Week 10: Professional Blog: 19.04.13 - 26.04.13

I found this week very interesting in my placement school. As my dissertation topic next year will be on ‘Personal Development and Mutual Understanding’, I have been asking Miss Kasia questions about how she deals with multiculturalism in her classroom. She told me about the specialised training she received for multicultural teaching . She also mentioned her general classroom rules which help to promote a friendly, inclusive classroom, for example, every child must speak English (as some children may not know Polish) and the classroom layout and every child’s seat changes each week. This helps to prevent exclusion in the classroom, whether it is to do with differences of race and culture or generally. However, when I asked how she approached the topic of the children’s different cultures and traditions, her answer surprised me.

The school reception area is covered in many different flags

In comparison to the Northern Ireland Curriculum, where we may often approach this subject directly in many of the suggested activities within ‘Personal Development and Mutual Understanding strands’ such as ‘Circle time’, the teachers in the INSP (International School of Poznan) prefer to use the more subtle, indirect approach by addressing it through themes (CCEA, 2007). One of the older Primary classes have just finished a project called ‘religion, ethics and morality’ in which they learnt about many different cultures and religions and at the end of the topic had to interview someone from a different religion and ask them about how their beliefs affect their life.

Map showing the migration of the class

My class have just begun the topic of ‘Migration’. This topic enables the children to share their own stories about where they have come from. It also helps children to understand each other more, help them to consider their own identity and also, for some children who may still not be settled into Poland, it can help them understand the reasons behind them moving country. I read a number of the children’s interviews they gave their family members and listened to them talk about their personal migration stories and it is very clear that this method has been successful as all the children were very proud of their own identities and accepting of others'.

Children's 'Earth Day' bags

On Monday it was also ‘Earth day’. I took a ‘bag painting lesson’ in which children painted a bag with their ‘Earth day message’. Afterwards we made ‘Earth day promises’ and hung them on a tree in the reception area of the school, Miss Kasia even wrote that she would give less homework to save paper, needless to say, the children were very happy! The rest of the day was spent outside with nature, in the beautiful grassy grounds of the school. 

I definitely have noticed that there is a much more relaxed approach in this school and I think this could be due to the INSP having their own curriculum. When we first came to the school we were told by the coordinator that the curriculum gives guidelines, however the teachers within the school have the space to be creative and fun with their teaching. I think that this definitely reduces teacher’s stress levels which contributes to a much happier staff, who can, instead of focusing on high test results, can teach children life skills, relating to the ‘Thinking Skills and Personal Capabilities framework’ in the Northern Ireland Curriculum (CCEA, 2007). This is supported by the research carried out by The GTC for England which gave a statement saying that this 'teaching to test' approach not only frustrates the teachers, but that "the tests can depress pupils' motivation and increase anxiety" (House of Commons, 2008).

This suggests to me that school could be a much happier place for both teachers and students if there was less emphasis put on assessments, testing and exams.

References:
CCEA (2007) available at, http://www.nicurriculum.org.uk/ accessed 2/05/13 

House of Commons (2008) Teaching and assessment: Third Report of Session 2007-08, Vol. 2: Oral and Written Evidence. The Stationery Office

INSP (2013) available at http://isop.pl/en/mission-statement/ accessed on 2/05/2013