Russian schools have received new recommendations on conducting special lessons against the background of a “special military operation” in Ukraine, Kommersant reports. This time, teachers should organize classes for students of grades 5-9 and 10-11 on the topic “Anti-Russian sanctions and their impact on the domestic economy.”
In the training manual, this “influence” is presented rather positively — schoolchildren will be told about the growth of the share of Russian products in several areas, and then they will be asked to assess which countries will suffer great economic losses from sanctions. The economists interviewed by Kommersant point out the mistakes of the authors of the manual and warn that Russian schoolchildren will soon see the effect of sanctions themselves.
Materials for the “sanctioned” lesson were handed over by a teacher near Moscow. Kommersant journalists found reports of such lessons on the websites of a number of schools in the Moscow region, Oryol and Samara regions. As stated in the manual, the teacher should “show Russia’s capabilities to overcome the negative consequences of the sanctions pressure of Western countries on the economic sphere of our society, give an idea of the main directions of anti-sanctions policy in the Russian Federation.” Classes should be held as part of a school course in social studies.
At the beginning of the lesson, the teacher should quote President Vladimir Putin that “unprecedented external pressure is being exerted on Russia.” After that, you need to ask schoolchildren if they know “what priority measures include the anti-sanctions policy of our state.”
Only after that, the teacher should tell what sanctions are: “Restrictions designed to “punish” any country for its actions.” Here it is also necessary to clarify what “actions” are meant — “a special military operation conducted by Russia in Ukraine, caused by the need to protect the population of Donbass.” Examples of sanctions include the freezing of assets of state corporations and banks, as well as part of the gold and foreign exchange reserve of Russia. Another example is the departure of foreign companies.
After that, the teacher should tell that Prime Minister Mikhail Mishustin “named the protection of the domestic market and the maintenance of employment of the able-bodied population as the most important directions of the anti-sanctions policy.” And students need to answer, “why exactly these areas are a priority.”
In addition to these recommendations, the manual contains a link to a video about the benefits of import substitution. “The teacher, together with the students, concludes that economic policy in recent years has been aimed at increasing the protection of domestic producers, ensuring its sustainability in the face of external crises,” the lesson script says. Fifth- and ninth—grade students should name measures to support the Russian economy and citizens in “conditions of increased sanctions pressure,” and high school students should describe the economic effect of them.
At the end of the lesson, children will have to fill out a questionnaire with questions: “Are sanctions against Russia fair?”, “Will sanctions lead to strengthening of the Russian economy?”, “Who will suffer big economic losses?”. There are three possible answers to the last question: Russia, NATO countries, all countries of the world.