| Contents |
Chapter 1 | Chapter 2 | Chapter 3 | Chapter 4 | Appendix 1 |
| Appendix 2 part 1... | Appendix 2 part 2 | Appendix 2 part 3 |

Appendix II

An edited selection of teachers' reports
from the 1985 schools program
 

YEAR 5

Why trial this program . . . Teaching for Human Rights?
I initially read about the Human Rights Program whilst browsing through the paper early in the 1985 school year. It immediately caught my attention by sounding relevant to a number of concerns I have had over the last few years about teaching and where we are heading.

I have been fortunate enough to have had the experience of working in a school, over the last six years, where the emphasis has been placed on 'talking over' problems, listening to both points of view in an argument and trying to consider the rights of everyone involved. For the last two years I have worked in the senior section of the school with a group of children I know well and who have overall, above-average academic ability. I guess I found myself looking for avenues of getting this group thinking about other things related to the world, the future and ways to deal with future uncertainties, and to try and see things from different points of view.

The Human Rights Program sounded like just the thing! I thought it might relate to real life situations more than much of what is normally dealt with in schools.

After receiving the kit and resources I felt sure that there were many components that were exactly what I'd been looking for; a few others I felt a little more dubious about. I felt that we had 'plenty to gain' but 'little to lose', and so off we went with many interesting problems and issues ahead to look at.

[1] Any reference in the reports that follow to the teaching manual, Teaching for human rights: activities for schools, is to the first edition. which this publication supersedes.

Structure
I work in a two-teacher Year 5 unit and initially I planned things with my colleague of Term 1. However, due to two teacher changes, I ended up working mainly by myself with the materials in Terms 2 and 3!

Initially, after deciding that we would be using the Human Rights Program in the unit, we timetabled a slot for it in the unit timetable between recess and lunch on Fridays. As this timetable was up in the unit before the materials arrived, quite a bit of interest was generated, with many students asking what was 'Human Rights' and so on. Some students were really interested.

I guess we did consider it to be a completely new unit of the curriculum, fitting in with the idea of a Social Science theme, to a certain extent. We introduced it to parents, at a parent-teacher information night, as a new unit of work. However, as time went by, we were really surprised at how many different things from other areas of work that term tied in with the human rights ideas being considered. Hopefully examples of this will be evident in the section on 'implementation'.

Those involved
After viewing the materials I decided that it would be better to work with one group of children all the time, rather than the whole unit (sixty-three), in order to keep some continuity and to 'follow things up', whenever possible. I decided to make this group my home group because:

(i) We all knew each other really well (I'd taught most in Years 1 and 4); and
(ii) With teacher changes imminent in the unit, it seemed to be the most sensible idea.

Although initially only I and my unit colleague were involved in the program (I should add the principal was supportive right from the start), other teachers soon began to express an interest in what it was we were doing. Staff were interested in displays and work we had in the unit (e.g. charts of students' and teachers' rights) and those who had the children for band and other subjects found the group behaving in a very 'reasonable' manner. (More on that later.)

In second term I led an in-service activity for our staff on the program and my experiences to that stage. A lot of interest has been generated, with a number of staff trying the introductory sections with their groups.

Setting goals
When I initially entered the program my only real 'goal' was to find an area of work that would be a challenge and would relate to real-life situations. After working with the materials for a while and after being asked for information by our staff, I did sit down and really consider which goals I thought might be attainable, both for myself and the students. Here is the list of goals (or objectives if you like!) that I came up with.

Why do this program . . . 'Teaching for Human Rights'?

• The things to be gained will be of value to 'real-life' situations.
• It will help to build a feeling of cohesion in the class.
• It will help develop group discussion skills.
• It will help build a respect for other people's opinions.
• It will help language development by:
  -helping with clarity of ideas
  -formulation of own ideas
  -investigation of both sides of 'arguments' and questions
• It will provide us with more insight and background into world events.
• It will promote consideration of others, both in and outside our unit.
• It will provide an outlet for the discussion of problems.
• It can give a feeling that students' opinions do count and that they can understand and discuss real 'adult' problems.
• It will provide opportunities to look at problems or situations where there is no one or right answer.
• We will have to face the difficulty of finding solutions to problems no-one can agree on.
• It will promote logical thinking, and problem-solving strategies.

Whilst I'm sure there are many other achievable goals, these were the main ones I felt we were working towards. It struck me that in fact, the goals related to any curriculum area can be met or enhanced in one way or another through teaching for human rights. Certainly there should be no difficulties justifying it educationally in any arena!

Obstacles encountered
Overall I felt there were difficulties, and probably the ones we encountered could be overcome with a little more experience with the teaching materials. Main ones were:

1. Unrealistic teacher expectations. Although I was often pleasantly surprised by the student outcomes there were times when I expected too much. The concepts at times were very difficult for the children to come to grips with (10-11 years age range). At times discussions led us in circles and you felt 'have we achieved anything?'. It is probably best not to have set expectations of the children's understanding of topics, but rather work on the discussion and reasoning skills and see how you go.

2. Repeating others' views and opinions. Another problem encountered initially was that the children tended to give views and opinions that were the ones they'd heard at home. It took a number of weeks and all the introductory activities to break through this and get them really thinking.

3. Time. It took me much longer than I thought to work through activities. Some lessons in the manual looked short, but if they captured the children's interest we tended to extend them for a week or two. A great deal of time was needed just for discussion and listening to each others' ideas and presenting work and so on. Often it was necessary to 're-cap' on what we'd been doing if there had been a considerable break since the last lesson (e.g. due to holidays or excursions).

4. The format of some materials. A few things I trialled were too difficult for the age group and had to be reworded or worked around e.g. the wording of the Universal declaration of human rights. We spent some weeks looking at this and the children worked in small groups to present their own version of what each right meant, to the rest of the group.

Teaching strategies
During the course of the program I tried to vary the lesson format as much as possible. I did, however, try to include at least a small-group discussion for ideas sharing, with every new idea.

Serious group discussion was best achieved in our 'quiet room', where we always sit in a circle. The children soon came to settle down and really participate well once we got into this format and were free of other distractions. I tried to limit all discussions to no more than twenty minutes, to keep concentration at a maximum. We did however have some really 'successful' discussions that ran by themselves for over half an hour.

Whenever possible I had a 'practical' activity to help get interest going. Sometimes it was a role-play or research in small groups then reporting back to the group. Some times we played a 'game' and had a discussion later. Some times we went to a play (e.g. Green Thumb Theatre), watched a related TV or video program (such as Behind the News), checked the news, worked from newspapers and magazines, displayed art work or poetry or shared stories, or tried to solve a problem or answered open-ended questions (e.g. group or individual work).

Overall the main model I used could be summarised as input (whole group)--activity (whole group, small group or individual)--reporting back and discussion (whole group). This allowed the children a range of activities and didn't strain their attention span.

Implementation
In the following section I will provide some fairly detailed reports of the first few sessions and then provide comments on the more successful lessons and the most difficult lessons I encountered.

Sessions 1 and 2
This began with the whole group withdrawing to the quiet room. I said that I had a little story I would like to read to them and that I wanted them to think if any of the things in the story had ever happened to them, or if they had heard of such things happening to anyone else. I then proceeded to read the small, black and white Human rights for human kind: a handbook to the group. I modified the language in some sections as I read to make it simpler for them to understand.

In the discussion that followed most children showed that whilst none of the things at issue had actually happened to them they could think of incidents (nearly all from the news) of such things happening to other people. One thing that did come out at this stage was that the children felt all these terrible things were sure to happen in the countries that they see at war on TV each day. No consideration seemed to be given to at home, in Australia.

As things were grinding to a halt I then explained that whilst we on our own might not be able to change things in the 'outside' world, they were all old enough to discuss some of these things. I emphasised that there were not always 'right' or 'wrong' answers and that sometimes they would probably disagree strongly with what someone else said, but that that was O.K. I felt that all of this was necessary at this stage as the children were pretty unsure about what was really required of them, and seemed to be wanting to 'please me' rather than really stretch their minds to see what they thought.

Next I explained that we would play. a game. We went outside and with blindfolds played the trust game in the Teaching for human rights lesson book. This was, of course, greatly enjoyed. We then returned to the quiet room and discussed how it had felt etc. Most felt that it was hard to really 'trust' the person not to lead you into a tree etc. Some felt that their partners hadn't provided enough guidance and should have verbally told them what was coming up.

After this discussion I tried to relate it to trusting each other in a conversation situation. I explained that I didn't want to 'run' the discussions all the time, but how could we avoid everyone talking at once and people missing out altogether. After a number of suggestions, most children felt that they should still have to put their hand up to speak to avoid chaos. Next I asked who'd ever felt silly or embarrassed contributing verbally in the class. This opened a real floodgate of comments. Every child could think of at least one incident when he or she had felt this way. The most common conclusions were:
 

After this we all agreed that even if we didn't agree with someone else we would respect their opinion in discussions and try to think of a good way of saying our opinion on our turn to speak. So we were ready to give it a try!

Next I asked that if there were such things as human rights, what rights did they think they had as students in our unit. This drew a blank response and I really had to prompt them with a few joking comments, like 'How would you feel if suddenly you were never allowed to have lunch any more?' Is that fair?' etc. As the children got on to the idea I asked them to write down at least two things each, together with the necessary duty or behaviour we all needed to adopt to ensure that they would occur. All went well with this, most children showed in their lists that they really understood, although the types of rights listed ranged from those that benefited all, to the more trivial, though, perhaps, no less valid type. I promised to make these up into a big list for next time, and also promised to get together with the other teacher to make up a list of what we felt our rights in the unit weke. A copy of these is set out below.

Children's rights in Unit 4

Session 3
This lesson was mainly a time when we went through each of the rights listed on the students' list and decided how much we all agreed on them. As everyone seemed happy with the list, I then showed them the list that my colleague and I had made up f6r teachers' rights in the unit. I asked if they understood what each one meant and that seemed O.K.

Next I got three children to read the short play, Three young people speaking, from pages 26-7 of the manual. (They had already practised the reading earlier in the morning.) The discussion that arose from this was fairly predictable and very conservative. For example, on the topic of pockey money, all children agreed that you should have to do some type of chores or work to get it or, as one boy put it, 4when you grow up you'll just expect to get everything for nothing and sit back waiting for it and n"ne'll give you anything'. One girl did feet however, that it wasn't fair if you were expected to do chores that your parent didn't have to do as she got very angry whenever she had to clear the table away after dinner and her parents just sat there relaxing.

Perhaps the most notable thing so far is that the list of rights that the children compiled for themselves has proved to be a really good way to deal with some children's problems in the unit. For example, when one child had been physically hurtful to another over a relatively minor incident, it was useful to point out that one of the rights we had all decided a student should have was to feel safe at school. Did he remember us deciding that? Yes. Did he still agree with that right? Yes. Had he infringed on the other child's right? Yes. From there we were able to decide on a better way to deal with the situation, should it arise again, without taking away anyone's rights.

Session 4 and 5
This lesson arose as an idea from my teaching partner after viewing a program called Behind the News, that deals with current affairs in a manner suitable for this age group. There had been a lot over the last few weeks about the nuclear arms race, famine, and wars in various countries and so on.

We asked the children to get into groups of three or four. We then gave each group a piece of paper and asked them to go off and do the following:
 

The lists that the children thought up were not all that varied. Items listed were the nuclear arms race, atomic bombs, people starving, people getting killed, wars, not enough jobs, crime, countries not getting on with each other, pollution, animals getting killed, species becoming extinct, trees getting chopped down. It is interesting to note that the thing that seems to worry nearly all of these children is the possibility of there being a nuclear war. Possibly this is so as it is more of a personal threat than any of the other, more removed, world problems.

Solutions given for a person with absolute power ranged from the ridiculous to the feasible. Some were:

Most children did seem to realise that in the real way that things are, it was a lot harder to get any real solutions operating, but that we should still try them. Often political reflections from home were voiced regarding world leaders etc. Certainly however, the activity seemed very worthwhile and appeared to tie into the framework of human rights. The discussion groups were very animated and it appears to be a topic that this age group has a lot to say about and can come to grips with, even if no real conclusions are drawn.
 

Session 6  We now began by trying to decide what made us human so that, having agreed there were human rights, we could decide who should get them. I had my group do activities under the heading 'Who are you?' in Chapter 3. With the activity where the children had to list human attributes in order of importance, I compiled this main list from theirs.  What am I that everyone else is?  1. a mammal 2. a human 3. a living creature 4. alive 5. can breathe 6. a thinking person 7. we are all the same and yet different in some ways 8. male or female 9. child or adult 10. can eat 11. we all have different bodies 12. have a face 13. see, talk, and hear 14. able to do at least one thing 15. have a brain 16. have organs and veins 17. wear clothing 18. can walk 19. have hair When we first started on the lists the children were putting down any old thing, and it did take a bit of teacher intervention in the form of 'Does everyone see?' etc. to get us started on the right track. Some children found this task extremely difficult and kept asking what they should put. Overall, however, I feel that they did grasp the idea of straining out the criteria that only apply to some people and hunting for more universal statements defining 'human'. This is reflected in some of the statements on the above list.

Sessions 7 and 8
The exercise where the children write a description of a favourite film or TV star without actually saying who it is was very appropriate to this age group. They enjoyed this activity and listened very attentively when each person read out his or her piece of work. Popular characters were those in A Country Practice, A-Team, Indiana Jones, cartoon characters and quiz show personalities. This activity was time-consuming and took quite some time to get through all the children in the class as every child wanted to have ago.

Sessions 9 and 10
This lesson began with the activity where each student must write down five complimentary facts about someone else in the group. This was a good activity and we were able to guess every person, although sometimes more by whose friend was doing the description than the actual description.

We then split up into four groups to prepare short plays of the 'This Is your Life' variety. I should point out however that only three children in my class had ever heard of the TV series and 1, and those three children,, had to spend time with each group explaining the format that the show might take. It would seem that such programs date very quickly. The children needed extra time to prepare their plays and were all keen to come in at lunch and practise. They presented them to the rest of the unit that afternoon and they had a decidedly slapstick, tongue-in-cheek quality about them. Perhaps the most valuable aspect was the degree of co-operation shown in the groups to get the play prepared in such a short time.

Sessions 11, 12 and 13
New topic--not in handbook--Nuclear war
At this stage I received information about a play to be presented by the Green Thumb Theatre from Canada. The play was called 1,000 Paper Cranes. As it seemed relevant to the spirit of human rights and much of what we had been seeing on current affairs work, I decided to pursue this avenue.

We spent one week looking at the background of the Japanese tradition of origami and paper cranes (children made them). We discussed nuclear war and what had happened at Hiroshima. This discussion generated much interest. I was a little concerned about how the students would deal with the death of Sadako in the story, but we were all keen to go.

The week we went to see the play there was some discussion about the story 1,000 Paper Cranes, in the unit. The play was excellent, of a high standard and tastefully done.

The follow-up discussion the next week concentrated on the feelings of the characters- the relationship between the boy and his father etc. We then worked through the role-play about the planet CRASMEANI. I felt the children gained a good understanding of the difficulties involved in governments making decisions and the way in which different groups are affected. I thoroughly recommend the activity.

Sessions 14 and 15
Planning a world community
Although I followed the idea in the manual for this, I changed it to make it more practical' and I feel this was the most successful lesson so far. After taking a session to discuss the difference between 'wants' and 'needs' the children made up their own lists of wants and needs.

Next session we cut up all the wants into strips and all the needs. We then placed them all in a big box. I removed quite a few needs slips of paper as they brought them to me, so the box had plenty of wants, but was a bit short on needs. Then we all sat in a circle while one person handed a scoop of paper slips to each child. We then had a trading session for ten minutes where the children had to try and obtain their basic needs through bartering with what they had. It looked like a mad market scene for 10 minutes. At the end of the 10 minutes we stopped and analysed what everyone had ended up with. We had:

• two or three very rich people with all their needs and wants satisfied
• half the group were 'O.K.', but not rich
• four or five people were in a bad way
• four to six people would be dead

This really brought home the 'luck of the draw' idea for how well off your situation is. It generated excellent discussion and seems very apt for this age group.

Another idea that went well
The children went through magazines and newspapers to find examples of people being dealt with unfairly. Each group had to give an explanation to the group. They mainly chose famine or war articles but there were a few on civil injustice. Although the children tended to agree with the tone in which the article was written there was considerable value for them in having to understand and explain what had happened and if anyone had lost his or her rights and why.

Evaluation
My own evaluation was mainly of an on-going 'over the shoulder' type but a number of comments can be made:

• The children enjoyed most activities and responded well to the responsibility of discussing 'real-life' matters.
• Consideration for others improved, and discussions concerning problems or behaviour were generally more 'productive'.
• I noticed an increased awareness of current affairs and what goes on in other countries.
• At this age some beliefs and prejudices are so closely allied to parental ones that is is difficult to get a real opinion from children.
• Discussion skills improved, especially willingness to consider new ideas.
• The best activities for this age-group involved role-play or something practical which provided the basis for the following discussion.
• I really got to know the children better and was surprised at the depth of their ideas.

YEAR 6

In the school involved in this report, three teachers worked as a team. The report describes the Year 6 program. Other sections contained accounts of a Grade 3, and a composite Grade 3/4 one.

Structure
Three teachers at our school were directly involved in the program.

The first was the Grade 6 teacher. In her early forties, she has had more than a decade of teaching experience and another twelve years away from teaching during her children's early years. At this time she completed her studies for her B.A. and was at present engaged in studies for her Master's degree in Education. The Education Department had awarded her study leave for 1986 to complete her studies. Her field was language.

The second was the Grade 3 teacher. In her early twenties, this was her second year of teaching and her first year based in one class-room. In 1983 she was appointed to the relieving staff and had gained wide experience of a variety of schools in the region. A characteristic of the region is that schools are somewhat isolated from each other so her experience was valued. She had a Diploma of Teaching (Primary).

I was the composite Grade 3/4 teacher. I was thirty-six and had had seven years teaching experience. I came late to teaching, being accepted as a mature age student by my State College in 1975. My children were of secondary school age. I gained my B.Ed. by part-time evening study, in 1984. My special field was Social Science.

One teacher not directly involved in the program made an important contribution. The Vice-Principal provided encouragement and advice from the earliest stages of the program onwards. He assisted in gaining parental approval of the program at School Council level. He also kept the channels of communication open between ourselves and the organisers of the Human Rights Program.

The Human Rights Program was kept separate from existing curricula, or rather, we attempted to keep it so. The reasons for this were:

(a) We considered we were trialling material, not adopting it blindly.
(b) To incorporate it into existing programs would have been a unilateral decision out of keeping with the consensus model that operates in our schools.
(c) The evaluation task might be easier if the program was a separate entity.
(d) We wanted to be able to chop and change rather than conform to a plan that might prove inflexible.

Each teacher worked independently and autonomously; there was no boss, no coordinator. Generally one session of human rights per week was the aim. In the case of the Grade 3 and 3/4, we chose afternoon sessions and they followed roughly the same sequence I had drawn up at the start of Term 2. But where I had allowed one week for an activity, it generally took me two. One for the children to take in the experience and a second session for expressing their understanding.

We met weekly. This was a serious lunch-time session where we talked about what we'd done, what the outcomes had been, and how to relate these findings back to the Human Rights Program. Decisions were made after discussion. We were a good team because we were sufficiently different to bring fresh insights to issues, but we shared the same values. We didn't lose sight of the fact that we were testing material that we sometimes found imperfect, illogical, and poorly thought out. By the same token, we were proud that human rights were being paid serious attention and thought the subject a vital part of the education of children.

To summarise: The structure for testing the human rights material was loose in terms of supervision or control. There was no boss. But we were each accountable to the others at the weekly meeting. The meeting was our support as well as our forum.

A suggestion: Where neighbouring schools are involved in the program, strength could be derived from a common group meeting, say fortnightly.

Teachers who are attracted to human rights teaching don't need bossing; they are idealists to begin with but need the companionship of equals.

Grade 6 Report
As the Grade 6 teacher it was a privilege to be involved in trialling a new, innovative program. As the area of values teaching has always been of utmost importance to my classroom, it seemed a natural thing to accept the materials from the Human Rights Commission.

One of my main tasks was to determine which parts of the manual were suitable for Grade 6. 1 quickly found that the best way into any of the activities was to find a way into the children's existing framework of thinking and develop it from there. The most effective and systematic approach seemed to be units of work concentrating on single themes. This not only organised our work, but meant there was a definite starting and finishing time.

In using the manual with Grade 6 children I tried to place the activities set out into manageable units of work. In this way I would build up a series of activities to convey the message. That meant that new concepts which were introduced were emphasized again and again. The first unit 'Trust' proved most rewarding.
 

Most of the material from the manual was found to be self generating. The activities led on to all sorts of other areas which were only bounded by time and interest. The material saturated all parts of the curriculum and could not be contained as a separate entity.

To evaluate whether the activities changed the children's thinking and behaviour patterns is very difficult to do. If any changes were seen, was it due to the program or to the environment already created in the classroom? I had already introduced such things as self concept activities, awareness of ourselves and others etc. The children had already been 'moulded' into 'my way of thinking' from the start of the year. When I was around, they treated each other fairly well. Whether this was a superficial thing to please a teacher was something that was very difficult to gauge.

However there was very tangible growth for me as the teacher. From using the manual, I repeatedly found myself protecting the children's rights by asking their opinions, giving them choices, and allowing a greater amount of freedom. Small things maybe. Things like access to the toilet, eating lunch early if needed, choosing who to sit with, being able to move seats if friendships weren't working out, allowing entry to the room when it was too wet or too hot. These added up to a shift of power towards the children. They felt more in control of their environment and I trusted them not to abuse it. This trust and responsibility ensured I had enough 'control' for my classroom teaching. The language of the classroom became:

• 'Is it alright to ...?'
• 'What do you think?'
• 'Do you need more time to finish?'

The language of power and control was not needed as trust and responsibility for each other developed on both sides.

It is more difficult to evaluate the change in the children's thinking and behaviour. It may be best to try and explain by recounting some incidents that occurred. If the activities in the manual succeeded, it was to create an awareness of the rights of each person and allow real life situations to be dealt with, within this framework of human rights.

Early in the year, the girls decided it was unfair that the boys always took the cricket equipment out. It had been issued to Grade 6. but they didn't ever have a turn. One day, the equipment was grabbed quickly by some girls and taken into the yard and a game began. The boys were horrified and very hostile. After recess, we tried to discuss it reasonably, but failed. The boys argued that they didn't want girls playing with them as they were too slow and didn't know how to play properly. This of course quite missed the point as the girls only wanted the equipment. Some boys became more and more heated, some others saw that this wasn't what the girls wanted (to play with the boys) and suggested a compromise. One boy lost his temper and stormed to the school gate. (Fortunately he didn't leave the grounds.)

This episode showed various things about the grade. The girls had been very subdued in Grade 5, but were now firmly demanding what they saw were their rights. Apart from the obvious sexist remarks, the class showed they could not discuss an issue like this in a rational manner. There were only a few boys and girls who were able to listen to the other side and modify their stance. By the end of the year children were responding better to differences of opinion. Many slowly learnt the techniques of listening, modifying their information, and speaking their mind. Some were not ready to learn these skills, but the program might make it easier for them in later years.

At first the children did not show any interest in the events happening in South Africa (June 1985). They had no knowledge of the situation, even though most said they watched the TV news. The children could not discuss the happenings or share an opinion if they didn't know the events. To counter this, I began asking direct questions, e.g.

• What is apartheid?
• Why are funerals important in South Africa?
• What is Mr Fraser saying about South Africa?

This worked wonders. The children.needed a direct focus to assimilate the information. Suddenly they began having opinions about white policemen bashing black people, children being involved in riots etc. Their minds became alert to the issue. After the intense publicity of these riots, suddenly there was a news blackout. Freedom of information became a real issue.

By the end of the year, the Grade 6 seemed an easy going grade, getting on well with each other, not causing too many problems in the playground. On the surface the program seemed to be succeeding, but there were many incidents that raised doubts.

A new girl joined the grade--an Indian from Fiji of Hindu religion. She dressed differently, was overweight, and in the first few weeks didn't speak very much. It was difficult to judge her standard of English. Everything went smoothly for her in her new school until I was absent on sick leave for one day. A group of boys pushed and shoved her around in the playground and in the classroom made faces at her calling her 'Hari Krishna'.

On my return another girl related to me what had happened, the boys were asked what they had done and why. None of them knew what 'Hari Krishna' was--just 'funny people in Melbourne', who they thought dressed like Indians.

This incident showed many things apart from the apparent racism. Most newcomers are subjected to some hassles. When it was discussed as a class everyone knew they had been silly and most saw they had been led by the group. This was made easier because, due to the Human Rights program, we had the language needed to discuss the incident in terms of human rights, responsibility, trust etc. We had a framework of ideas within which to discuss it. The boys were able to write down why they had done it and in this way apologise. Some children were able to suggest how the new girl could have reacted. Surprisingly, because of this incident, the new girl found a place in the classroom. She began to speak English fluently (a lesson was taught to me never to under-estimate the ability of children) and her relationship with me developed into a loving and trustful one.

Although this incident and others like it took place I feel the growth in the children was great. They were able to discuss issues and listen to each other's point of view. Racism and sexism are still a force in their thinking, but perhaps some seeds are sown for future questioning.. Perhaps this is all that is obtainable at primary level.

Continue to Appendix 2 part 2
 

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Chapter 1 | Chapter 2 | Chapter 3 | Chapter 4 | Appendix 1 |
| Appendix 2 part 1... | Appendix 2 part 2 | Appendix 2 part 3 |