As one of our pupils astutely remarked, “Black history never stops!” Accordingly, celebrating Black History Month is just one small part of the year-round work we do to ensure equity for our pupils and create an anti-racist community.
Ruby Class launched the school year by learning all about their class’ namesake. The children engaged in mature, thoughtful discussion about this pioneer’s incredible courage and resilience, considering what we can all learn from her example. They then wrote school reports in role as Ruby’s teacher, herself an awesome ally, reflecting on this inspirational little girl’s extraordinary strength of character while consolidating their own understanding of different sentence types including statements and commands.
At COLPAI, we are committed to ensuring our library’s bookshelves are bursting with a range of texts that reflect our vibrant and diverse community. Here is one of our pupils delving into biographies of inspirational Black women.
Several members of staff were fortunate enough to join some Black History Month training run by Culture Mile Learning. Coming together with colleagues from across our family of schools, we have been doing some deep thinking. In the first session, we watched The $100 Race. We all agreed that this is an incredibly powerful way to explain the meaning and impact of privilege.
I am always in awe of people who are brilliant at the things I find difficult and I have always found Maths challenging. So, I have huge respect for all mathematicians and, in particular, for Katherine Johnson, who overcame barriers of gender and race to become a pioneer in the world of orbital mechanics. Katherine started work on the space programme before computers were used and did all her calculations in her head and on paper. Those complex calculations helped to launch the first moon landing by Apollo 11 and the Space Shuttle. Her story is one of resilience, persistence and pure brilliance. She is pictured here as a young mathematician and then in later life being presented with the Presidential Medal of Freedom by Barack Obama, the first African American president of the United States. Alongside all the Maths, she also did a degree in French, so she has my particular admiration!
My black music hero is Ms Nina Simone. Amongst others. I was very lucky many years ago to see her in concert. The stage was set, and she walked out and sat at her glorious grand piano. A few people in the audience were chatting. Even though she was clearly ready to start her performance, some people thought it was okay to continue to talk. She calmly put the lid of the piano down, walked to the front of the stage and stared out to the auditorium. “I will not start this performance until I have complete silence.“ The concert hall became very quiet very quickly. it was the first time I’ve been told off by a performer at the start of the concert. She then went to her piano and did one of the most memorable concerts I have attended. I think she was absolutely right to demand respect for her music and for herself. She put up with quite a lot of bad treatment in her life, but now is remembered as one of the most remarkable composers, singers and performers in history.
Ruby Class is proud to share its splendid artwork with the COLPAI community. Having talked about ‘wearing our crowns’ with pride and the diversity of Black identity, the Year Two children discovered the incredible work of brilliant British artist Chris Ofili. We pored over his exquisite, small-scale watercolour portraits of different women sporting splendid Afro hairstyles and colourful clothes, marvelling at each subject’s distinct style and beauty. Since his Untitled work is composed of thirty portraits, precisely the number of children in our class, we each chose one to replicate in pencil before diffusing the colour carefully with water. We hope we have done each sitter and the original artist justice with
our efforts.
In the second part of our training we considered various issues. One useful piece of film to watch was this;
The danger of a single story | Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie
The session left us with many questions. How can we ensure more than a single race story? How can we decolonise our classrooms? Who decides on the role models for the class, the children or the adults? How do we answer questions that we don’t immediately know the answers to? And how do we develop an atmosphere where we all know the tools for challenging racism?
Lemn Sissay is a poet, author and the chancellor of Manchester University who had a challenging upbringing in foster care. I used to live in Manchester and remember feeling very inspired by poems you can see painted around the city by Lemn. One of my favourite poems is Rain which you can see at the bottom of the curry mile (see photo below). Manchester is a very rainy city and this poem would always cheer me up on a rainy day and help me to see the world more positively. I recently read Lemn Sissay’s memoir My Name Is Why which is incredibly moving and beautifully written!
Despite incredible achievements and contributions to society, it is often the case that black British women are left out of the history books. Malorie Blackman is my inspirational black British author. She is someone we should all know about and celebrate.
Malorie Blackman began her career as a computer programmer and TV scriptwriter before being propelled into writing her first book. A lack of children’s stories featuring black characters inspired her to write. She has now written more than sixty books for children and teenagers. How many of her books have you read?
As an inclusive school, I want COLPAI children to know about and respect a wide range of different cultures. Malorie said, “We need more books that are specifically about the British black and minority ethnic experience and that’s why I bang the drum for more diversity and not having this idea that if a book has got pictures of a Black or Asian child then it’s going to have a limited market.”
The main focus of her two years as Children’s Laureate was to “get more children reading and to make reading irresistible in all its forms”. This too is my vision for COLPAI – every child a devoted reader.
We are so much more than a ‘month’. I could tell you about the amazing Black people of history that have laid the foundations of my rights. I could explain the life of poet and activist Maya Angelou. I could describe the beauty that was singer Mahalia Jackson who encouraged Dr Martin Luther King and his famous ‘I Have A Dream’ speech. I could describe the triumph and struggles of Seaman William Brown, the first Black female to serve in the British Navy. But I won’t. There are so many people alive today who are making an impact for Black women and men. I want to take the time to celebrate. In 1987, Diane Abbott made history by becoming the first black woman ever to be elected to Parliament. Her career in politics began in 1982, when she was elected to Westminster City Council, before being voted into the House of Commons five years later. It made her part of the first group of black and Asian people to sit in Parliament for almost a century. She also started the London Schools and the Black Child programme, which aims to help black children to do well in school. She still serves in Parliament to this day as one of the main politicians in the Labour Party.
‘I have a dream that my little children will one day live in a nation where they will not be judged by the color of their skin but by the content of their character.’
My black sporting hero is Jesse Owens, who became a sporting legend at the 1936 Berlin Olympic Games. Jesse Owens won four Olympic gold medals during the 1936 games (yes four!) which is an impressive feat on its own. However, more significantly he did so in the presence of Adolf Hitler, who had hoped that the Berlin games would support his beliefs of ‘master race superiority’. Instead Jesse Owens became a hero to the people of Berlin. The story of Jesse Owens has always inspired me to never let anyone’s thoughts or beliefs stop you from doing what you love and achieving what you dream of.
As part of our focus on Black History Month, in French, Malala Class looked at the life and work of Lilian Thuram, who played football for France an amazing 142 times. Celebrated for his agility and intelligent defending, he famously allowed a crucial goal in during a World Cup semi-final, much to the disappointment of his team-mates and millions of French fans. Rather than give up, he decided to rectify his mistake and went on to score two spectacular goals which carried the French team through to the final. France went on to win 3-0 against Brazil. It was the first time France had ever won the World Cup. What skill and strength of character!
Since retiring from football, he has put his energy and personal income into the ‘Lilian Thuram Foundation’ – Education against Racism. The cornerstone of his foundation is –
“We are not born racist, we become racist.”
The children explored articulately and intelligently how racist attitudes might arise and how Thuram’s work in primary schools is important in educating young children.
find it really difficult to choose just one person. I am inspired by Beyonce for her music and being an inspiration to young women. I avidly listen to Michelle Obama’s podcasts and absorb her honesty, strength and relentless resilience. I cried when I first heard the rapper Dave perform, and was struck by his talent and bravery. I love listening to the Brown Sugar young women for their fun and insightful opinions on some very current issues.
A hero of mine is my Grandad. My family are from Mauritius. They began life in Tamil Nadu but were taken to Mauritius to labour on the sugar cane plantations. The days were very long and many people were treated unfairly. I remember by grandad telling me about a time that he was walking to the Temple on his one day off. He was dressed smartly. The person in charge of the sugar cane plantation where he worked saw him and told him to go to work. He told him to cut the cane and load it ready to be taken away. My Grandfather only had one set of smart clothes and they were ruined. He also felt humiliated and his family had to go back home. None of them went to the Temple that day.
My Grandparents decided that life would be different for their children. They worked really hard so that they had enough money for their children to go to University or in the case of my dad, come to England to train to be a nurse. Both of my parents were nurses in the NHS until they retired, over forty years! They have lots of Mauritian friends, and when I was little we would go to lots of parties where they played Sega music, a type of music that came about during slavery.
My Grandfather’s determination and vision has meant that his children and grandchildren have had very different lives and opportunities. I feel very lucky to have had him in my life.
The children in Year Three learned all about performance poetry through John Agard’s Windrush Child poem. They read out the poem in pairs and performed to the class, using lots of expression, gesture and movement. For the rest of the week, they studied Agard’s use of personification and wrote their own poems using Windrush Child as their inspiration. In these photos, the children are seen rehearsing their performance of the poem.
One small step for Ruby Class, one giant leap for COLPAI! Year Two blasted off into a lesson exploring the life of the astronaut Mae Jemison. On our small-steps sheet, we recorded how Mae Jemison inspired us by her actions in pursuing her dream to go to space and how she never stopped believing she could make it. Our next step was to choose the rocket fuel we would need to follow our own dreams, like the courage, resilience, passion and belief that Mae showed us. Getting into Mae’s character by wearing the astronaut helmet motivated us to consider what we might like to achieve when we’re older. We realised we have to say thank you to Mae Jemison for helping each of us to feel ready for our own journey.
COLPAI staff attended the final session of Black History Month training with Culture Mile London. We were inspired to think about how we can decolonise our classrooms and curriculum in a long term and meaningful way. We wrote poetry and discussed photography; music; and the activism of collage! Just looking carefully at the images in the tears of this woman gave us so many ideas…
We gathered as a school for a special assembly about Remembrance Day. We thought about Walter Tull, who was a professional footballer before he became a Sergeant and then Officer in World War 1. We then took some time to think about all who gave their lives so that we could live in peace.
