Today we travelled to the Island Utopia!
Utopia is an island in the ocean and it
looks like an island many of us dream about. Here are sand beaches, palm trees;
the weather is often sunny and warm. On the inner side if the island, we find
forests and hills. The island is inhabited. People live in two villages and in
a nomad settlement. One village is on the seaside, one on a hill, and the nomad
settlement changes place, because its inhabitants are nomads.
Until last month, island Utopia was ruled
by King Uto. Before him, his mother had been the Queen of the island, and
before her, Uto’s grandfather had been the King. Uto himself did not have
children. But he loved to travel and he visited many other islands, small and
big, and studied how people lived there. He learned that not all islands have
kings. On some islands, the people ruled themselves. It was not easy to
understand how they ruled themselves. But King Uto had the impression that they
lived well.
As King Uto became old without children, he
did not want to choose a successor. In a speech in front of all Utopians, he
declared that all Utopians together should be his successors and rule
themselves. Soon after his speech, King Uto died. He left the Utopians with a
great heritage and an even greater task.
Who is Utopian?
How great the task was, the Utopians
understood when they needed to decide who should participate in the decisions,
which previously were taken by King Uto on his own. King Uto said that the
Utopians should decide together and explained the system of elections and votes
on other islands. But King Uto did not say who exactly is a Utopian, and thus
who is allowed to participate in elections and votes.
The big task of the Utopians
Who should participate in decisions on
Utopia?
If they have different opinions, who should decide what should happen?
Should some of them be allowed to decide about certain things, but not about
other things?
The students had to think about these
questions and define rules about who is allowed to participate in decisions on
island Utopia. They had to determine if there should be different rules for different
types of people and for different types of decisions.