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''Two studies looking into the impact of homophobia at school found that for LGBTI students:"

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Research highlights the prevalence of children who identify as lesbian, gay, bisexual, transgender, intersex and queer (LGBTIQ) experiencing discrimination, harassment and homophobic violence at school (Robinson & Ferfoja, 2001; Kosciw, Palmer, Kull & Greytak, 2013; Swanson & Gettinger, 2016). This prevalence of LGBTIQ harassment and victimization has resulted in the need for effective school-wide support frameworks and classroom practices to recognise sexual diversity. Research highlights the use of anti-bulling policies, gay-straight alliance (GSA) clubs, an inclusive curriculum and supportive educators as effective practices to offset negative outcomes (Kosciw, Palmer, Kull & Greytak, 2013). Therefore, this padlet will provide the resources to help establish a community of respect and acceptance for LGBTIQ students or students with LGBTIQ parents, and protect them from discrimination and harassment. Specifically, this padlet will provide information to build teachers knowledge and outline classroom practices to create an inclusive and supportive school community who are aware of LGBTIQ perspectives.

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Some statistics which represent the dangers of school for LGBTQ youth:

- 58% of LGBTQ students didn't feel safe at school due to their sexual orientation and 43% due to their gender expression
- 72% of LGBTQ students didn't attend school functions because they felt uncomfortable or unsafe
- 60% of LGBTQ students had been recently sexually harassed and reporting this to the school was rare due to their lack of confidence in the school
- 56% of all students had heard homophobic remarks from their teachers or other school staff
- 66% of LGBTQ students had been discriminated against by school policies
(Gay, Lesbian & Strait Education Network, 2016)

Dominant heteronormative discourses are not challenged or questioned in schools because of their normalisation.

Teachers recognise the importance of integrating LGBTQ education but rarely do, waiting for the 'teachable moment' which is infective.

Issues of minority students affect all students perceptions of gender and sexuality

Discussing non-heterosexuality can challenge dominant heterosexual discourse and challenge heterosexual/LGBTQ power relations.
(Robinson & Ferfolja, 2007)

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"Writing Themselves In 3, the third national study on the sexual health and wellbeing of same sex attracted and gender questioning young people found that:"

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Youtube Clip: LGBT High School Students Share Their Experiences

"These LGBT high school students from across the United States share their experiences and talk about the impact GSAs, Day of Silence, and other GLSEN programs have made on their lives."

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LGBT High School Students Share Their Experiences

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Supportive teachers and adults in the school of LGBTIQ students (*most significant)
--> related to decreased incidence of victimization, greater self-esteem, higher GPAs and fewer missed days at school.

Gay-straight alliance (GSA) clubs
--> related to a decreased incidence of victimization.

Anti-bulling policies that specifically provide protections for sexual orientation and  training for teachers
--> predictive of increased self-esteem.

LGBTIQ-inclusive curriculum; including diverse representations of sexuality in the classroom
--> related to less victimization and increased self-esteem.

(Kosciw, Palmer, Kull and Greytak, 2013, p. 47).

Kosciw, Palmer, Kull and Greytak (2013) found that these support structures provide a less hostile environment and increased self-esteem for LGBTIQ students; and therefore resulted in positive educational outcomes.

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Swanson and Gettinger (2016) interpret the benefits of a positive school climate from a social support theoretical perspective, emphasising the importance of the knowledge, attitudes and behaviours of individual classroom teachers.

Found that teachers reported a higher importance rating for engaging in supportive behaviours after receiving training relating to LGBTIQ issues.

Anti-bullying policies were positively associated with teachers taking on supportive roles for LGBTIQ students.

However, teachers reported a belief in the importance of supporting LGBTIQ students more highly than their actual behaviours in implementing supportive practices, suggesting more than knowledge and belief is needed.

IMPLICATIONS

Pursue training and Professional Development about LGBTIQ perspectives and effective practices.

Implement inclusive practices into lessons, an LGBTIQ-inclusive curriculum.

Take on leadership roles in GSAs.

Lobby school management for antibullying policies to incorporate LGBTIQ rights and protections.

Actively protect LGBTIQ students by addressing any harassment or bullying in the classroom.

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Youtube Clip: In a Heartbeat - An animated short film
“A closeted boy runs the risk of being outed by his own heart after it pops out of his chest to chase down the boy of his dreams.”

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Presence of Gay‑Straight Alliances and Feelings of Safety and Missing School

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Presence of Gay‑Straight Alliances and Feelings of Safety and Missing School

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The 2011 National School Climate Survey Executive Summary

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The 2011 National School Climate Survey Executive Summary

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Supportive School Staff and Feelings of Safety and Missing School

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Supportive School Staff and Feelings of Safety and Missing School

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The 2011 National School Climate Survey Executive Summary

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The 2011 National School Climate Survey Executive Summary

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Youtue Clip: Imagine A World Where Being "Gay" The Norm & Being "Straight" Would Be The Minority!
"Teen bulling and teen suicide based on someone's sexual preference is ridiculous - and this film turns the tables on modern society. What IF the shoe was on the other foot?"
*Warning: Mature content*

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Imagine A World Where Being "Gay" The Norm & Being "Straight" Would Be The Minority! [Short Film]

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What Can Schools Do?

The most effective way for schools to embrace and support sexual diversity is by endorsing constructive policies through a whole-school learning approach that suits the individual needs of its environment.

Here are 5 steps schools can modify and implement to provide a safe environment for their students:

1. Make it clear to students, parents and the community that your school supports sexual diversity:

Place posters in noticeable, high-traffic areas around the school (ensure that posters are frequently updated and checked for vandalism)

Use newsletters to inform parents and students about events relating to sexual diversity

Demonstrate good leadership and provide practical support for student involvement aimed at creating safe environments and discouraging homophobia.

2. Provide training and professional development sessions to all school staff:

Demonstrate how to communicate with students who are homophobic while supporting students who are same sex attracted.

Provide specialist staff training programs to help deliver a more inclusive curriculum in core subject areas.

Provide specialist staff training programs that demonstrate how to provide inclusive education on sexuality.

3. Implement anti-bullying policies and procedures that explicitly challenge homophobia:

Update the school bullying policy to identify homophobia.

Implement explicit procedures that deal with complaints relating to homophobia.

Have clear consequences in place for homophobic bullying.

4. Supply students and staff with adequate resources that provide information about diverse sexualities:

Place books, booklets and pamphlets explicitly related to sexual diversity within the school library

Online information on sexual diversity should be accessible to staff and students from school computers.

5. Sexuality education as well as other areas of the curriculum should be made inclusive for sexual diversity:

Sexuality education programs on safe sex should include information for same sex relationships

Include sexually diversity within a range of subjects, such as texts that involve gay and lesbian themes or characters, as well as applicable case studies involving sexual diversity.

(NSW Teachers Federation, 2011; Smith et al., 2010)

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Wear it Purple Day

A youth-led organisation created to support and empower sexually and gender diverse young people.
Wear it Purple Day has grown into a world-wide celebration of diversity and pride and is currently celebrated in Australia, New Zealand, UK, USA, Canada, Italy, Germany and the Netherlands.

Ideas on how schools can get involved:

Have students make their own purple ribbons to wear on the day.

Have your school host a purple themed lunch or morning tea with purple food, purple drinks.

Hold a school or class guessing competition, such as how many purple jellybeans/skittles are in the jar? Or how many purple foods can you name?

Share photos from your school to the Wear It Purple Facebook or Twitter page, or have students create a fun video instead.

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Youtube Clip: Kids Explain Gay Marriage
"Some people wonder if children are sophisticated enough to wrap their heads around something like this, so we went out on the street to ask kids what they think and know about same sex marriage."

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"Supporting Sexual Diversity in Schools"

Two important pieces of legislation that highlight the importance of this issue in schools:

The Victorian Equal Opportunity Act 1995

the Victorian Charter of Human Rights and Responsibilities.

Under the Victorian Equal Opportunity Act 1995 it is unlawful to discriminate on the grounds of:

-       "a student’s actual or assumed sexual orientation or a student’s gender identity."

-       "the sexual orientation or gender identity of a student’s parents, friends or family members."
(Department of Education and Early Childhood Development, 2008, p. 5).

The Victorian Charter of Human Rights and Responsibilities protects civil and political rights related to "freedom, respect, equality and dignity, and includes rights to non-discrimination ... as well as freedom from cruel, inhuman and degrading treatment"
(Department of Education and Early Childhood Development, 2008, p. 6).

Strategies should be taken by schools to prevent discrimination, and inaction may also amount to implicitly authorising discrimination.

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Lesson Plans
Lesson plans from the United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organisation.

Educational Exercises
Educational activities from the University of Southern California. These activities can be modified and used as ice breakers, or be utilised to generate discussions and introduce activities in the classroom.

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"Resilience Rights & Respectful Relationships"
A possible lesson that could be done in classrooms to teach students about the importance of discrimination.

Students will understand what the term discrimination means and that it breaches human rights.

Students will identify groups likely to experience discrimination, such as LGBTQ people.

Students should recall some groups who have more or less power than others.

Explain that those with less power have a higher chance of discrimination.

Have a go at guessing what the word discrimination means.

Brainstorm different groups of people who experience discrimination. If they don’t mention the LGBTQ community, introduce them to this idea.

Students will all take a group and place them on a line (spectrum) in order of where they think the most to least likely to experience high levels of discrimination would go. They will explain their choices.There is no right or wrong answer in this task, it is designed to get students thinking about why some groups are disadvantaged due to the attitudes of others. This would now be a good opportunity to discuss with students what can be done to ensure disadvantaged groups are not being discriminated against.

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"LGBTQ-inclusive curricula: why supportive
curricula matter"

This study focuses on whether LGBTQ students feel safer in schools with curricula that includes LGBTQ people in a supportive way. They found that "LGBTQ-inclusive curricula were associated with higher reports of safety", and lower levels of bullying (Snapp et al., 2015, p. 580). This really illustrates how these practices are inclusive, as feeling safe within your school is necessary for all students to feel a part of the school.

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Youtube Clip: Kids React to Gay Marriage

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Resource links below for more information: http://www.apa.org/helpcenter/sexual-orientation.aspx Marriage Equality Links/Information: http://www.freedomtomarry.org/ http://www.hrc.org/resources/category/marriage To find information and resources on coming out visit: http://www.itgetsbetter.org/ http://community.pflag.org/ http://www.thetrevorproject.org/ Matthew Shepard photo copyright 1998 Gina van Hoof http://www.ginavanhoof.com Watch the Videos Featured in this Episode: Spencer's Home Depot Marriage Proposal http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=l4HpWQmEXrM Seattle+The Washington Bus+Jeanne+Alissa = wedding proposal https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=umdepNP5yVw Link to subscribe to our channel: http://goo.gl/nxzGJv Link to all episodes of React: http://goo.gl/4iDVa ---------------------------------------------------------------- This episode featured the following amazing children.

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"Teachers' knowledge, attitudes, and supportive behaviors toward LGBT students: Relationship to Gay-Straight Alliances, antibullying policy, and teacher training"

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Telephone:
9637 3699
Email:
safe.schools@edumail.vic.gov.au

Website:

http://www.education.vic.gov.au/Documents/about/programs/health/safeschoolsguide.pdf

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Youtube Clip: Australian Kids Respond To America’s Same-Sex Marriage Ruling

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Australian Kids Respond To America’s Same-Sex Marriage Ruling

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"I think you should be able to marry whoever you love." Check out more awesome BuzzFeedYellow videos! http://bit.ly/YTbuzzfeedyellow MUSIC Chapter Seven Licensed via Warner Chappell Production Music Inc. SFX provided by Audioblocks. (https://www.Audioblocks.com GET MORE BUZZFEED www.buzzfeed.com www.buzzfeed.com/video www.buzzfeed.com/videoteam www.youtube.com/buzzfeedvideo www.youtube.com/buzzfeedyellow www.youtube.com/buzzfeedblue www.youtube.com/buzzfeedviolet www.youtube.com/buzzfeed BUZZFEED YELLOW Tasty short, fun, inspiring, funny, interesting videos from BuzzFeed.

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"The Effect of Negative School Climate on Academic Outcomes for LGBT Youth and the Role of In-School Supports"

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21 LGBT Picture Books Every Kid Should Read:

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21 LGBT Picture Books Every Kid Should Read:

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21 LGBT Picture Books Every Kid Should Read

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These stories celebrate identity, acceptance, diversity, family, and love without limits.

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Books for Preschoolers about Gay and Lesbian Families:

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Books for Preschoolers about Gay and Lesbian Families:

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·    ABC: A Family Alphabet Book (2001), by Bobbie Combs, illus. by Desiree and Brian Rappa
·         And Tango Makes Three (2005), by Justin Richardson and Peter Parnell, illus. by Henry Cole
·         Daddy, Papa, and Me (2009), by Lesléa Newman, illus. by Carol Thompson
·         The Different Dragon (2006), by Jennifer Bryan, illus. by Danamarie Hosler
·         Emma and Meesha My Boy: A Two Mom Story (2005), by Kaitlyn Taylor Considine, illus. by Binny Hobbs
·         Everywhere Babies (2001), by Susan Meyers, illus. by Marla Frazee
·         The Family Book (2003), by Todd Parr
·         Flying Free (2005), by Jennifer C. Gregg, illus. by Janna Richards
·         In Our Mothers’ House (2009), by Patricia Polacco
·         Mommy, Mama, and Me (2009), by Lesléa Newman, illus. by Carol Thompson
·         Monday Is One Day (2011), by Arthur A. Levine, illus. by Julian Hector
·         One Dad, Two Dads, Brown Dad, Blue Dads (2004), by Johnny Valentine, illus. by Melody Sarecky
·         A Tale of Two Daddies (2010), by Vanita Oelschlager, illus. by Kristin Blackwood and Mike Blanc
·         Who’s in a Family? (1997), by Robert Skutch, illus. by Laura Nienhaus

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Cahill, H. et al., (2016) Resilience, rights and Respectful Relationships: Teaching for Social and Emotional learning and Respectful Relationships, Level 7 and 8 Learning materials, Department of Education and Training, Melbourne. Retrieved from http://fuse.education.vic.gov.au/Resource/LandingPage?ObjectId=2cb0472f-c903-4c2d-a053-a330df31eefe

David, B., & Bravo, E. (Producers) (2017). In a heartbeat [Video]. Retrieved from: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2REkk9SCRn0

Department of Education and Early Childhood Development. (2008). Supporting Sexual Diversity in Schools. Retrieved from https://www.eduweb.vic.gov.au/edulibrary/public/teachlearn/student/supportsexualdiversity.pdf

Kosciw, J. G., Palmer, N. A., Kull, R. M., & Greytak, E. A. (2013). The effect of negative school climate on academic outcomes for LGBT youth and the role of in-school supports. Journal of School Violence, 12, 45–63. doi:10.1080/15388220.2012.732546.

NSW Teachers Federation. (2011).   Gender, sexuality and identity.  Decision of the 2011 Annual Conference.  Retrieved from: https://www.nswtf.org.au/files/gender_sexuality_and_identity_policy_0.pdf

Robinson, K. H., & Ferfoja, T. (2001). What are we doing this for? Dealing with lesbian and gay issues in teacher education. British Journal of Sociology, 22(1), 121-133. doi:10.1080/01425690020030828.

Robinson, K. H., & Ferfolja, A. (2007). Playing it up, playing it safe: Queering teacher education. Teaching and Teacher Education. 24(4), 846-858.

Smith, B., Ward, R., Mitchell A.,  Sainsbury, J.  (2010). Supporting Sexual Diversity In Schools: A Guide. Safe Schools Coalition Victoria. Retrieved from: http://www.glhv.org.au/files/SupportingSexualDiversitySchoolsGuide.pdf

Snapp, S. D., McGuire, J. K., Sinclair, K. O., Gabrion, K. & Russell, S. T. (2015). LGBTQ-inclusive curricula: why supportive curricula matter. Sex Education: Sexuality, Society and Learning, 15(6), 580-596. doi:http://dx.doi.org.ezp.lib.unimelb.edu.au/10.1080/14681811.2015.1042573

Swanson, K., & Gettinger, M. (2016). Teachers' knowledge, attitudes, and supportive behaviors toward LGBT students: Relationship to Gay-Straight Alliances, antibullying policy, and teacher training. Journal of LGBT Youth, 13(4), 326-351. doi:10.1080/19361653.2016.1185765.

The Gay, Lesbian & Straight Education Network (Producers). (2013). LGBT High School Students Share Their Experiences [Video]. Retrieved from: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=iAwJQYs7pKM

The Gay, Lesbian & Straight Education Network. (2016). The 2015 National School Climate Survey. New York, United States of America: GLSEN.

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Therese Tanti
Andrew Ham
Jenny Cumming
Olivia Frim