Peaceful primary schools
Izzy Cartwright is inspired by some new educational initiatives
‘Today is about what’s possible,’ said Anna Lubelska, director of Spiritual England and organiser of the ‘Peaceful Primary Schools’ conference held recently at Friends House, London. The Small Meeting House was packed with about one hundred teachers and educationalists from throughout Britain and across Europe. The conference was a springboard for Spiritual England’s ‘Peaceful Schools’ campaign, which seeks to ‘bring some stillness and peace into children’s lives at a time when concerns about young people’s mental health are escalating, children are bombarded with information, advertising and under all sorts of pressure in our global and media-driven society’.
Damilola Taylor’s father stood up to witness an opening prayer in honour of his son. The effect was palpable. This theme matters. This conference matters.
It was only 9.45am and I was in tears. My mind was cast back to one of the young people I had worked with in Hackney. Jahmal was bright, popular, cheeky, a talented footballer and dead – stabbed in the neck. He was seventeen.
Values
My mind was brought back into the room by Neil Hawkes, former head teacher and exponent of ‘values-based education’. Images of children from all over the world rotated on a cube. This was no ordinary PowerPoint presentation. It came as no surprise to discover that Neil is an international consultant. He had done this before. Almost put off by the slickness – and a feeling that these images were a long way away from the world Jahmal had lived in – I could not help but be drawn in by Neil’s message. He was arguing for values to be more explicitly at the heart of our schools. Neil wasn’t suggesting which values schools must embrace (although he says that most people, the world over, come up with the same list). Rather, he was promoting an exploration of values that enable children to keep returning to the meaning of values such as trust, friendship and honesty, with increasing levels of analysis as they progress through school. Why? Because ‘children need to learn an ethical vocabulary, ethical intelligence – change your words, change your world’. Neil called for a fourth ‘R’ – Reflection. Teachers, he believes, must engage meaningfully with reflective practice and need to be supported in doing so through professional supervision. They need this in order to be able to model these values effectively. Having spent years in schools in East London witnessing the pressure teachers are under and little evidence of the fourth ‘R’, I couldn’t agree more.
When asked by Ofsted what competencies Neil looked for in the professionals he had employed as a head teacher he replied: ‘Oh I didn’t employ professionals. I employed people, and there is only one competency that matters… smiling eyes’. What I was hearing was a breath of fresh air. We learnt that the governments of Australian and New Zealand agree. They are investing heavily in moving their schools in this direction.
Beauty
Laura Daniels, head teacher at Woodheys Primary in Manchester, spoke next. She was equally inspirational. In order to address ‘nature deprivation’ and an ‘overdose of technology’ she has had a Zen peace garden established in the centre of her school. Four outdoor classrooms have been built. Children can walk the labyrinth to ‘regain balance’. They can go to the ‘rainbow room’ to meditate or receive holistic treatments such as massage and aromatherapy. A nature trail runs through the school because ‘children need to know the names of butterflies’. Laura believes passionately in children being surrounded by beauty. This is a state primary school. Amazing.
Relationships
Another theme at the conference was the need for restorative work in primary schools. Suzanne Lee, a former head teacher, explained that she is often asked how she can teach conflict resolution to primary children. She replies that children also can’t read when they arrive at school. Suzanne rejected the notion of a school ‘behaviour policy’ – likely to teach children how to perform, rather than how to behave. She called for a ‘relationships policy’ that, instead of relying on sanctions, helps children to develop an inner moral compass. When problems arise, rather than investigate, police style, all those involved need to be helped to understand the consequences of their actions. Children need to see who has been affected and to be supported to play a part in working out what can be done to repair the harm caused. This opens up the possibility of enabling everyone to move on.
A culture of peace
As the new mediation and peace education project manager at Quaker Peace & Social Witness (QPSW) I had been asked to run a workshop. Chris Nickolay, from Quaker Life, and I asked our participants to think about what a peaceful primary school might look and feel like. The group included Quakers, non-Quakers and four head teachers. We explored how you can create the conditions for a culture of peace. We talked about the need for children to feel special, heard and loved and to be given the opportunity to care for others and to feel solidarity. We discussed the need to work with children around difficult and painful issues like violence and war and we shared practical resources. We drew from Journeys in the Spirit and the materials available on landmines and the conflict in Israel/Palestine. We watched Where is the love? – a short film I had worked on with young people exploring the arms trade. The session generated heated debate.
It helped me realise that while many people at the conference were committed to making schools more peaceful places – such as through creating spaces for stillness and mediation – there was perhaps less agreement, and more unease, with the more political aspects of peace education. Yet surely to build a culture of peace we need to recognise and challenge structures of violence? For children and young people live within these structures, although some more than others. The Hackney that Jahmal lived in was full of these realities. Alongside the Tudor-cum-Jacobean style houses of De Beauvoir Town and independent coffee houses of Broadway Market, young people there, as in many parts of the country, live amongst the pressure of the imminent risk of violence. Quakers have historically born witness to uncomfortable truths and kept their eyes open to the many forms of violence around us. It feels to me, new into this role, that Quakers have a special role to play in this movement. The West Midlands Quaker Peace Education Project (WMQPEP) is already involved. I would love to hear from other Quakers who would like to be.
I felt truly moved by the conference. With teachers under so much pressure to deliver ‘results’ it was inspiring to see them there. The idea of ‘peaceful schools’ is possibly more attractive than the broader notion of ‘peace education’. But perhaps this angle is a way in, a starting point. One of the head teachers in our workshop, who was also an Ofsted inspector, invited us into her primary school to help teachers facilitate a ‘peace week’. It feels like this is a movement with momentum.
Izzy Cartwright is the mediation and peace education project manager, QPSW. Email: isabelc@quaker.org.uk
Further information:
• www.spiritualengland.org.uk
• www.values-education.com
To see ‘Where is the love? go to bit.ly/WITLove
You need to login to read subscriber-only content and/or comment on articles.