Training
You will find materials here for inservice sessions and continuing professional development.
At the consultative conferences organised during the creation of this area of TeacherNet it was observed and emphasised that staff training in relation to racist bullying is both particularly important and distinctively difficult. For it deals with issues on which staff may have a wide range of views and on which there is an even wider and more obvious range of views in society at large. Stress arises not only because the subject matter is controversial but also because staff may have to come to terms with their own prejudices, and may have to change or modify deeply-held views of themselves and their professional responsibilities, and of national story and history.
'Typically,' said someone at one of the conferences, 'we think about training in terms of skills, knowledge and understanding. But whenever there's training which involves the element of race, it has to be more than that. It has to engage hearts and minds, it has to force us to contemplate our humanity. It's got to be more than facts, figures, skills and pedagogy, it's actually got to make us think about love and care and concern and kindness.'
The same speaker continued: 'We have to acknowledge the guilt that some of our white colleagues feel and the resentment and anger of some of our black colleagues and we've got to come to a position collectively, where we agree that guilt and blame have no place at the dining table of shared responsibility.'
With these crucial points in mind, the following areas are discussed here:
Discussing scenarios — stories and situations about what to do
Notes on scenarios — points that are likely to arise
Sorting views and voices — quotations from 100 years of history
Clarifying terms and concepts — concerns around political correctness
Minding language — words and their meanings
Download a Word version of this section.
Published: 25 October 2006
