I am a teacher in a school - is this right?

[TTlover]

Hi all.

I am a primary school teacher (UK) and after the racism that has been happening in the football, I taught the children in my class a lovely lesson on equality.

The children then made equality posters and anti racism posters.

We then went to put the posters up around the school.

The head teacher approached me and asked all of the children to take them down.

I feel really upset by this. It wasn’t an issue with the blue tac on the walls as there are always posters going up from other classes.

I had to turn all of my children around, ask them to take their posters down and then come back up to the classroom with the children confused.

Perhaps I should have asked first, but I really didn’t see it being an issue.

Did I cross the line? Now I feel anxious.

@Unfinishednam

As others have mentioned.. I don't think racism or equality in themselves are politically based and I definitely think they should be an important lesson in schools. However as others have mentioned, the groups that have formed as a result of these issues absolutely have a political agenda.

OK. Let's explore.

You say groups- so more than one? Which ones are you specifically referring to?

@FrippEnos

MissKeithsNeice

Maybe you should choose another game as you don't seem to understand bingo.

Maybe not

I'm spot on about the rest of it though.

Please see some examples below for more context.

On reflection @strawberrydonuts mentioned that phrases such as ‘fight’ may be negative. I do agree looking back.

But I don’t feel that the posters are particularly bad?

@FrippEnos

KittyMcKitty

The OP hasn't mentioned a lot of things.

the content of the lesson
what the posters showed etc.

unless she does all of the posts supporting her or disagreeing with her are all based on supposition.

Ok so let’s just consider the message the Head Teacher has just given to that class. It’s fine to stick up Eco Posters (which btw - outside of this thread - is seen by many to have a political agenda) but it’s not ok to stick up posters challenging racism. There will be children in that class who have experienced racism so the message that head teacher has given those (and all) pupils is that racism is OK. Those children would have seen what happened in the football and then come into school and found that school was siding with the racists (just being more subtle about it). The HT has condoned racism which is presumably against the schools own policy which I’m guessing says it has a zero tolerance of racism.

Anyone shouting that Black Lives Matter is a bad political movement are just making excuses and allowing racism to happen.

No. Fight is fine.

Fight is a broad term that encompasses more than physical fighting. Its always the word used in relation to the journey towards securing rights.

Unfortunately, because of a lot of very deeply internalised prejudice about black aggression, people will feel uncomfortable seeing it in the context of the fight against racism.

MissKeithsNeice

I'm spot on about the rest of it though.

But no-one has declared black lives matters to be an anarchist organisation just that it has moved to being a political movement

The problem with the term anti racism depends on whether you are just talking about anti racism (being against racism) or the movement spawned by critical race theory and BLM which is about rejecting your 'whiteness' and the stages to becoming an anti racist.

The problem that this is a multi faceted discussion with a huge amount of nuance and terminology that in order to discuss fully all bias must be put to one side.

And at no point in that am I supporting racism.

On reading that back, I should have put "black aggression" in quote marks.

@FrippEnos

But no-one has declared black lives matters to be an anarchist organisation just that it has moved to being a political movement

Except they did.

TeddingtonTrashbag @ 1240

It depends.
If they were referencing ‘Black Lives Matter’ then that is a political group with the aim of de-fundimg the police and promoting anarchy, so you should not be promulgatimg that.
What was the learning objective?

Kudos for the patronising comment about the learning objective at the end. I'd missed that first time round.

OP, you truly sound like a lovely and caring teacher! I am so happy for your kids at the school that they have you there, and those posters are sweet! All you wanted to do was do good for people, to do something nice, to make the world a bit of a better place by encouraging your students to embrace people. I would be genuinely thrilled if you taught my children. Seriously you have nothing to be ashamed of. I'd give you a big hug if I could but I can only shout you a virtual drink (or 3) and 2 big pieces of cake instead.

@NeonDreams thank you. That truly means the world xxx

[quote User5827372728]@ihtwsf

That sounds like an awful environment to teach in.

At secondary, we can plan and do whatever we want every day with our tutor group. I could spend a month looking at equality in that time without anyone checking what I am doing. Also in my lessons, if something topical has come up in the news, I can totally ditch the lesson plan for the day and discuss that issue. It’s one of the reasons why I love what I do![/quote]
Seriously?

There’s no supervision or requirement to follow a syllabus ?

@MissKeithsNeice

No. Fight is fine.

Fight is a broad term that encompasses more than physical fighting. Its always the word used in relation to the journey towards securing rights.

Unfortunately, because of a lot of very deeply internalised prejudice about black aggression, people will feel uncomfortable seeing it in the context of the fight against racism.

Agree totally.

One of the key messages (perhaps THE key message) which schools should have been giving yesterday was that Black Lives Matter - the black children in the school matter and that the school is proactively anti racist and a safe space for black students. The heads actions achieved the opposite!

@Northernparent68 there is a requirement of course to follow the National Curriculum, but British Values falls under this too

@TTlover

Please see some examples below for more context.

On reflection @strawberrydonuts mentioned that phrases such as ‘fight’ may be negative. I do agree looking back.

But I don’t feel that the posters are particularly bad?

Right. Forget content, racism, complaints

You should NOT be posting children's work on an online forum.

If your school were to find out this is serious misconduct.

I think you need to very strongly consider some of the things you've done and said in this thread , less of the 'im a great teacher' and some self reflection over the holidays.

If that was my child's work you have just posted without permission I would be making a complaint to your school immediately. This is serious.

OP your students are lucky to have you.
Is your school mostly white?

@YarnOver NOT TRUE

Child’s work does not have names.

Go and bully somewhere else.

@YarnOver

LOL, oh please! Glad I don’t teach your kids!

@FrippEnos

The problem with the term anti racism depends on whether you are just talking about anti racism (being against racism) or the movement spawned by critical race theory and BLM which is about rejecting your 'whiteness' and the stages to becoming an anti racist.

Suggesting that there is any ambiguity about what the term anti-racism means is disingenuous, cyclical nonsense. Its rhetoric of rhetoric used to shut down discussion. As you well know, for 99.99% of people, anti-racism means to neither support nor engage in discriminatory behaviours based on racial prejudice.

Yes, there's bucketloads of nuance in discussions about race. But there's zero nuance in what you've posted so far.

[quote TTlover]@YarnOver NOT TRUE

Child’s work does not have names.

Go and bully somewhere else.[/quote]
Ummmmm I would check your schools internet policy if I were you. I'm not bullying you. I'm pointing something out so that you can hopefully ask MN to remove it and you don't get caught out by this.

But if you want to see that as bullying then ok it's your career not mine.

And yeah I would imagine it's really annoying to teach my kids as we have said no to any photos for use anywhere outside of the classroom so it'll be a bugger on the school's social media but hey. My perorgative.

This is not bullying, this is a word of strong advice from someone who's been doing the job a lot longer than you have and who's written school policies, which include things like this being not permitted.

Have to say I'm concerned to see you posting pupils' work on here. It's not bullying to point this out, it's good advice.

Oh FFS!! The posters look like generic kids artwork - there are NO NAMES, and NO IDENTIFYING INFORMATION. It looks like something you'd find on a generic Google Image search. Give over, YarnOver, bloody hell!

Reading your first post, I was shocked and the obvious implication you make is that the head's racism drove his request.

Looking at the posters and the full thread I feel a bit differently. For example the phrase "black and white lives matter" is problematic in a way a child couldn't understand at this age perhaps.

At any rate, it reads as if you've not taken the opportunity to learn, question and discuss, and that is so important.

I'm not questioning your good intentions, but I am thinking sensitivity, collaboration and other such skills are important.

I suspect it wasn't the theme of the posters that was an issue but perhaps a longer observed pattern of individualistic behaviour.

you don't get caught out by this.

Caught out by who? You sound pretty paranoid.

It’s become one.

No, it is labelled that way by people who want to derail the discussion because they can’t say what they really want to say in response to it.