of the heroic figures of our time" and flew to Delano to be with him when he ended the fast.

Relevance to Current Issues:

In May 2008, The Coalition of Immokalee Workers and Burger King Corp. announced plans to work together to improve wages and working conditions for the farm workers who harvest tomatoes for Burger King in Florida. Burger King agreed to pay an additional net penny per pound for Florida tomatoes to increase wages for the Florida farm workers who harvest tomatoes. This victory sends a strong message to other fast-food companies that they need to become more socially responsible and recognize the work of the migrant farm worker through fair wages and better working conditions. This is the latest in a string of victories against other fast-food companies such as Taco Bell in 2005 and McDonald's in 2007.

Inequality for migrant workers in the farming industry has not abated since Cesar Chavez began the struggle for the rights of California migrant workers in 1965. Today, groups are working to ensure that workers receive fair wages. One individual or a group of dedicated activists can make a difference and right injustice.

Student Activities

Anticipatory Set

Show students the following video clip, followed by a class discussion:

• Con Estes Manos…With These Hands – Five-minute video that shows farm workers' broken and abused hands that pick the tomatoes in the Florida fields. www.youtube.com/watch?v=UlcIAfkXklk
• If the hands could talk, what would they say about life as a worker in the tomato fields?

Write the student responses on the board, flip chart or smart board.

• DOWNLOAD: Document 3a: Comparison Chart (PDF)

Activity 1

• Teacher will divide students into four groups and the students will continue to work in groups through the next three activities.
• Students will read the excerpt from the AFL-CIO Web site on unions and answer the guiding questions.

How do unions help working families today?

Through unions, workers win better wages, benefits and a voice on the job - and good union jobs mean stronger communities. Union workers earn 30 percent more than nonunion workers and are more likely to receive health care and pension benefits than those without a union. In 2005, median weekly earnings for full-time union wage and salary workers were $833, compared with $642 for their nonunion counterparts. Unions lead the fight today for better lives for working people, such as through expanded family and medical leave, improved safety and health protections and fair-trade agreements that lift the standard of living for workers all over the world.

What have unions accomplished for all workers?

Unions have made life better for all working Americans by helping to pass laws ending child labor, establishing the eight-hour day, protecting workers' safety and health and helping create Social Security, unemployment insurance and the minimum wage, for example. Unions are continuing the fight today to improve life for all working families in America. www.aflcio.org/joinaunion/union101.cfm

• Why do people form or join unions?
• What benefits have unions achieved for workers?
• How have unions made life better for all working Americans?

Activity 2

Grape Boycott in 1965:

By 1964, a movement arose and the union United Farm Workers Association (UFWA) was formed with 1,000 members. The farm workers wanted better wages and better working and living conditions. In August 1965, an independent walkout of Mexican and Filipino grape workers in Delano, Calif., caught the attention of the leader and organizer of the UFWA, Cesar Chavez. An even larger strike, led by the Filipinos against all the grape companies in the Delano area, was supported by UFWA. When the strike was unsuccessful in completely halting field work, Chavez organized a march to California's state capital to inspire farm workers to join the union. The march was effective in getting national attention; however, Chavez knew that neither the march nor the strike would be effective in getting the grape producers to negotiate. UFWA then decided to call a boycott of the Schenley Liquor Co., which owned the vast majority of the vineyards in the San Joaquin Valley. This was a success and soon other grape producers were forced to sign contracts. Chavez sent representatives throughout the country to coordinate boycott meetings and fund-raising efforts. For the next four years, the United Farm Workers Organizing Committee decided to boycott all table grapes; this received wide public support. This boycott was the most successful in American history. In 1970, the pressure of the ongoing boycott resulted in the signing of contracts that provided workers with significant benefits. http://library.thinkquest.org/26504/History.html

• What did the farm workers want that caused them to organize?
• Why did Chavez expand the boycott?
• Why do you think Cesar Chavez was successful in organizing farm workers?

Activity 3

Tomato Boycott, 2008

A group of tomato pickers from Florida announced an end to a boycott of Taco Bell yesterday (March 8, 2008) after the fast-food chain and its parent company agreed to meet demands to improve wages and working conditions for the farm workers.

In what both sides called an unprecedented agreement, the fast-food company said it will increase the amount it pays for tomatoes by a penny per pound, with the increase to go directly to workers' wages. Taco Bell said it will help the farm workers' efforts to improve working and living conditions.

The Coalition of Immokalee Workers, an advocacy group made up largely of indigent immigrants who work tomato fields in southwest Florida, and representatives of Taco Bell and its corporate parent, Yum Brands Inc., announced the agreement at a news conference at Yum headquarters in Louisville. The farm workers had traveled there for a protest.

About 80 Immokalee farm workers had traveled by bus to Louisville for what they called their Taco Bell Truth Tour, stopping at 15 cities en route to bolster support for the boycott. The rally on Saturday, featuring celebrities such as Martin Sheen and Kerry Kennedy, a daughter of the late Robert F. Kennedy, will go on, coalition members said, as a celebration of the agreement.

Nieves, E. (March 9, 2005). Accord with tomato pickers ends boycott of Taco Bell. The Washington Post, p. A6. Retrieved from the Coalition of Immokalee Workers Web site, July 23, 2008. www.ciw-online.org/washpost05b.html

• Why did the boycott of Taco Bell succeed?
• How was Robert F. Kennedy's legacy for social justice action represented?

Activity 4

Eric Schlosser, author Fast Food Nation:

"At a time of declining union membership, failed organizing drives and public apathy about poverty, a group of immigrant tomato pickers has persuaded an enormous fast food company – Yum Brands, which in addition to Taco Bell owns KFC, Pizza Hut, A&W All American Food Restaurants and Long John Silver's – to increase the wages of migrant workers and impose a tough code of conduct on Florida tomato suppliers. Now McDonald's, Burger King, Wendy's and Yum's other brands need to do the same." www.sfalliance.org/tacobell.html

• Why was the victory of the tomato pickers an important event in unionism?

Culminating Activity

• Teacher will divide students into four groups.
• The students will discuss the guiding questions in their groups and fill in the remaining columns on their hand-outs. One student will act as reporter.
• How do unions protect their workers?
• How did Cesar Chavez and the Coalition of Immokalee Workers help to make the lives of field workers better?

After completing the group work, each group will report out. The recorder will place the group's information on the large chart. Students will fill in their individual charts.

Homework:

Read the quote from Robert F. Kennedy, "Picking tomatoes and grapes at harvest time, going on relief the rest of the year, agricultural migrants were among the lowest paid, worst-housed, least-educated and least visible of all Americans." (vanden Heuvel, (1970), p. 101)

• Assign students to write an essay comparing how Cesar Chavez and the Coalition of Immokalee Workers organized migrant workers.

Extension:

• Students could create a series of posters supporting the migrant farm workers.
• Students could listen to the brief clip of Sen. Robert F. Kennedy's hearing on the boycott in Delano, Calif. After the viewing, the students could research what happened to those farm workers who were arrested and detained.