Quality first teaching for equality and diversity in secondary

‘Part of disrupting and dismantling preconceived ideas of learning and pedagogy requires people to engage in a new way of thinking, intrinsically interrogating existing values and belief systems’

Professor Jason Arday

Equality and diversity shouldn’t just happen in your classroom or school because there is an ethnically diverse child in the room.  Developing a sense of identity and exploring other’s identities is key to a well-rounded curriculum and learning experience.  

Our secondary school’s demographics have changed significantly over the years and this has led to children telling us through our Equality, diversity and inclusion pupil forums that they want to experience and learn more.  One year 10 boy said to us, ‘we learn it in PSE, but when will it become our whole school culture?’

Only 4% of our Devon schools’ websites homepage reflect every child and staff member in their school and we believe that every child should be seen.

So, what changes can we make in our classrooms and school environment to truly be inclusive?

In the classroom

• Particularly more experienced teachers use presentations that they created many years ago.  Allocate time to review these, are you including questions and graphics that reflect more identities than just White British?
• Understand your own biases.  We generally all have these and American studies show that teachers focus their attention on ethnically diverse children’s behaviours more than others.
• Challenge negative attitudes.  Ensure you are circulating the room and addressing any comments or behaviour that isn’t acceptable.  If a child can’t understand why it is unacceptable, ask them to replace key words with a different ethnicity.  For example, children often don’t realise they are discriminating against Travellers, but as soon as you ask them to replace words with different ethnicities, they can hear the impact of their words.
• Are your displays celebrating diversity?  Be creative in exploring Tessellations in Maths using Mosque mosaics, or different culture’s clothing in textiles.
• Can you incorporate new words from different languages into your lessons?
• Use differentiation to support English as an additional language children or children who are new to British school life.
• Be mindful that racism appears in various topics in History lessons and in English – be prepared to have those discussions and raise awareness first.
• If a child has experienced racism of prejudice, report it the Local Authority.  If the target feels anxious or unsafe, complete a ‘My safety plan’.
• Can you stretch your curriculum, exploring the impacts of the Holocaust on Gypsies and Travellers, looking at segregation and racism in WW1 and celebrate diversity in Geography lessons.
• Set high expectations for all children.

Whole school

• Arrange school visits from those in your community to share stories, pictures and food from their culture.
• Walk through the school, does your reception welcome all children, do your TV screens around the school represent your whole school community, or do your celebration walls have a fair representation of all ethnicities?
• Does your uniform policy allow for cultural and religious clothing and dressings?
• Is your ‘welcome’ meeting helping you to understand new arrivals cultures and needs?
• Ensure your policies represent your schools’ demographics.  Does it outline the need for interpreters to all parental meetings and not to use a child to interpret?  Does it outline how you are going to meet your equality duty and that you have a zero tolerance to racism and prejudice?
• Ensure that you provide intervention straight away to any assailants of prejudice or racism incidents. Using this time to provide a safe space for the assailant to reflect is key to them taking responsibility and understanding the impacts.
• Do your library books reflect a range of diverse cultures and experiences?
• Embed a translation app into your website.
• Provide training to all your staff to ensure they are confident in identifying and managing racism and prejudice