Lesson Thoughts Please

[Teacher4Life]

Hi,

A lesson was delivered by a history teacher at our school which has caused so much staff unrest it prompted a fairly immediate Diversity Workshop day for all staff.

The lesson was on the slave trade. This is word for word what was on the PowerPoint slide:

Imagine you are an 18th Century slave owner. Look at the list of slaves and the different tribes they come from. You have £120 to spend and your goal is to get the most value for your money.

Slave info:

Felup - charming but very lazy. Useful as domestics. £30

Awikas - very vicious but can be tamed. Hard working. £20

There were 6 other slaves tribes named and described.

The history teacher was up for promotion to head of key stage which still went through. The head sent an email out to shut down conversations about it which in a nutshell read “shut up about it, we are dealing with it.” Head wrote letter to parents what was very vague due to multiple teachers writing very strong complaints.

Wondered how people view this?

That's absolutely appalling! I cannot see any educational merit at all in the activity.

Well it looks like a terrible activity but then the way you've worded it, it's obviously supposed to. What I'd need to know is how was it followed up? What was the message of the lesson? How long were they allowed to work on their "slave budget"?
If, for example, she used this as a springboard into a discussion about how slave owners viewed slaves as possessions, like livestock to be owned and tamed rather than as human beings and used the activity as shock value to help children reflect on how wrong that was. Then I can see the purpose, albeit perhaps misguided if the children went away with the wrong idea.
If she allowed the children to sit for a while happily working out their slave budget and presented it as a valid lifestyle at that time then yes that's appalling and would require a serious discussion.
So more information needed?