Teach Primary Issue 18.7

FEATURES PASTORAL 4 | EXAMINE THE IMPACT OF PREJUDICE The natural successor to usualising is ‘actualising’. This involves exploring social issues relating to identity, difference and discrimination in the classroom in detail. Actualising enables us to explore the impact that prejudice can have on individuals and on society; it allows us to encourage critical thinking and engage with key social questions relating to equality. When discussing social issues such as prejudice and discrimination, you can use personal stories from popular culture or literature, create characters to explore issues or find real-life case studies to build empathy and understanding. 5 | BRING YOUR SCHOOL VALUES TO LIFE School values can be abstract, so efforts should be made to ensure those values, as well as policies, are understood – and embodied within the behaviour and attitudes of the whole community. Diversity Role Models ( diversityrolemodels.org ) has a range of resources available to support schools with celebrating different identities and fostering inclusion and respect, including through its multimedia Role Model Stories videos and Upstander Animation Series for primary pupils. Exploring diversity is a wonderful opportunity for schools to engage and work with the local community, parents/ carers and governors. It also offers an opportunity for school leaders to build a positive environment where the diversity of the school community is visibly celebrated. 6 | PROVIDE TRAINING AND DEVELOPMENT Bullying should be addressed with a ‘whole-school approach’. As such, all colleagues, including lunchtime supervisors and reception staff, should be included in any training, which should be tailored and relevant to their roles. Everyone – staff, pupils, even governors – has a part to play in preventing and tackling bullying in schools. Building the confidence and skills to take action against bullying is the key to success; currently many people in school lack the confidence to do so. Embrace difference and boost empathy to create an inclusive school environment 6 ways to tackle bullying JAC BASTIAN is chief education officer at Diversity RoleModels. www.teachwire.net | 11 diversityrolemodels.org 1 | TALK ABOUT POLICIES Consult with pupils, staff, parents/carers and governors to identify the key challenges within your community and better understand how school policies and processes can be improved. This can also help establish a shared vision for tackling and preventing prejudice-based bullying across the whole school community. Once policies and processes have been reviewed, it’s vital they are effectively disseminated so that every member of the school community knows what their role is in implementing the school’s anti-bullying strategies. Bullying shouldn’t be viewed in isolation, and efforts to tackle and prevent it need to be rooted in your school values. Set time aside to work with young people on ensuring they understand the school polices and their role in tackling prejudice. 2 | PRIORITISE PREVENTION Research suggests that preventative measures, such as bystander training and programmes focused on empathy building, can have a positive impact in schools. A recent research and evaluation report from Diversity Role Models and the National Council for Voluntary Organisations (NCVO) found that storytelling workshops, featuring personal stories from volunteer role models that focused on difference, had hugely positive outcomes for young people ( tinyurl.com/tp-NCVO ) . 3 | MAKE DIFFERENCE A PART OF THE EVERYDAY The NCVO report revealed that schools where pupils were educated extensively about diversity saw significantly lower instances of bullying related to those differences. For example, schools in which young people said they regularly learned about LGBTQ+ identities tended to report lower rates of homophobic, biphobic and transphobic bullying. One of the ways teachers can introduce diverse identities and a positive representation of difference into the classroom is through ‘usualising’. When you usualise, you familiarise pupils with the presence of diverse identities in society and take away the threat of difference which can create fear and motivate bullying.