Wix and Wrabness Primary pupils focus on racial inequalities

The students at Wix and Wrabness Primary School enthused when it came to learning about topics unfamiliar to them.

The project was driven by the school’s Curious Education programme which helps to build the pupil’s cultural capital.

It began with adding a multi-cultural element into its Covid recovery curriculum, but quickly evolved due to the enthusiasm shown by the children.

They have now created a website which celebrates black heroes and heroines.

Kenny Brundle, who teaches years five and six at the school, explained the success of the project, which began in September last year.

Pupils (L-R) Aiden, Kipp and Lucas

He said: “Our deputy-headteacher had a multi-cultural element of the curriculum planned based on the George Floyd case last year.

“There had been a lot of talk that racial issues aren’t covered enough in schools, and we thought our intake isn’t very diverse at all, so we decided to look into how we can still discuss the issues.

“We went round the class and asked each child to write down famous artists, scientists, sports people etc. All the names they came up with were white males; there being all these people out there who we don’t really celebrate or even know about.

“So, in their English lessons, the children learnt about black heroes and then, as this went so well, it evolved into a website project to present all the stories they had uncovered.

The pupils have even tried their hand at Bollywood dancing

“I thought we can’t have anyone visit the school at the moment to check out the work, so let’s put it online and get it out there for people to see.

“The stories of people really started to hit home and they would ask if they could take a copy home to show their family, they were telling me they wouldn’t believe what had happened in the past.”

The project was helped by the Junior Ambassador Project, an initiative from Tendring Council.

It has seen Bollywood dancing, an African drummer and Chinese Calligraphy all brought into the school during taster days to show the children a variety of cultures.

The pupils designed their own web pages for the site

Sophie, a year five student, said: “I really enjoyed learning about Rosa Parks and Harriet Tubman because their stories are so important.

While Hugo added: "Creating the website was a really fun experience as it is a chance for us to get our writing out there, and I learnt such a lot from the whole project.

“No matter how different people look on the outside, we are all the same on the inside.”

You can visit the website at https://bit.ly/3e0ZmzH.