No matter who you are or where you live, we’re all entitled to human rights. That’s what Girl Guides in Winnipeg would tell you on Human Rights Day (December 10) and every day. With a trip to the Canadian Museum of Human Rights, they discovered the very real power they have to stand up for everyone’s rights. Unit Guider Jennifer explains:
As the evening began, a buzz of excitement filled the air. Our first stop was the What are Human Rights gallery. As Guiders, we stood back and let the girls take the lead in how they wanted to explore. We watched with pride as each girl was drawn into a different exhibit, reading stories on what people in history viewed as ‘human rights’. We fielded so many thoughtful questions from the Guides. Some examples were, why was it like that? Or, how could they have treated people like that?
As the evening progressed, we explored spaces devoted to the First Nations, Métis and Inuit peoples and their views on human rights. Here the girls took in the sights of beautiful hand-beaded tapestries along the walls and stories of a peoples treated unjustly for many years. In the Canadian Journeys gallery, we reflected on both the freedoms and the discrimination people faced within our own Canadian heritage.
We closed our evening in the Inspiring Change gallery, where the girls took their own thoughts and feelings about love, beliefs and change and left empowering messages on the walls to share with visitors from around the world. Their messages were so moving and honest. Some chose to write about ending discrimination and fighting for equality while others added messages of love and hope…visions of a brighter, stronger, united future… together.
I believe that each girl gained so much from this outing and that it changed them in some way, both broadening their views on the world around them and strengthening their knowledge that they each have the power to bring about positivity and change in the world. It’s through Girl Guide outings like this that girls can discover that they have the power to change the world’s thinking. Girls can truly do anything – we just need to let girls guide the way. The CMHR has not seen the last of the Winnipeg 99th Girl Guides. We will be back.
Guest post by Jennifer Franzin, a Guider with the 99th Winnipeg Girl Guides. Do you have a story of a unique unit activity you’d like to share? Email us: ggcblog@girlguides.ca
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