Staff training in Citizenship at Hethersett High School

See also  "Black Achievement Festival at Hethersett High School", which reports on the Festival.

Aims

• To engage staff into thinking that this could be easily done, fun and worthwhile.
• To promote multicultural awareness and foster anti-racist attitudes among students and staff.
• To learn what it is to be a global citizen and what it is to take that responsibility seriously.
• To foster a positive approach to Citizenship from students and staff.

Context and background
At Hethersett High School we chose to focus on a Black Achievement Festival to coincide with Black History Month. Year 9 were off timetable for one day. The aim of Black History Month is to enable all people to be aware of and enjoy the achievements and contributions that black people have made to Britain and the world.

Our festival aimed to:

• enable our students and teachers to learn about other countries and cultures directly from people whose cultural heritage is rooted in countries of the south – Africa, Asia or the Americas.
• develop global citizenship by showing the interdependence of our world, addressing local/global sustainable issues, promoting multicultural awareness and fostering anti-racist attitudes.
  

In an area such as Norfolk with a small ethnic minority population – less than 3.7% recorded in the last census – this was a rare opportunity for our students and teachers to meet and learn from people with a wide range of backgrounds and perspectives.

Planning
Planning a Black Achievement Festival involves a month of activities which reach all year groups across the whole curriculum – through assemblies as well as lessons. The cunning and sneaky plan is to enthuse students and teachers alike into enjoying and gaining from this new perspective so much that they begin to look at their learning and experiences in life with an added insight and richness. It is then but a small step to get the learning and teaching activity into print and into schemes of work of departments.

Preparation
Enlist the real support of two or three other staff members.

Early Spring Term:

• Meet with SMT and give proposed action plan (as follows) and enlist their support, mentioning advantages such as the School Improvement Plan, School Review Data, Ofsted criteria and other such tick-boxes.
• Enlist the support of the named Governor for Citizenship.
• Enlist the support of your LEA advisor (Citizenship/Race-Awareness Officer/Multicultural Advisor/ RDA etc).
• Enlist the support of your local DEC Education Officer. Otherwise, contact DECs via web sites.
• Book a staff INSET session for September.
  

Early Summer Term:

• Begin to plan and book visitors for Black Achievement Festival and assemblies and class visiting speakers.

Staff INSET session

Don't:

• Slap on OHP after OHP and read them out loud.
• Request a written response by such and such a date.
• Deluge staff with handouts.
• Appear threatening with government requirements and dictats.

Do:

• Be clear about the aims of the session.
• Talk – short, activity and discussion – longer.
• Empathise with their pain!!!
• Give practical and fun examples. Be personal.
• Engage the intellect (the troublemakers in the back row).
• Have concrete examples of lessons/artefacts/resources available on tables at the back of the room.
• Involve staff in an ‘activity’ which is FUN, taxing, thought-provoking, controversial and doesn’t seem like ‘work’.
• In discussion, listen, accept and enquire…do not be judgemental, but rather seek to engage further views and enlightenment.
• Offer examples and purchaseable resources (which you just happen to have at the back of the room).
• Welcome staff suggestions/thoughts/arguments/problems etc.

Global Citizenship takes up but a small proportion of the whole Citizenship curriculum. Yet, in our view, it is paramount. It is worthwhile, it is really meaningful. It is easy and it is fun. It is important. It is cross-curricular.

Programme for the INSET session
Introduce Citizenship and Global Citizenship. Our view was that if you can’t beat ‘em, join ‘em and then beat ‘em at their own game!

So. A personal account:
'I came into teaching on the crest of a wave called comprehensive education. Armed with the set book Teaching as a Subversive Activity, we looked to a brave new world. In those hard early years of ROSLA and in these desperate twilight years, I cling to the unforgettable image of Marlon Brando, on a jetty, (I forget which movie) but at the end he turns to the camera and says, “Don’t let the bastards grind you down”.'

I agree with Lat Blaylock who says, and I paraphrase/quote:
'There’s a bit of the dissident in me. I want to dissent from the vision which Prof. Crick and Secretary of State Blunkett seem to share of how education impacts on young people’s attitudes. There is an old joke about sex education, which says that ‘in Biology they tell you how to and in RE they tell you not to’….the citizenship order is in danger of a kind of monism, in which only one story is told….I want to dissent from the idea that government legislation makes much of a difference. Prof. Cruick says “we aim for nothing less than a change in the political culture of the nation.” If he thinks this can be achieved by hitting the nations 450,000 teachers with a new set of curriculum orders, assessment requirements and Ofsted tick boxes, then I dissent quite sharply from him.'

And so we are presented with a government dictat coupled with KS targets…

Activity
Move into groups of 3 or 4 and collect a yellow card (KS target) and a red card (Subject area). You have 10 minutes in your group to come up with a list of suggested teaching activities/topics of a global nature which might match this KS target. (The 3-4 enlisted staff circulate and offer suggestions/ideas if groups flounder.)

Go around each group eliciting their responses – which are invariably wild, clever, thought-provoking, simple, complicated, and sometimes desperate!

The point is made. All curriculum areas have something to offer to global citizenship – it is just a matter of thinking it through.

Coffee/Tea break and an opportunity to visit resources and artefacts on sale at the back of the room.

On reconvening, explain and display plans for a Black Achievement Festival, by way of example. A day of workshops for Year 9 involving sport, music, art, dance, cookery, role-play, drumming etc. The build up involves all departments during Black History Month as well as assemblies…and the ensuing discussions/questions/debates which followed sparked staff INSET for some to come. Much of the debate/discussion centered  around racism. It was and continues to be, an education.

However, the aims of global citizenship were clearly understood, subject areas discovered many ways in which they could contribute towards global citizenship and include these ideas into their SoW and lesson planning. Importantly, healthy discussion continued and continues, surrounding the whole issue of racism.

Note:
In order to be effective and sustainable, some type of INSET needs to be re-visited annually. Suggest: Trading Game, Paper Bag Game, Chocolate Game etc.
Arundhati Roy’s 'When The Saints Go Marching Out' (2004) offers a thought-provoking reflection on BHM.