Racism and discrimination in primary schools and the need for ongoing professional development of ed

Australia recognizes the acceptance of a pluralistic society and the importance of addressing racism and discrimination in education. Incidents of racism can have a negative impact on students' well-being and mental health, affecting their behavior and relationships. Strategies such as teaching social skills and diversity, incorporating multiculturalism into the curriculum, and providing professional development for educators can help create a positive classroom culture and address these issues. It is important to facilitate learning and understanding rather than confront the instigators of racism. Ongoing efforts are needed to respond to the increasing cultural diversity in classrooms and promote inclusivity. It has been argued that on the basis of conservative Australia's beliefs, the pre-trial rate of non-Australian Australians is much higher than that of Australian Australians. On this day I was asked to indicate that rates of 70% of Australian Australians were lower than those of 70% of non-Australian Australians. I have witnessed this for years, but I think it is essential that we act as a system in which the rate of non-Australian Australians is much higher than that of Australian Australians. 50% of non-Australian Australians are culturally and racially balanced. Increase my rate of non-Australian Australians. Every day one in five schools use the technology. One in five, 70% of non-Australian Australians speak a language other than English. And one in four people are all non-Australian Australians. All together now, in 2014, found one in five students were also non-Australian Australians. Primary school teachers reported 26% more experience of racism than high school students. In 2017, Speak Out Against Racism, the board, found 31% experienced racial discrimination by their peers. Today we will discuss with Hannah, a primary school teacher. Her experience reported 18% of her class were 32% of racially disabled than high school students. Thanks for chatting with me today. Can you tell me a bit about your experience of race in your classroom? Certainly. I have taught both primary and high school, and I would agree with that statement made earlier that there are higher rates in primary schools. And in my experience, it has a lot to do with the rates of racism. Well, that's really interesting. That's a good way to look at it. And I think because it's built around ignorance that, as an educator, I find it quite easy to address and to say to the children, you know, we're all so different in our beliefs and our understandings and our likes and our dislikes. And when we look at it holistically like that, you can have quite safe conversations without instilling prejudice on your students. Oh, thank you for that insight. Do you think these incidents are having an ongoing effect on students' educational outcomes in the classroom? Well, interestingly, in this last year, I actually taught a student from the Sikh religion in, you know, in a city school, really. And it was really sad to see that at times students would make fun of their cultural headpiece and just their cultural understandings around communication. And I think at the end of the day, though, it opened up for discussion around accepting differences and learning about different cultures. But yeah, sadly, I think it did affect this child at times from one particular student bullying of him. And the consequence was that he missed days of school and at the end of the day or during times of tiredness was physically upset, which was really hard to navigate at times. Do you think teachers and educators are provided with the opportunities to develop the skills acquired to effectively manage these types of incidents in the classroom? I think previously, possibly not, but I see a really good opportunity for us to address multiculturalism as we develop a curriculum more richly around First Nation understandings and just letting people know that you don't make blanket comments about groups of people and that there's diversity and richness and culture and that this isn't something to be afraid of, but more to learn about and share stories and culture. So you really believe that we can make this an advantage for us within the curriculum to make it a better way to manage and facilitate diverse educational environments? Certainly. I think there's so many resources available now with the internet, with many First Nation stories coming out to share with students. These are great opportunities for us to explore these issues across multiple cultures and the world as a whole. Do you think that'll make a difference for society? I think it will. I think what I touched on earlier around the main issue being ignorance due to fear from lack of exposure and understanding and not wanting to look silly, not knowing something. I think hopefully over time this will become less of a case and already we're making appropriate steps by having multiculturalism in children's books and also on television and in programs. Fantastic. Thank you for your insights there. How do you think we can do it? I think just always making sure that we're being kind whenever something pops up. Not shaming the student who may be expressing the racism. I think that's never a way for someone to grow or to learn. So making sure that we're being open with them and also just trying to instill empathy. Ask them how they might feel or instill a sense of pride at being able to move countries or places or have a shared story. Thank you, Hannah. That's great. I'm going to leave it there. Thank you for joining me today on my podcast. Thanks, Gabby. Great issue. Australia had signed the UN International Convention on the Elimination of All Forms of Racial Discrimination in 1966. And it's recognised that Australia's policies and ongoing national development includes the acceptance of a pluralistic society and ongoing changes to the make-up of our national identity. This is a part of the policies and this includes education, reform and curriculum development. Children's understandings of themselves occur from explicit and implicit social processes and interactions with adults, peers, teachers, caregivers and other members of their community and society. As you heard in Hannah's interview, incidents of racism do occur within classrooms. And it's acknowledged that incidents of racism and discrimination or bullying can influence students' well-being and mental health. The student's mental health is influenced by their social and emotional well-being, learners with positive well-being are likely to engage in expected behaviour and develop positive relationships. Students who experience racism and discrimination are likely to develop negative well-being, affecting their behaviour, attitudes and relationships with others. This can lead to anxiety and mental health issues that have an overall effect on the student's motivation to learn, their attendance at school and engagement in learning outcomes. Ongoing strategies in the classroom to tackle discrimination and racism through teaching social skills and diversity can potentially develop positive classroom culture and behaviours. As Hannah mentioned in the discussion and interview, it is important not to challenge the instigator but to facilitate learning that will benefit the whole classroom of understanding and difference and diversity, building positive culture. This is culturally responsive teaching. Identifying multiculturalism and with the Australian curriculum incorporating learning linked to a variety of history, culture, experiences and perspectives of minority groups to introduce new ideas of acceptance and understanding of difference and breaking down cultural stereotypes. It can be argued that teaching diverse students will require a number of teaching strategies to accommodate for the individual differences in the classroom for all students to benefit and to break down stereotypes. Research statistics and evidence of racism and discrimination in the classroom indicates educators need to learn new ways to respond to changing cultural diversity and they need to do this by engaging and understanding culturally effective pedagogies. Going into the future, it has been suggested that there is a need for further professional development for educators, administrators and leaders so they can appropriately respond to increasingly diverse classrooms and tackle issues such as racism and discrimination in a way that socially and educationally benefits all students and learners. As Hannah discussed in her interview, basically she believes that some teachers do need to have further professional development and also learn other skills and understand ideas such as empathy and understanding the differences in all of their individual students to be able to be effective at reducing incidents of racism and discrimination in the classroom. That's my podcast today. Sorry it's been a bit all over the place and I've really struggled with figuring out how to edit and cut and stuff things. I've tried to raise a few issues and things and hopefully in the future I'll learn how to podcast a lot better and find apps that won't be so difficult to use. Alright, thanks for listening everyone out there. Bye.