Welp, back to the drawing board.
Due to an incident involving one of the kids this morning, we devoted the first lesson today to a serious talk about racism. We also brought up other instances of hate speech and belittling words. It went pretty well, we thought.
Fast-forward to the last class of the day. One of the kids is missing, the other boys say that he's off crying in the changing room. Why is he crying in the changing room? They're vague, but apparently he was the definite villain of the piece, and called one of the boys "a racism" (what gave it a little extra spice was that the kid he called a racist is middle-eastern, while he himself is white). Okay. Seems weird, but I go in search of the errant boy while the gym teacher starts her lesson.
He's crying in the changing room, but after a while he's calmed down enough to give me his side of the story.
Apparently the middle-eastern boy (who was already in a strop due to an incident during wood-shop class) was talking about the gym teacher, using one of the words we'd brought up as unacceptable this morning. Remembering that we'd said that it's important to respect each other and not use that kind of language, this kid, who'd obviously interpreted "racism" as an umbrella term for anyone who says mean things, had called him a "racism." The other kid had then fired back and called *him* a "racism."
And that was what he was crying. He also said that he "would carry being called 'a racism' with him forever." Which, by the by, was a term I'd used this morning to describe how painful it can be to be called racist terms, or other belittling words.
To make a long story short, we'll be having another lesson devoted to racism tomorrow!
Fast-forward to the last class of the day. One of the kids is missing, the other boys say that he's off crying in the changing room. Why is he crying in the changing room? They're vague, but apparently he was the definite villain of the piece, and called one of the boys "a racism" (what gave it a little extra spice was that the kid he called a racist is middle-eastern, while he himself is white). Okay. Seems weird, but I go in search of the errant boy while the gym teacher starts her lesson.
He's crying in the changing room, but after a while he's calmed down enough to give me his side of the story.
Apparently the middle-eastern boy (who was already in a strop due to an incident during wood-shop class) was talking about the gym teacher, using one of the words we'd brought up as unacceptable this morning. Remembering that we'd said that it's important to respect each other and not use that kind of language, this kid, who'd obviously interpreted "racism" as an umbrella term for anyone who says mean things, had called him a "racism." The other kid had then fired back and called *him* a "racism."
And that was what he was crying. He also said that he "would carry being called 'a racism' with him forever." Which, by the by, was a term I'd used this morning to describe how painful it can be to be called racist terms, or other belittling words.
To make a long story short, we'll be having another lesson devoted to racism tomorrow!