Should we be teaching young children (EYFS & Primary) about global issues?

[lrva94]

I am a teacher and I am currently doing some research into the pro's and con's of teaching children about worldly issues, such as diversity, human rights, global warming, interdependence and global citizenship e.t.c..

I was wondering as parents how you feel about your little ones learning about these kinds of things and would you be for it or against?

Do you think they are too young to start learning about these things or do you think the earlier the better?

Thanks

I think it's important. I don't think they are too young to learn those issues in EYFS upwards.

Appropriate issues, and in an age appropriate way. For example DD's reception class learned about recycling, which is an area where there are child friendly positive things they can do to help the global issue. Issues like diversity will hopefully naturally come up in EYFS settings - if the setting is not itself very diverse they can still read stories from different cultures. I don't think it would be appropriate to teach very young children about some of the more horrible things humans do to other humans.

Totally agree with cat.

They already do. At our nursery and school, in an age appropriate way.

I think the key has got to be "age appropriate"; and context-appropriate too. For example, knowing about refugee children is definitely appropriate by, say, upper primary, (probably earlier); but at a school in a community where there were a number of refugees, and certainly if there were refugee children in the school, it would be a topic to cover sooner rather than later. Without such a concrete context to put it in then foundation stage would perhaps be too early.

My reception child learned about grenfell tower at school and I wasn't happy. I thought he was too young to cope with it. In general though I think they can be introduced to some issues gently he is interested in the hurricane.

For some of those issues I would worry about particular viewpoints being pushed to the exclusion of others. It can easily become very political.

I would also worry about academic stuff getting sidelined as we try to pack more and more "issues" into the curriculum. We'd have a better chance of creating an adult electorate who was clued up about environmental issues if we simply taught science properly and spent more time on it.

Schools in some areas like Scotland already seem to spend a lot of time banging on about being "rights-respecting schools" etc etc. It seems to involve a lot of poster-making. If there are children whose human rights in the school are not being respected (example: there is abuse at home), then work with social workers to ensure that those children's issues are dealt with appropriately.

No, it is not age appropriate.

At EYFS and primary, children should be learning how to conduct themselves (keeping our hands to ourselves, not taking items we know do not belong to others, what being kind and inclusive entails, how to be considerate, how to be actively kind, how to be actively inclusive).

They should not be exposed to worrying current affairs that they (and actually most adults) can do nothing about.

I agree with Catkind - I think the most they could be safely exposed to without causing anxiety, hopelessness and stress is actively taking part in recycling. You could do a school project, with older children assessing the potential for recycling or saving resources (for instance by school office using e-mail instead of paper for communicating with home) and younger children collecting stuff to recycle. The children could create a school vegetable garden or a nice mural to liven up a bare wall. The mural could celebrate the values the school holds dear. The school could also set up a 'students of the week' notice board, where a few students' example of being kind, inclusive, and showing leadership in creating a positive environment could be celebrated.

The important thing to communicate to children about issues is that they can do something to improve their own physical and human environment, that their creativity can yield results, and their impulses to be kind will be met with encouragement. Therefore they should only be exposed to things that affect them personally and things they can do something about in their own small world.

The rest - leave to the grown ups. No to exposing them to refugee issues, LGBT issues, DV issues, North Korea, "diversity, human rights, global warming, interdependence and global citizenship", etc.. Or teach that to teens 15 and older in a civics or ethics class or forensics club.

I think diversity and global warming are totally ok to teach reception children.

I think it's really important.

I had to report a definitely unquestionably racist incident involving one of my children at 4 (we are white but he was a bystander) so I was frankly grateful that the school helped explain some of the history of racism and why you still might come across it now. Obviously at that age it had to be simple and not too much but it also had to be explicit. Because some kid was clearly getting the opposite message at home.

By the end of primary they are absolutely old enough to be handling the more extreme details of most things.

I think kids can handle a lot more than we give them credit for and hiding them from the reality of their peers around the world is wrong.

I agree that it's a good idea but also want age appropriate. They did an assembly after the Manchester terror attack last year and I then spent a few days assuring a very worried five year old and also correcting him that it was not an atomic bomb.

I am generally in favour, and agree with what Catkind said. I would much prefer teachers to cover current affairs in an age-appropriate way, rather than risking the child hearing the story in 'adult' news and only partially understanding it and getting upset or confused. DD's school seems to cover current issues very well which I'm pleased about.

I think it's really important that care is taken to ensure that it's pitched at a level that all children can understand. A friend's son (in Y3) has learned about apartheid, but unfortunately he has latched onto the segregation bit without really absorbing the fact that this is historical and wrong. So he has started coming up with comments about how person X and person Y will have to sit at the back of a bus on a school trip, etc. Of course it's an innocent mistake with his learning, but his parents now need to really drum into him the main messages! He's an able boy, so I wonder how well this topic has been covered, and how many other children are confused.

Actually that's a point, all my kids have had someone in their class from nursery /reception who is either a child refugee or child of a previous refugee.

So it's definitely very relevant to them all.

We don't live in a particularly diverse area either! It's just not that uncommon in the kind of global culture we live in to have family directly affected.

This is a short discussion of how to approach catastrophes when it comes to young children. The speaker is Fred Rogers, who was a mainstay of Public Television in the US for a few decades. His show 'Mister Rogers Neighborhood' covered all sorts of issues in a way that children could easily grasp. The approach he advised for commentary on disasters, etc, is to direct children's attention to the helpers, and the rescuers.

www.fredrogers.org/parents/special-challenges/tragic-events.php
Fred Rogers website, with advice for parents on how to talk to children about disasters or worrying events. It could easily be adapted for school use.

Children do not need to know the nuts and bolts of all the negative stuff that is happening in the world, or why it is happening. They cannot cope on an emotional level with terrorism or famine or extreme poverty or racism. They can cope with encouragement to be kind to the other children in their class and school, and they need reassurance that they will continue to be cared for by parents and teachers.

In worrying times (and what times are not worrying - I was a child in the age of Mutually Assured Destruction) they need reassurance that someone cares about them and will look after them and they will be ok. Their own emotions are the only thing we need to address with them.

From the website:
Talking and Listening
Even if we wanted to, it would be impossible to give our children all the reasons for such things as war, terrorists, abuse, murders, major fires, hurricanes, and earthquakes. If they ask questions, our best answer may be to ask them, "What do you think happened?" If the answer is "I don't know," then the simplest reply might be something like, "I'm sad about the news, and I'm worried. But I love you, and I'm here to care for you."

If we don't let children know it's okay to feel sad and scared, they may think something is wrong with them when they do feel that way. They certainly don't need to hear all the details of what's making us sad or scared, but if we can help them accept their own feelings as natural and normal, their feelings will be much more manageable for them.

Angry feelings are part of being human, especially when we feel powerless. One of the most important messages we can give our children is, "It's okay to be angry, but it's not okay to hurt ourselves or others." Besides giving children the right to their anger, we can help them find constructive things to do with their feelings. This way, we'll be giving them useful tools that will serve them all their life, and help them to become the worlds' future peacemakers -- the world's future "helpers."

Whilst I appreciate that reception children (particularly the eldest in the family) might find some topics difficult, my view is that from yr1/yr2 they can handle most things in an age appropriate way. When my oldest was that age I would turn off the TV/radio, but my younger son has been exposed to those concepts through discussions within the family and takes things more in his stride. I don't announce every bit of news but I make sure that I tell them about major things because I know they will discuss it at school or watch Newsround in class.

DS, despite his many girlfriends, has been an advocate of gay marriage since he was in nursery. At 4 they don't think it is strange to have two men married or two women, it is their normal. Having said that when I was that age I don't think that I would have batted an eyelid about gay marriage. I can remember the games where you would pretend to marry your best friend before other children would come along and tell you that you couldn't.

From Reception onwards DD's school has included "current affairs" and general topics in lessons.

They celebrate Black History months each year and with each year they go deeper in the subject. While the first years it was to learn about it in general , DD came home with requests to go to the library for books on Rose Parks, Martin Luther King, last year she asked for more information on the Black Panther movement, this year (Y6) they will go into the topic of slavery.

In some areas environmental problems like deforestations and sea pollution are covered in term topics and biology. The school has an eco certificate and the children are taught about recycling by doing. We had to explain why using rainwater to flush our toilet was not possible (living in a 1930 semi) but that in new buildings this can be done. She learned about alternative energy and had a discussion on holiday with our host about the solar panels on the roof.

They watch newsround from Y3 onwards and we encourage her to do so at home and as DH listens to BBC4 all the time she listen and ask questions.

Gay/Lesbian movement is not something she needs to learn about, she just accepts it as part of life. The idea of a marriage has to be between a man and a woman was confusing to her, for her marriage is love and that's it. Obviously she learnt that not everybody thinks so but a recent discussion on German newspaper (we are German) about "marriage for all" had her as a strong advocate towards it and with very good argumentation.

They talk about disasters, natural and political. Natural ones are often used to throw around the lesson plan and suddenly include hurricans or earthquakes in science. Political ones are talked about in assembly, we normally speak to DD about it in the morning if something big happened overnight to make her aware but apart from empathy with the victims she had no issues. The only one really bugs her is Brexit though.

Our kids live in this world and I see no reason why they shouldn't learn about it, in an age-appropriate way, of course. Kids do hear about stuff that happens in any case, so it's better for them to be able to talk about it and ask questions in a safe environment.

We have talked to dd about global issues for as long as I can remember. She is now 12 and is astonished at how little some of her peers seem to know about the world. I guess, in some cases, that's because their parents have actively tried to shield them from this knowledge, but personally, I find it a bit alarming that they're so utterly unaware, given that they'll be voting in a few years. It explains a lot!