Promoting diversity within geography

The Geographical Association (GA)’s Strategic Plan for 2020-2025 includes three aims and objectives, one of which focuses on ‘creating a more inclusive and sustainable geography education community’ and ‘promoting greater diversity in geography education and the Association’ (https://www.geography.org.uk/Journals/GA-Magazine).  In the same magazine, Alan Kinder, Chief Executive, and Susan Pike, the current President, write about ‘From compassion to action, through geography education’ in the section entitled ‘Policy matters’.

The latest edition of Teaching Geography has a thought-provoking and informative article written by Charlotte Milner about ‘classroom strategies for tackling the whiteness of geography’ (https://www.geography.org.uk/Journals/Teaching-geography).

This quarter’s Primary Geography journal also mentioned diversity; take a look at ‘Fundamental British Values: Geography’s contribution to understanding difference’ by Fatima Pirbhai-Illich and Fran Martin and ‘Democracy in the classroom’ by Lily Smith (https://www.geography.org.uk/Journals/Primary-Geography).

Further insight into British Values and geography can be gleaned by visiting the following pages of the GA’s website: https://www.geography.org.uk/teaching-resources/british-values-geography.

GeogPod, the GA’s podcast, is often more relevant to secondary teachers and above.  However, episodes 12 and 13 may well be worth listening to as they discuss the issues around diversity within geography and defining and decolonising the subject (https://www.geography.org.uk/GeogPod-The-GAs-Podcast).

A useful resource for Key Stage 2 teachers is ‘The UK: Investigating who we are’, part of the Geography Plus series (https://www.geography.org.uk/Shop/Geography-Plus-The-UK-Investigating-who-we-are/9781843772712).

In their ‘Critical thinking in practice’ guide, there is an activity called ‘Odd one out’, which helps to identify communality and reflect on difference (https://www.geography.org.uk/Critical-thinking-in-the-classroom).  I explained this in more detail, before exemplifying how it had been employed successfully within a primary classroom.  Other approaches highlighted within this guide were utilised during a recent multi-schools event, which took 248 children and 20 staff from five schools across the Gloucestershire/South Gloucestershire/Bristol area on a ‘scintillating South American adventure’ (https://create2inspire.co.uk/2020/10/15/lets-go-on-a-scintillating-south-american-adventure/).  Whilst the day explored the tropical rainforest ecosystem, deforestation and climate change, attention was also given to the indigenous people and their culture, beliefs and way of life; an effective means of highlighting how diverse our planet is.  Teachers were in awe of what had been achieved within a single day and many expressed an interest in being involved in the next multi-schools event.

In addition, to mark Black History Month, the Royal Geographical Society (RGS) have shared stories of black geographers from the 1800s to the present day, who have contributed to a better understanding of the world (https://www.rgs.org/geography/black-geographers/).  There is also an opportunity to listen to the lively conversation between Francisca Rockey, Founder and Activist, and Louis Smith Lassey, External Staff Officer, from the group, Black Geographers (https://www.rgs.org/schools/teaching-resources/a-conversation-with-francisca-rockey-and-louis-smi).

Beyond the leading subject associations, I have discovered numerous new websites and FREE resources to promote diversity over the past few weeks.

A must read in conjunction with a focus on migration is ‘The Boy at the Back of the Class’ by Onjali Rauf; Teachwire magazine has a double-page spread on how this modern classic can be used to promote empathy and compassion in the classroom (https://www.teachwire.net/assets/flippingbook/Teach-Reading–Writing/).

If you are studying ‘space’ and are keen to incorporate some Black History into your topic work, then why not contemplate ‘Look Up!’ by Nathan Byron and Teachwire’s accompanying PDF with a range of activities (https://www.amazon.co.uk/Look-Up-Nathan-Bryon/dp/0241345847/ and https://www.teachwire.net/teaching-resources/books-for-topics-ks1-2-learn-about-black-history-and-astronaut-mae-jemison-with-look-up)?

The Centre for Literacy in Primary Education (CLPE) has just published their third ‘Reflecting Realities’ report, which looks at diversity in children’s literature (https://clpe.org.uk/publications-and-bookpacks/reflecting-realities).  Rather shockingly, only 7% of the children’s books published in the UK over the last 3 years (2017, 2018, 2019) feature characters from a Black, Asian or minority ethnic background.  Whilst there has been some positive progress over the past three years (2017-2019), there still remains a long way to go before representation in children’s books and publishing mirrors UK society.   As teachers, we should be conscious of this and do all we can to address the issue.  Their website also contains a brilliant blog post by Farrah Serroukh, entitled ‘Beyond Black History Month – Integrating the study of black historical figures into the mainstream primary curriculum through literature’ (https://clpe.org.uk/blog/2020/beyond-black-history-month-integrating-study-black-historical-figures-mainstream-primary).

Jamia Wilson’s ‘Big ideas for Young Thinkers’ teaches children to train their busy minds and think outside the box (https://www.amazon.co.uk/gp/product/0711249202).  It has a couple of chapters whose questions link closely with diversity, in addition to highlighting the diverse range of thinkers that exist.