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Jul. 23rd, 2011 09:48 am![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
nnyA week ago there was a 500 person strong EDL (English Defence League) protest march in Portsmouth. 200 people showed up from UAF (Unite Against Fascism) to counter-protest. I wasn't one of them - I didn't know about any of it. Those numbers kind of make my skin crawl, though. Makes me feel like saying maybe I'm living in the wrong place, but moving wouldn't solve anything at all. It's strange and horrible living in a place where even the nicest kids I teach can be so casually racist, thoughtlessly reproducing what their parents have said; where people involved wholeheartedly in charity work can still sneer at the fact that I used to teach unaccompanied asylum seekers.
And then in a pub last night I was transfixed by screens showing the situation in Norway, and sometimes it is just difficult not to lose faith in us as a species, y'know?
I don't know what to do. I mean, I'm going to continue with what I do, which is taking care to make sure my teaching resources feature as diverse a range of influences and illustrations as possible, and taking care to challenge ignorance when I see it in the kids I teach, and taking care not to perpetuate what I hear, but it's not enough. (Please don't praise me for that, okay, that's not what I'm saying). It's hard to do pretty much anything in education, your hands are tied with so many different knots, but there has to be something more that I, as an educator, can do.
How can I find out the precise nature of the legalities constraining me? Section 28 had a hell of a lot of teachers scared even of mentioning homosexuality in the classroom due to the wording, the difficulty of defining where 'promotion' began and ended; I think I need to know where I stand and what I can talk about and precisely which stance I can take - I'll worry about getting someone to listen to me later.
And then in a pub last night I was transfixed by screens showing the situation in Norway, and sometimes it is just difficult not to lose faith in us as a species, y'know?
I don't know what to do. I mean, I'm going to continue with what I do, which is taking care to make sure my teaching resources feature as diverse a range of influences and illustrations as possible, and taking care to challenge ignorance when I see it in the kids I teach, and taking care not to perpetuate what I hear, but it's not enough. (Please don't praise me for that, okay, that's not what I'm saying). It's hard to do pretty much anything in education, your hands are tied with so many different knots, but there has to be something more that I, as an educator, can do.
How can I find out the precise nature of the legalities constraining me? Section 28 had a hell of a lot of teachers scared even of mentioning homosexuality in the classroom due to the wording, the difficulty of defining where 'promotion' began and ended; I think I need to know where I stand and what I can talk about and precisely which stance I can take - I'll worry about getting someone to listen to me later.
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Date: 2011-07-23 06:04 pm (UTC)I do think it's excellent that you're trying to use diverse resources :) There are policy guidelines for this and I have a number of booklets on trans inclusion in education knocking about in my room in Nottingham - when I'm back there I can pass on details of who published them if you like? They might have similar research/policy on LGBT and other issues.