This accessible resource will help groups to explore and reflect on ideas of community, identity and global citizenship.

As a some-time publisher of resources for the youth sector, I'm aware that you can't please everyone with an activity pack. For some it's too structured, for others it is not structured enough. Or it is too school-orientated. Or the age group is wrong. Or the illustrations are inappropriate.

Fortunately though, most youth workers aren't necessarily looking for a complete and perfect off-the-shelf package - they want inspiration, information and ideas to adapt for the circumstances they are working in.

So, while this resource from Hodder Education is certainly geared to the school market and the national curriculum, it doesn't mean there isn't something in it that others will find useful.

It won't necessarily grab your attention on a rainy Thursday when the Xbox packs up but, as part of project work with groups aged from 12 to - maybe - 15, who are already committed to considering citizenship issues, there's some good stuff.

There are three broad sections, each one containing a number of activities. The first section covers rules and fairness, rights and responsibilities. It begins with one of those ideas that, even if it's not right for you, might inspire a simple home-made adaptation.

An alien high school on the planet Hoff has its own unique forms of discipline, rules and punishments - the activity involves thinking about what is fair and unfair in the rules, working out what might need to change and comparing to your own experiences of school.

The middle section addresses communities and identities. Some of the material here will be familiar - encouraging young people to create diagrams to show all the communities to which they feel they belong, or collages of images that make up their identity - a Star of David, a picture of the Houses of Parliament or the national flag of Trinidad and Tobago, for example.

Such activity, of course, can remain superficial if young people are not encouraged to reflect on and discuss more complex issues about identity - such as the conflicts that can arise between different aspects or dealing with the assumptions and stereotypes of others.

It's easy to see some of these activities proving useful for groups such as youth councils and youth opportunity fund panels.

One simple exercise gets groups to look at a drawing of a town centre, come up with lists of things that might make people either like or not like living there and, subsequently, to compare it to their own nearest town centre.

The last section looks at global citizenship - from knowledge of life in other countries to the work of development charities and the impact of tourism.

The strengths here, then, are that it has a lively presentation and avoidance of too much text and detail, which makes it both flexible for the educator and accessible to a wider range of abilities.

That, of course, might also be perceived as a weakness - at times the material is a little thin (this is the pupils' book, a more detailed teacher's resource book is also available priced at £50). Ultimately, though, its impact will depend on the quality of the educator using it.