Humanities Too ISSN 1461-4537 Humanities Too ISSN 1461-4537 Global Citizenship The Humanities Association is indebted to Margaret Burr, of Tower Hamlets Humanities edition and there will be Education Centre, for passing on the Global Citzenship on Fair Trade which is enclosed Editorial another heading for Oakbank with your magazine. This is the first in a series of leaflets aimed at literacy and numeracy School when you read this. for Years 3 & 4 and Years 5 & 6. The series will be published over the coming year. Please continue with your To receive the other three leaflets on fair trade and the rest of the series:- he Association support, I hope that all of you continues to make will have renewed your subs by • Food progress. Last now and that many of you will • Water year's conference was a have signed up for the • Waste and Recycling great success and will be a conference. • Transport hard act to follow. Plans are well under way and we have Please send 10 1st class stamps and your name & address to: already secured the services of Christine Peter Walsh Counsell, Steve Johnson and Humanities Education Centre Membership Secretary Tower Hamlets Professional Development Centre Ian Colwill. Who will forget Christine's brilliant session English Street 11 Lloyd Street and Steve's usual fast London E3 4TA Ryton moving, witty address in Tel: 020 7364 6405 Tyne Wear 1999? It is welcome back to NE 40 4DJ Ian for so long a keynote speaker at our conferences. [email protected] The conference is at the Village, Warrington on November 10-12, 2000. here has been a slight mix up with the issue numbers so we are restarting both TOO and NOW at Issue 10. However the magazine is International Development slowly improving. We are at last able to publish articles and materials, DfID has conducted a survey, published in March 2000 through MORI on children's understanding of which have not come international development issues. Fully completed questionnaires were received from 2,767 pupils. directly from the Executive. MORI reports that there are some encouraging findings from the study. Eight out of ten children say We see the magazine as a they at least know something about developing countries, and the majority say that they are concerned means of easily exchanging about the plight of people in poorer countries. There seems to be some understanding that the subject ideas and materials. We is more complicated than simply providing financial assistance. Copies of the survey can be hope we are succeeding. A downloaded from the DfID web site at: www.dfid.gov.uk/ (Working with Us) cheque is on its way to Thelma Wiltshire for her contribution to the Spring 12 1 ISSN 1461-4537 Humanities Too Anti-bullying by Thea Tomlinson inadequate. However it was clear that the message was one we wanted to pursue. Continued Whilst trying to find funding to have the video I "ITS GOOD TO TALK" made commercially, a local firm, Custom Video Television from New Brighton, n Anti-Bullying video for use with suggested a partnership between Park High Secondary School pupils School, their company, and Wirral Education Thea Tomlinson: Anti-Bullying Authority. The result is the video "It's Good Co-ordinator, Park High School, To Talk" Birkenhead. It is a high-class product. It comes with a full "Words cannot describe how I felt. It was set of Teachers' Notes with suggested like mental torture. I kept on thinking that lessons. The video itself lasts about 20 Geography plays a significant part in promoting education for sustainable development it was my fault - as if I had done something minutes, but there are a number of points at through: that made them hate me. I was frightened which the pupils can discuss what they have and nervous. I would wake up in the seen. One example of this is the section Developing pupils' knowledge and understanding of the concept of sustainable morning not wanting to go to relating to the different types of builying development and the skills to act upon this understanding (for example, as part of school........... " behaviour. The suggested task is that pupils a Local Agenda 21 initiative). sort a number of types of behaviour under Developing pupils' knowledge and understanding of key concepts of sustamable headings: Physical, Social and Verbal. development, such as interdependence, quality of life and diversity. These are the words of a 13-year-old pupil Instead they could use this as an exercise who tried to cope alone with the effects of Developing pupils' skills of critical enquiry and an ability to handle and interpret where all pupils agree on the types of information. bullying. Bullying exists in all schools and behaviour that will not be accepted in school: according to recent statistics affects as many Exploring values and attitudes about complex issues, such as resource use and what better way for pupils to develop a sense global development as a third of the pupils. It is not a new of ownership of the school's Anti - Bullying phenomenon, but the legal requirement for Policy? each school to have an Anti-Bullying Policy, History plays a part through developing pupils' skills_ of enquir_y, ~ritical thiz:iking and and some high profile cases of litigation communication, and knowledge of how past actions, choices and values may impact on The main message of the video is clear from future societies, economies and environments. against schools, has meant an increased its title. If we know when someone is being awareness of the need to develop a wide bullied then we can help. A school will have Citizenship plays a part through developing pupils' skills in, and commitment to, effect~ve range of strategies to help tackle this to develop its own strategies to respond to unpleasant aspect of life in our schools. participation in the democratic and other decision making proc~sses that affect the qual~ty, pupils, but one thing is clear: if you say "It's structure and health of environments and society and exploring values that determine Good To Talk" then it is essential that you people's actions within society, economy and the environment. It was against this background that this video promise to listen. was produced. While developing schemes of It seems that so many of the new initiatives are giving Humanities a much needed boost. work for students in Years 7 and 8 for their The video is targeted at Secondary School PHSE lessons, I was unable to find a suitable pupils and is available for use, free of charge, video that dealt with the types of questions by all schools in the Wirral. that I wanted to address. These included: lease contact Corinne Lands; General Inspector: Pupils Response and · What is bullying? PHSE, Wirral LEA. · Different types of bullying Some strategies that pupils can use to For schools outside the area copies can be deal with bullying situations. obtained from CVT, Station House Studios, Atherton Street, New Brighton, Merseyside. An initial attempt to make the video within CH45 9LT Price £49.99. school, using school equipment, and of course 0151 637 1114 pupils, was hopelessly and hilariously [email protected] www.customtv.co.uk 2 11 Humanities Too Humanities Too ISSN 1461-4537 Politics of the Shopping Trolley Education for by Dan McEwan Sus~ainability eflections on Doug Holly and a Doug's suggestions for further reading, Sustainable Development - Council for Environmental Education. Green Left Approach to Education. (Ivan Illich, Paulo Freire, and his own inspirational "Beyond Curriculum"); There is an interesting article in the CEEmail (a publication of resources and information Occasionally we realise that the way establish continuities with a tradition that by the CEE). It is entitled: we teach is part of who we are. Teaching is more has been unjustly neglected in our than the job that pays the mortgage. It is part of responding to government initiatives. What is sustainable development and how does it relate to education? our identity with roots that reach into our Illich's argument that "people will have to imaginations and deep down into our pasts. I was stop 'learning the need to be taught' and In practice, sustainable development is about balancing the needs of society, the recently reminded of this the night after a start learning the need to learn for economy and the environment through: Humanities Faculty meeting. The meeting had themselves" (p. 19) is at the heart of Doug's discussed the form we would use for OFSTED­ vision of education that is not based on The prudent use of resources. conscious lesson plans. The Head of Faculty and a domination. Protection of the environment. younger colleague had, quite rightly, presented Social justice. this as a tool for improving the learning and In his booklet Doug does not look to A vision for the future. teaching in each class. I had contributed little to schools to provide politically informed, the meeting. That night I woke in the midst of a collaborative education. He finds his hope How does this relate to education? disturbing dream. I was one of a group of men instead in campaigns like those around who were playing a game. My father, dead some genetically modified foods, the "politics of " Education for sustainable development enables people to develop the knowledge, values fifteen years, was part of the group. Each of us had the shopping trolley" in which consumers and skills to participate in decisions about the way we do things individually and collectively, a parcel and we had to open it and dress up with discover their power to drive a wedge both locally and globally, that will improve quality of life now without damaging the planet for whatever was inside.