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Actionable Strategies and Resources: Celebrating Diversity  

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Actionable Strategies and Resources: Celebrating Diversity  

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Go to MiniPD Core Courses to find out more about the course above.

Key Words: Global Citizenship; Intercultural Learning; International Mindedness; Allyship; Diversity; Equity; Inclusion; Social Justice; Bias; Prejudice.

- Bookmark this page - Jump into the card that appeals, or access content in daily bite-size chunks.

- Scroll horizontally along. Scroll each card vertically. Click links and images for take-aways.

Thank you to MiniPD Coaches, IB and Non-IB educators, who have co-constructed this calendar with the MiniPD Team.

Stay safe. Stay well. Stay connected.

The MiniPD Team
Get in touch: hello@minipd.com
minipd.com

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MiniPD Core Course - Designing Intercultural Undertanding

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Student Voice - Why Teacher Diversity is a Student Wellbeing Matter 

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Student Voice - Why Teacher Diversity is a Student Wellbeing Matter 

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Why Teacher Diversity is a Student Wellbeing Matter by Heloise Hughes

Heloise Hughes, 17 year old student, talks about the importance of diversity in teaching and why it matters.

"I have always found a lot of diversity in my peers, but never that much diversity in my teachers." Listen to Heloise talk in this 6 minute video.

The MiniPD Team thanks Heloise, and her parents, for allowing us to share and amplify her powerful message.

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The Power of 'All'

Christine Orkisz Lang, MiniPD coach and MiniCourse designer, writes,

Consider adding the word 'all' to your 21st Century/ATL skills. Notice the impactful difference - and see if your students can as well!

Listen actively and respectfully to others' ideas becomes: Listen actively and respectfully to all others' ideas.

Be respectful to others becomes: Be respectful to all others.

Help others to succeed becomes: Help all others to succeed.

Practise empathy and care for others becomes: Practise empathy and care for all others.

Encourage others to contribute becomes: Encourage all others to contribute.

Advocate for one's own rights and needs and those of others becomes: Advocate for one's own rights and needs and those of all others.

For more ideas on improving intercultural relationships and equity in your classroom, see resources from the National (US) Association for the Education of Young Children (NAEYC), including a framework for the practice of anti-bias education with children.

Christine Orkisz Lang, MiniPD coach and MiniCourse designer: https://app.minipd.com/profile

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Types of Diversity in the Classroom

Culture - Cultural background influences orientation towards learning, critical thinking and comprehension of subject matter.

Race - Race plays a role in access to education and resources, peer interactions and application of learning material.

Religion - Religious practices can dictate something as basic as access to education or interpretations of history and science.

Language - Language proficiency of students and medium of teaching influence how much of the learning material students are able to grasp and articulate.

Gender - Gender identities, sexual orientations and perceptions around them affect how students experience their academic environment.

Socio economic status - SES can be a determinant in the kind of resources (technology, books, community facilities) students have access to.

Physical and cognitive skill sets - Include physical abilities, types of intelligence, neurodiversity and non-visible factors such as mental health concerns.

Connect with Esha Patnaik on MiniPD.

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Decolonise Your Curriculum

The MiniPD team recommends reading, 'Decolonise Your Curriculum' by Dr. Conrad Hughes, Campus and Secondary Principal at the International School of Geneva, La Grande Boissière.

Dr. Hughes states, "Decolonising the curriculum is about being more accurate, more inclusive, and more interculturally responsive" and makes 3 suggestions for action:

1. "Consider project-based learning as an opportunity for students to investigate their own ancestry and to present their findings to their classmates.

2. Consider guiding questions for discussions, presentations and written assignments that focus on the sociology of knowledge (“Why do we think this is important?”; “What are other cultural perspectives on this same question?”)

3. Only present the Enlightenment and the Industrial Revolution with full understanding and reflection on slavery and colonisation."

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By Conrad Hughes, Campus and Secondary Principal at the International School of Geneva, La Grande Boissière

"The work to purposefully and intentionally 'tackle' racism has begun in schools and universities across the world. What does this work look like and how will we hold ourselves accountable to each other and for the young people we are educating? Conrad Hughes describes the actions educational institutions can take to 'decolonise the curriculum'
-Jane Larsson, Executive Director, CIS

The modern idea of a curriculum, which is to say a published and detailed scheme of work that lays out what students will learn, is relatively recent. It was only after the 1850s and the expansion of compulsory education that schools and universities began to detail the aims, objectives, assessment, and structure of courses systematically and massively.

Needless to say, the act of designing a curriculum is political, economic, cultural and social: curricula do not fall out of the sky, they are designed by people.

Some curricula, early on, had clear philosophical and even ideological aims: the teaching of national history, for example, was explicitly to unite students under common references to symbols, dates, and legacies so as to reinforce nationalist sentiments. Educational programmes of the colonial and war periods were full of jingoistic, nationalist, political and even propagandistic prerogatives. In general, many history textbooks were and continue to be subject to strong biases.

Looking at education this way-as something that carries an agenda so to speak-is relatively recent and can be situated with the birth of postmodernism and postcolonialism.

In the wake of World War II, from the late 1940s through to the 1980s, three important forces would change the relationship with history and knowledge:

1. Decolonisation: countries across Africa and Asia became independent and started to question the way that political, historical, and economic relationships had been forged and normalised over the centuries. The need to recount African and Asian histories became more prevalent.

2. The end of World War II led to an explosion of existentialist and feminist thought in Europe: the violence of the Holocaust put Enlightenment, rationalist convictions into doubt. Previous deterministic convictions were questioned, and cast-types were seen more as social constructs than fixed identities. People were free to choose their lives and what they wanted to become.

3. Throughout the 1960s and 1970s, the Civil Rights movement in the United States led to social justice uprisings and awareness movements including Black Consciousness, Women's Rights and, later, Gay Rights.

Running through these intellectual and social reforms, two key philosophical movements emerged: postmodernism and postcolonialism.

Postmodernism, best expressed by French thinkers such as Michel Foucault, Jacques Derrida, Julia Kristeva, and Gilles Deleuze, is the idea that knowledge works in tacit, hidden ways, through codes and assumptions, unstated systems and constructions. An agenda of patriarchal, rationalist, and capitalist thinking has essentially characterised the formation of knowledge over the last four hundred years. Although postmodernism is often derided as being obtuse and over-intellectualised (which is a fair criticism), its impact on the way we look at the world cannot be overlooked. From now on, knowledge could be 'deconstructed', in other words, pulled apart to show how latent strata of power and ideology lie behind it.

Postcolonialism is a similar project in that it seeks to deconstruct knowledge, but it does so with a specific emphasis on the way that colonised nations have been dominated culturally, linguistically, and economically. The whole enterprise of knowledge, from a postcolonial perspective, is deeply embedded in colonialist power and economic imperatives. The main authors of this view are Franz Fanon, Edward Said, Gayatri Spivak, Ngugi Thiong'o, Arundathi Roy, Homi Babba, and, more recently, Achille Mbembe. Postcolonialism seeks alternatives to Western paradigms of knowledge, referring instead to non-Western philosophies of social cohesion, cyclical time, and ancestry.

Throughout the 1960s and 1970s, many universities, particularly liberal arts colleges in the United States, saw postmodern and postcolonial thinkers disrupt what was seen as a continuity of patriarchal, Western, imperialistic thought, urging for booklists, courses, guest speakers and faculty to express a more balanced opinion and not merely the Western, masculine canon. Acronyms such as WASP (White Anglo Saxon Protestant) and DWEM (Dead White European Males) were used to describe the hitherto dominant paradigm.

A number of famous artists, activists and public figures embraced some elements of this movement: the Black Panther Angela Davis (who is still an activist, concentrating on the carceral system in the United States); Muhammad Ali with his questioning of white supremacy and, like James Brown and Malcolm X, his efforts to give black people a sense of pride and identity outside the constructs of a white world; Bob Marley and Fela Kuti's Pan-African philosophies, James Baldwin's deconstruction of American sociology and Women's Liberation leader Gloria Steinem's work on female identity and male-female relationships of power.

Postmodern and postcolonial ideas were accelerated in the 21st Century through the Me Too and Black Lives Matter movements. Although, at face value, they may appear to have erupted onto the scene after heavily mediatised events such as the Harvey Weinstein scandal and the killing of George Floyd, they are part of a longer historical development of revolt and subversion.

So, what does it actually mean to decolonise the curriculum?

Schools and universities are no longer merely trying to transmit knowledge and culture, they are fostering critical thinking. This is widely seen as an important educational aim for the individual and for society. Critical thinking features in most 21st Century skills designs.

Decolonising the curriculum does not mean, as detractors might suggest, rather disingenuously, a superficial and rushed replacement of authors on book lists or merely throwing the Western canon out the window for the sake of doing it. The project has been slow in the making-even if it is something of a bandwagon today-and reposes on those central goals of education, which are to think deeply, to consider multiple perspectives, and to situate knowledge in time, power and politics.

We can no longer get away with telling students that the Ancient Greeks invented mathematics, that Columbus discovered America, that the Declaration of Independence was truly democratic, that European and American literature and history are essentially the only humanities worth knowing, or that it is somehow understandable that historical heroes and leaders in the history books have been almost entirely white men. It also seems difficult today to present the philosophies of Kant, Hegel, and Auguste Comte without some critical reflection on the strongly racist ideology running through their convictions and writings. There must be some distancing from these issues, some critical thought, some reflection on why history has been presented the way it has and why some discourses have been promoted over others.

And what are we doing in educational circles to rethink discourses around discoveries and origins? For example, do we explain that Pythagoras' theorem was actually discovered much earlier in Babylon; that the Cyrus Cylinder and the edict of Asoka can be seen as the earliest formal statements on human rights and tolerance; that Jesus was not white; that the first universities were in Morocco and India; that Pushkin has African ancestry; Alexandre Dumas was mixed race; that Chinese discoverer Zengh He had navigated far more extensively and earlier that European navigators; and do we teach about the ancient queens Hatchepsut, Nefertiti, Artemisia, Zenobia, Boudicca, Cleopatra or ancient female poets such as Enheduanna and Sappho?

To be even more postcolonial, to what extent might the canon of history and performativity, a type of global competition of Great Man History constructed by narratives on the first, the strongest, the best, be overturned altogether? Are these competitive and intrinsically imperialistic trajectories not part of the problem in the first place? Ancestral approaches such as that of Ubuntu tend to deconstruct this view entirely, placing the study of humanity in a more inclusive and less exclusivist modus operandi. Perhaps one day the past will not merely be a description of war, discovery, and dominion but, as authors such as Howard Zinn has attempted to do, a story of common people.

Here are four questions for educators and leaders that will help guide the decolonisation of the curriculum:

1. Review each course outline or scope and curriculum sequence documentation. Imagine what this would look like from the perspective of postcolonial thought and try to 'deconstruct' the dominant narrative. What do you see?

2. Investigate the extent to which cultural references, historical facts, authors, and discoveries are presented as Western, male and European. Why is this?

3. Ask what sort of discussions are happening in the classroom to ensure critical thinking and deep reflection on the power of representation in the way that textbooks present materials to learners.

4. Reflect on the extent to which the curriculum offers students views and stories from First Peoples, Africa, Asia, Pre-Colombian civilizations, the Middle East, and Oceanic regions. What do you see?

And here are three suggestions for action:

1. Consider project-based learning as an opportunity for students to investigate their own ancestry and to present their findings to their classmates.

2. Consider guiding questions for discussions, presentations and written assignments that focus on the sociology of knowledge ("Why do we think this is important?"; "What are other cultural perspectives on this same question?")

3. Only present the Enlightenment and the Industrial Revolution with full understanding and reflection on slavery and colonisation.

Decolonising the curriculum is about being more accurate, more inclusive, and more interculturally responsive. It is not about forcing one ideological perspective on students, it's about telling both sides of the story.

Related content:

Explore the following blogs and more on topics associated with inclusion via diversity, equity and anti-racism (I-DEA)

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What does it look like to purposefully and intentionally 'tackle' racism in schools and universities? How will we hold ourselves accountable to each other and the young people we are educating? Conrad Hughes describes ways educational institutions can 'decolonise the curriculum'.

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Join the MiniPD Twitter slow chat

Q1. What does celebrating diversity look like for you?

Q2. How can we include diversity, equity, inclusion, and anti-racist practices in international schools?

Q3. What are effective ways international schools are improving practices in the context of global citizenship and intercultural learning?

Celebrating Diversity
@FariaMiniPD #MiniPDchat

The MiniPD Team

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Celebrate global citizenship

It is important that as educators we help our students understand that there are multiplicities in the world, that the beauty of humankind is that we do not all have a singular commonalities- Nick Nwolisa

An ideal way of encouraging diversity in the classroom through global citizenship is to “celebrate different voices”. Here are some practical ways to do that:

1. Bring in colleagues from different cultures to tell first hand stories -let the kids hear from other people.

2. Encourage students to compare stories and events from their cultures with those of other cultures and find similarities.

3. Every child, irrespective of their capabilities, should be encouraged to have a sincere and transparent opinion, especially opinions about their heritage -what they like or don’t like.

For further reading: Five Ways to Teach Your Students to Appreciate and Embrace Our Differences

Connect with Nick Nwolisa on MiniPD

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Celebrate Neurodiversity

MiniPD Coach Kaitlyn Somers suggests:

Create a physical or digital bulletin board featuring famous neurodivergent people.

Don't shy away from talking about the different ways our brains work.

Provide opportunities for students to hear from neurodivergent voices (through guest speakers and books).

Connect with Kaitlyn via her MiniPD landing page here.

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Lou's superpowers: she's an amazingly talented musician and has a sensory processing difference.

Paralympic swimmer who has represented Great Britain and won 24 gold medals. She holds 11 British records and one world record for the 100 meter butterfly. Her superpower: Aspberger's/ASD.

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Neurodiversity Week 2022 - March 17 Jamie Sumner and Jessica-Jane Applegate

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Lou's superpowers: she's an amazingly talented musician and has a sensory processing difference. Paralympic swimmer who has represented Great Britain and won 24 gold medals. She holds 11 British records and one world record for the 100 meter butterfly. Her superpower: Aspberger's/ASD.

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Intersections Between Mental Health, Diversity and Teaching

Non-visible mental health concerns affect students' abilities to learn and engage with their peers.

Normalise conversations around stress, loneliness and pressure.

Share stories of public figures who have lived with mental health concerns.

Invite school counsellor / mental health professional to address the class periodically.

Have a school-level plan of action to respond to individual emergency situations.

Create safe spaces for students and teachers to de-stress and have downtime.

Connect with Esha Patnaik on MiniPD.

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Guidelines to Anchor our Work

MiniPD Coach, Marcelle Valladares, says:

Use Strategies for framing the approach to social and environmental justice work to focus on assets instead of deficits for marginalized identities.

Students need to explore who they are, the complexities that make up their identity.

Students need to learn to celebrate differences and similarities.

Students need to see an abundance of images of Brown, Black, Indigenous and Asian (BBIA)  people in empowering and positive ways to counter how history and media tend to show people of color negatively.

Students need to have an abundance of stories and examples of BBIA people’s joy and success  instead of just focusing on the stories of oppression and pain.

Connect with Marcelle Valladares on MiniPD.

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CLICK HERE TO WATCH Celebrating Diversity: MiniPD Coaches in Conversation (60 mins) with Estelle Baroung Hughes, Marcelle Valladares and Esha Patnaik. No cost.

Read the article, continue to learn with a coach 1-on-1 or in small groups, read articles, and access resources: create an account at no cost here.

MiniPD Coaches are experienced IB and Non-IB International Teachers, Leaders and Consultants.

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Diversity and inclusion in the classroom

Diversity can be taught, diversity can be instructional. Diversity in the classroom therefore should be intentional and planned because it does not just happen! -Nick Nwolisa

Why is diversity in the classroom important?

Diversity in the classroom builds critical thinkers

It improves academic outcomes

It helps students feel represented and included

For further reading: Five Ways to Teach Your Students to Appreciate and Embrace Our Differences

Connect with Nick Nwolisa on MiniPD

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DEIJ and Anti-racist Practices: Looking Through a Lens of Intercultural Learning and Global Citizenship (5 minute read)

- Read the article, continue to learn with a coach 1-on-1 or in small groups, read articles, and access resources: create an account at no cost here.

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DEIJ and Anti-racist Practices: Looking Through a Lens of Intercultural Learning and Global Citizenship - MiniPD

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How do you encourage your students to use the full range of their language skills to deepen engagement and comprehension of content? Every teacher is a language teacher. A CLIL (Content and Language Integrated Learning) dual focus promotes content mastery and language acquisition. Teachers need to b…

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Culturally Responsive SEL

MiniPD Coach, Marcelle Valladares, makes suggestions for culturally responsive social and & emotional learning:

Dismantle the idea that emotions are good or bad. All emotions just are. Often we equate pleasant emotions with being good and unpleasant emotions with being bad, when in actuality all emotions are important for informing us of what we need or want.

Teach students how to use sensations, a physical feeling or perception, to inform them when to check in with their feelings.

Help students to name their feelings. A great app for this is Mood Meter.

Connect with Marcelle Valladares on MiniPD.

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K-12 Social Justice Standards to Support Intercultural Understanding and Compassionate Global Citizens.

MiniPD Coach, Marcelle Valladares, says:

These are created by Learning For Justice. Check them out here!

Connect with Marcelle Valladares on MiniPD.

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Antiracist Book Lists

MiniPD Coach, Marcelle Valladares, recommends:

Freedom Reads: Anti-Bias Book Talk

We Need Diverse Books

Where to Find Diverse Books

Connect with Marcelle Valladares on MiniPD.

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A 501(c)(3) nonprofit, WNDB aims to create a world where every reader can find themselves in the pages of a book. To reach this goal, we've created programs to mentor diverse writers and illustrators, support diverse publishing professionals, and provide books to classrooms nationwide.

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Closing the gap: creating equity in the classroom

Classroom strategies, tips, and approaches to close the equity gap

1. Creating a culturally competent environment

In an equitable classroom environment, students of all backgrounds (e.g., race, nationality, gender) have the same opportunities to learn and develop their knowledge. To create an equitable learning environment, educators must be culturally competent and possess the ability to communicate and work effectively across cultural lines.

2. Strategies for equitable classroom management

Monitor discuss style

Be sensitive how different culture deal with conflict

Clarify expectations

Emphasise a positive environment, not punishment

For further reading: (Hanover Research) Closing the Gap: creating equity in the classroom

Connect with Nick Nwolisa on MiniPD

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Jump back into the MiniPD Twitter slow chat

Celebrating Diversity
@FariaMiniPD #MiniPDchat

The MiniPD Team

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Gender Spectrum Resources

MiniPD Coach, Marcelle Valladares, says:

Click here to view an annotated spreadsheet of resources both for adults and children that help expand the idea of gender beyond the binary.

Connect with Marcelle Valladares on MiniPD.

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Engage with the UNSDG

MiniPD Coach, Dr. James Hatch, writes,

This is a nice, user-friendly way for teachers and students to engage with the UNSDG. Many of these apply to issues circulating around diversity especially gender and socio-economic.

Connect with James on minipd.com.

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What are the good life goals?

The Sustainable Development Goals are the blueprint for a better future, and together we can reach them.

By following the good life goals we can all help make tomorrow better than today. Let's do this!

Best Lifehacks of 2022

Our curated list of the best lifehacks from this year that you definitely don't want to miss.

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The Sustainable Development Goals are the blueprint for a better future, and together we can reach them. By following the good life goals we can all help make tomorrow better than today. Let's do this! Our curated list of the best lifehacks from this year that you definitely don't want to miss.

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Join this FREE LIVE EVENT on MAY 19th

Celebrating Diversity: MiniPD Coaches in Conversation

7:00am EDT | 11:00 am UTC | 7:00pm HKT

CLICK HERE TO REGISTER

Get a 30% DISCOUNT to use for 1-on-1 MiniPD coaching sessions in May & June 2022.

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Welcome! You are invited to join a webinar: Celebrating Diversity: MiniPD Coaches in Conversation. After registering, you will receive a confirmation email about joining the webinar.

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This is a conversational session that will last between 45 - 60 mins to support educators in international school contexts. Spotlighted MiniPD Coaches will share concrete strategies around our theme 'Celebrating Diversity'. Topics can include: Global Citizenship; Intercultural Learning; International Mindedness; Allyship; Equity; Diversity; Social Justice; Bias; Prejudice.

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Bianca McCarthy - Global Calibration - Bianca explores why diversity enabled a more dynamic and more successful programme.

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Global Calibration

MiniPD Coach, Dr. James Hatch, recommends, watching this c. 10 minute video where the question is asked:

Who is responsible about educating our students about diversity and inclusion?

Explore why diversity enabled a more dynamic and more successful programme.

Connect with Dr. James Hatch on minipd.com.

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Register for Africa In The Curriculum - ALI Conference in association with AIELOC

MiniPD is supporting the NGO, Africa Learning International, an organisation focused on SDG 4 (Quality Education for All).

Details:
1 Day Online Conference - 11th June 2022
Morning content: French. Sessions on topics such as:

La figure du chef de village en Afrique précoloniale

Les héritages coloniaux dans i'enseignement de l'histoire et de la Géographie en Afrique francophone

Écrire pour impacter la jenuesse africaine

Afternoon content: English. Sessions on topics such as:

Decolonising and Indigenising the Curriculum

Counter- Storytelling and Learning from the Stories of the African Diaspora

Leading fore Educational Equity & Inclusion in Africa and Beyond

Register here
Information:
www.africalearninginternational.org
Founder and President of ALI: Estelle Hughes

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Celebrating Diversity: Share a story of impact on our Twitter chat

- Share a real story of how you have celebrated diversity this month.

@FariaMiniPD #MiniPDchat

The MiniPD Team

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Join the Diversity Collaborative

The MiniPD Team recommends, joining the Diversity Collaborative.

Access research, resources, events and ongoing discourse for 'creating and sustaining a more diverse, inclusive, equitable and just international school community'. ISS, International Schools Services.

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Our Mission

The Diversity Collaborative (DC) is committed to creating and sustaining a more diverse, inclusive, equitable, and just international school community through our focus on leadership.

Our Vision

We recognize that diversity without equity, inclusion, and justice is insufficient and can perpetuate ongoing harm. Therefore, we strive not only to recognize and redistribute power, but also to eradicate the systems and structures in place that cause and have caused injustice, inequity and exclusion. We aspire to see the leadership of international schools reflect the global majority.

Our Commitments

To realize our commitment to diversity, equity, inclusion, and justice, the Diversity Collaborative wholeheartedly challenges all leaders, international schools and associated organizations to address the absence of diverse leadership in formal leadership positions. Concurrently, we acknowledge that anyone in a school can demonstrate leadership by serving as an agent of change. The Diversity Collaborative (DC) conducts research on the leadership pipeline and recruitment practices, provides leadership development, and advocates for international school communities to (1) critically reflect on diversity or the lack thereof, (2) develop equity-minded stakeholders, (3) promote inclusive environments, and (4) serve as social justice activists.

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This cross-organization group connects educational professionals to create lasting change. See how you can make a difference today.

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Education and Elitism - Dr. Conrad Hughes

MiniPD Coach, Dr. James Hatch, recommends, watching this 20 minute keynote speech on Education and Elitism.

Dr. Hughes is Campus and Secondary Principal of La Grande Boissière, The International School of Geneva.

He is also author of books such as:
Understanding Prejudice and Education, The Challenge of Future Generations. Routledge.
Education and Elitism, Challenges and Opportunities. Routledge.

Connect with Dr. James Hatch on minipd.com.

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AIE Japan Chapter 2020-2021 Webinar Series : Keynote Speech by Dr. Conrad Hughes

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Educating Girls as Global Citizens

MiniPD Coach, James Hatch, recommends this podcast.

"Educators frequently speak of having global competencies or being a global citizen, but what does that really mean? Are we clear on how this happens both in school and at home?"

In On Educating Girls Clare Sisisky, the Executive Director of the Global Education Benchmark Group, talks with Trudy Hall exploring both the role of schools and parents in empowering girls to become global citizens.

Connect with James on minipd.com.

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On Educating Girls Podcast: Girls as Global Citizens

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“It is when you become aware of the global challenges and are prepared to act in the interest of the...

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Be an Anti-Racist Lang & Lit Teacher

"Teaching texts from culturally diverse backgrounds is the very first step for an anti-racist Language and Literature syllabus."

Read about critical next steps from Estelle Hughes, in How to be an Anti-Racist Language and Literature Teacher.

Estelle Hughes is the president of the NGO Africa Learning International (www.africalearninginternational.org), an organisation focused on SDG 4 (Quality Education for All).

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"2009 Student Research Fellows" by NWABR is licensed under CC BY 2.0

By Estelle Baroung Hughes
Teaching texts from culturally diverse backgrounds is the very first step for an anti-racist Language and Literature syllabus. Without cultural, ethnic and racial representation there is no antiracism. However, when studying books that represent cultures, people and traditions from all over the world, educators can still either open minds or tightly close them. The apparent diversity of a book list can hide the fact that fundamental racist biases are not addressed. Three key questions Language and Literature teachers can ask themselves are the following: Who is discussed (and who isn't) in our syllabus? Whose voice is heard? What is the impact of these voices on students? This is how to make Language and Literature courses more inclusive and intellectually stimulating for all students.

Who is discussed?

Teachers of Language and Literature should take it as a personal challenge to discuss texts from all the cultures or countries of origin of all the students in their classrooms. That seems particularly daunting in the context of international education where often, children have multiple nationalities and come from all over the globe. No effort, however, is more important than the one to connect with our students, understand who they are, where they come from, what their cultural identity looks like. Be it through the study of a song, a poem, a short-story, an extract from a novel or an essay, the attention you dedicate to inclusion sends a strong message on who matters: the student. Of course we keep Shakespeare and Salinger but we also widen the entrance for Adichie, Kadaré, Yoshimoto, Kavafi, Allende...This is the magic of world literature and a key principle of international education: an expression of the duty we have as teachers to personalise education while making it as diverse as possible. This way, every student is allowed, in one way or the other, to feature in the Language and Literature syllabus at least once.

Who is talking?

Perspective is the second key element for an antiracist Language and Literature course. If the visibility offered to the students' cultures happens through a faulty lens, it does more harm than good. For example, there is a real danger of hegemony and alienation when we prefer books where white voices mediate the experiences of people of colour. Language and Literature teachers should choose to teach as many authentic texts as possible, where the writing, the characters and the messages emerge from the lives, creativity and spirit of members of the communities depicted. This does not mean we should disqualify authors who choose to write about cultures that are not theirs. The polyphonic approach is recommended for global issues like oppression, peace and conflict and the environment. The way to avoid a hegemonic syllabus is through multiplying perspectives. For example the apartheid era could be studied through extracts from A Long Walk to Freedom by Nelson Mandela, July's People by Nadime Gordimer, a female & white anti-apartheid Nobel Prize winner from South africa or The Power of One by Bryce Courtenay, an Australian novelist. All of these books have literary merit so why not read extracts from all of them, to compare and contrast perspectives?

To propose another comparison, the novel To Kill a Mockingbird by Harper Lee describes the oppression of black Americans from the perspective of a well-meaning white person whereas The Bluest Eyes by Toni Morrison depicts the same racial dynamics but with a black voice. The second undoubtedly allows you to touch on black excellence through the analysis of Morrison's style. The characterisation of Pecola, her mother and her husband is fashioned intrinsically, with the cultural insights of the black American family unit that reveals the beauty as well as the pain brought by hardship. It seems difficult to imagine how an outsider to black American culture would communicate this. On the contrary, an outsider might all too easily fall into clichés of pity, martyrdom and oversimplified victimisation. Teaching black culture through an author belonging to that group can help a teacher highlight the power of resilience and counter the essentialization of black characters as sheer helpless victims.

The question 'who is talking' also applies to the teacher. A diverse teaching staff is important to present students with as many cultural perspectives as possible on the studied texts. It is a beautiful thing when teachers from the communities depicted in the studied texts can be present to help unpack the words. For there are hidden cultural gems that only trained eyes can spot. That is why it is also fruitful to invite parents and guest speakers in whenever relevant to enrich our classes' understanding of texts. For, it takes a village to raise a child.

How does this impact students?

An anti-racist Language and Literature syllabus actively deconstructs stereotypes. Sometimes it becomes a complex task when there is an intention to raise awareness about some crucial world issue but the unit winds up alienating some of the students in the classroom. Afropessismism is one example. This posture often stems from compassion, a desire to help Africans, but it is damaging to African students and skews the worldview of all the others. Teachers should therefore explore how to approach hard realities like slavery, segregation, colonisation, war, genocide, without it resulting in a feeling of shame in the students' whose part of the world is being discussed. As a matter of fact, diversity does not automatically produce tolerance, international mindedness and all the benefits we associate with continued exposure to different ways of life, appearances and beliefs. On the contrary, without appropriate mediation and if dominant narratives are left unchecked, we may be unknowingly educating racists and cynics. Let's make sure this does not happen!

Beyond the literacy, the cultural enrichment and the nurturing of lifelong learning, there is something ancient about reading together. Language and Literature should be a quest for passion and beauty, a journey where we salute the powerful expressions of the Human Soul, regardless of the language, culture, accent or times the author expresses him/her/them/self/selves in. Antiracism does not disrupt that journey. On the contrary, it binds us closer together as we tread more carefully, yes, but also more respectfully and more lovingly on a path to personal and community growth.

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How to be an Anti-Racist Language and Literature Teacher

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"2009 Student Research Fellows" by NWABR is licensed under CC BY 2.0 By Estelle Baroung Hughes Teaching texts from culturally diverse backgrounds is the very first step for an anti-racist Language and Literature syllabus. Without cultural, ethnic and racial representation there is no antiracism. However, when studying books that represent cultures, people and traditions from...

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5 Anti-Racist Books to Level Up your School's Professional Development

MiniPD Coach, Kwame Sarfo-Mensah writes,

Over the past year, I have been able to read a ton of great books focused on social justice, culturally relevant pedagogy, and disrupting white supremacy culture in our schools. With a new school year upon us and racial tensions being higher than ever within our society, schools must be intentional about structuring their professional development plans to support their teachers in building their capacity as anti-bias, anti-racist educators. Below are five books that are definite must-haves for your schools:

"Ratchedemic" by Chris Emdin

"Start Here, Start Now" by Liz Kleinrock

"Cultivating Genius" by Gholdy Muhammad

"Black Appetite, White Food" by Jamila Lyiscott

"Reading, Writing, and Racism" by Bree Picower

Connect with Kwame on minipd.com

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Make an Action Plan to be LGBTQ Inclusive

The MiniPD Team suggests,

Reflect on the LGBTQ Inclusive: Action Planning template, from glen.org.

"All students deserve a safe, affirming, and inclusive school environment. Addressing anti-LGBTQ bias,
understanding the complex nature of students’ identities and promoting their health and well-being helps
us achieve this goal." glen.org

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Create Norms for an Inclusive Environment

Create and share norms or agreements in meetings and classroom communities for an inclusive and equitable environment.

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Plan a Culturally and Historically Responsive Curriculum

The MiniPD Team recommends reading 12 Questions to Ask When Designing Culturally and Historically Responsive Curriculum.

Before planning your next unit, consider questions such as:

Out of all the things in the world, why are you teaching this?

How will your instruction help students to learn anti-oppression and anti-racism?

How will my instruction spread, amplify and elevate beauty within humanity?

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Next? Explore MiniPD resources on Designing High Quality Units.

High Quality Unit Design focused:

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Register here for this and future live events.

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Find events hosted by Faria for educators and schools staff. Obtain professional development and systems knowledge from expert staff and speakers.

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