Board games can be a teacher’s best friend, especially on a cold day with no recess! But the down side is that many board games are intensely competitive, leaving the children who lose feeling angry or frustrated. Wouldn’t it be great if there were board games that fostered concepts of Catholic social teaching instead?

Well, there are a few. The UnGame is a non-competitive game that explores the range of human experience — from lighthearted fun to tender moments. It works great as an ice-breaker with new acquaintances or as a time of surprising discovery with old friends. The UnGame consists of a series of questions with six different versions of questions available for all age levels. There is a Christian version also—here is a sample question: “Tell about a time when God answered one of your prayers.”

A Catholic justice educator will quickly realize that you can take the key principles of Catholic social teaching as a base for UnGame questions. For example: “Describe a time you felt valued as a human being.” (human dignity); “ What is something you really need from your family?” (family and community); or, “If a parent gives you the right to drive the family car, what responsibilities come with that right?” (rights and responsibilities).

The UnGame is distributed by Talicor, and is available for $17.95 plus $5.60 shipping and handling. For more information, call (800) 433-4263.

Another game in a similar vein is called Life Stories. This game has several categories of questions, from relationships to events, from vacation/trips to holiday memories. Lots of good fun and community sharing. Life Stories is available at St. Martin’s Table bookstore in Minneapolis; call (612) 339-3920 for more information. 

Michelle LeBlanc, Youth worker
Church of St. Phillip –Mpls

When we approach clothing retailers about requiring better wages for the workers who make our clothes, they often tell us pay must be kept low so U.S. consumers can have inexpensive products. Let’s evaluate the validity of this claim using some facts and simple math.

Consider a GAP t-shirt that sells for $20 in the United States. To manufacture the shirt, San-Francisco-based Gap, Inc. contracts with a maquiladora in El Salvador. (A maquiladora is a factory, usually foreign-owned, that assembles goods for export). The Salvadoran workers producing the shirt were paid $0.56 an hour. On average, a worker is able to sew approximately 4.7 shirts per hour.

Based on this information, calculate the following:

1. How much do workers get per shirt?

2. In 1994, the Salvadoran government determined that an average family’s bare subsistence required about four times the wages required by maquiladora work. If wages were quadrupled, how much would a worker make per hour? Per shirt?

3. If the company passed on all of this increased cost to customers, how much would a GAP shirt cost?

4. If a worker’s wages were increased by a factor of 10, how much would a worker make per hour? Per shirt?

5. If the company passes on all of this increased cost to consumers, how much would a GAP shirt cost?

 
Discuss the following questions:

1. Would you be willing to pay more for a shirt if it meant workers in another country were getting higher wages? Do you think most people from the United States would be willing to do so? Why or why not?

2. This clothing manufacturer sells its goods in the United States, yet manufactures them in El Salvador. Why do you think this is the case.

3. Who should be responsible for making sure that Salvadoran workers make wages suffi- cient to support themselves and their fami- lies?

The above was reprinted with permission from the Educating About the Americas—Spring, 1998, newsletter. It is based on a story by Larry Weiss of the Resource Center of the Americas and comes out of a new curriculum called Child Labor is Not Cheap. FFI call (612) 627-9445 or visit www.americas.org .