Gender Respect Pupil Conference 2 – 17th June 2016

The pupils were all very excited to meet back together for a second pupil conference to share what they had been doing in school. There were two primary and two secondary schools represented. As a warm up and ice breaker that would introduce ideas around consent that were suitable for the primary school pupils, Chella chose a simplifed version of the handshake activity by Justin Hancock of Bish Training, which can be found in the Consent Issue of The Sex Educational Sex Education Forum’s e-magazine. The use of a handshake as a metaphor for the basics around negotiating good consent was helpful for pupils and staff, and some fun and complicated handshake/fistbump/wave routines were created and shared, all in the space of a few minutes! The activity was followed by a discussion about which greeting felt more comfortable and how we can give our consent as to whether or not we wish to shake hands with someone. Chella linked this to stroking pets and how we can tell when a cat doesn’t want to be stroked.

The pupils then shared some of the activities they had been doing in school. We were very impressed with the creativity of the pupils and we enjoyed listening to the songs they had created and a video of a boys’ dance competition.

These were the pupils who organised a boys’ dance competition and made up a rap.

They did an assembly and inspired other pupils to get involved. This is a poster that someone made. When the school were asked if they would like to have an annual boys’ dance competition and how many would enter, they were overwhelmed by the positive response.

We had a great song all about respecting one another. Below is the song and the lyrics:

You respect me,

I respect you,

Respecting each other is so cool when your with your best friends even people you don’t know.

This is what we all expect you’ve got to learn to show respect or you might end up sad and all alone.

So lets come together, stand together, play and work and rest together.

Nice with each other now and forever yeah, ohhh yeah.

Cause we can be who we were born to be, living and working in harmony.

Respecting each other, protecting each other.

We come together, stand together.

Boys and girls forever together as friends.

Gender Respect!!!!

 

These pupils are part of a debating club. They created and performed a song about gender respect.

These are the words of their song:

Sometimes I wonder,

If there was no gender,

What would the world be like.

No sexism,

No bullying,

Free to do whatever I want.

All I wish there was, was equality because

I’m not a girl,

I’m not a boy,

I’m just a person in the world.

I’m not strong like a man,

I don’t throw like a girl,

I can cry! I can shout! I can scream!

I just want to be free to be me.

I’m not a girl,

I’m not a boy,

I’m just a person in the world.

Sick of all these labels.

I’m not a girl,

I’m not a boy,

I’m just a person in the world.

Pupil Conference 2 – The Workshops

The Secondary Workshop

The workshops planned in the second part of the day were linked to needs pupils had expressed around the most important idea they wanted to address with their classmates. For the secondary pupils these focused on two key issues: identifying and challenging verbal and physical harassment, and sharing good etiquette that would support inclusion of trans and non-binary classmates.

Chella and Becky used teacher in role and forum theatre techniques to bring up the issue of gender pronoun etiquette, this time using a different metaphor. But first, Chella asked everyone to think about whether someone had ever offended them and then spent so long apologising that they made it all about them, and didn’t really even think about or learn from their own mistake. There were several nods of recognition. Pupils identified the feelings around this as guilt, embarrassment, shame, fear of looking ignorant in front of their friends. She then asked if anyone had been afraid to get things wrong or over-reacted after making a mistake – more nods of recognition.

They talked about asking for someone’s pronouns  – their classmates at school who identify as non-binary or genderfluid have said they prefer to use the word ‘they’ instead of ‘he’ or ‘she’. We had a pupil time us having a quick exchange about it, and it took 12 seconds. We gave pupils a generous 15 seconds to have the same chat in pairs, and then again, swapping pairs to try it with someone else.

Then Chella changed the subject completely for our role play and asked them to imagine they were horses. She was given dubious looks:

Chella: Hi! Let’s all welcome our new friend Debra!

Becky: Actually my name isn’t Debra. It’s Zebra. I’m a zebra.

And then Chella went into paroxysms of guilt and melodramatic apologies all about getting it wrong for what felt like ages, until Zebra walked away to get a cup of tea.

 

They asked the group to change the scene and make it better for Zebra. Again, they only had 12 seconds.

They shared some of their scenes with us.

 

This was one version:

Chella: Hi! Let’s all welcome our new friend Debra!

Becky: Actually my name isn’t Debra. It’s Zebra. I’m a zebra.

Chella: Oh! I’m sorry – how rude of me. Everybody, this is Zebra!

 

They asked why it was important to take the focus off yourself and make a quick apology, and the pupils discussed that feeling like you were left out or in the minority was frustrating enough – to be ignored once and have someone correct their mistake and learn from it was helpful, but to be ignored twice while the person went into a whole giant insincere apology and then made the same mistake next time was disrespectful. The pupils talked about the intersection of race and gender and we also briefly talked about microaggressions, where a series of seemingly small instances of disrespectful treatment could add up throughout the school day and have a big impact on someone overall.

Carol and Boo took it from here, linking straight into a mind map session around types of harassment based on gender, gender identity and sexuality. Pupils discussed words heard around school and types of verbal and physical harassment witnessed or experienced, based on a survey that a group of the Gender Respect teacher researchers had given out earlier in the term. Name calling and gender-loaded words were queried, as were certain types of touching and contact, linking back to the consent starter activity and taking it further.

The activity ended with the group planning freeze frames and captions for image theatre, and coming up with some comebacks that could be safe and assertive responses to unwanted behaviour at school.

The session led straight into a quick-fire response round. Everyone was energised and ready to take on the world of Gender Respect, and we wanted to harness that!

How to get these ideas out quickly and creatively, using the pupils’ own ideas for text and artwork?

In the planning session last month, some of the teacher researchers reported that their pupils felt anxious about coming to the end of the school year and not having disseminated what they’d learned yet – that big plans were hard to achieve in one lunchtime a week, or when assemblies were quite busy already.

Chella thought about the project’s activism roots and then realised that the tools of art activism – murals and zines, could spread the word quickly. Murals could double as assembly presentation slides and adverts for schools with flat screens in public areas.  Zines (also called fanzines) are tiny home-made magazines or booklets on any topic you like. They can be any size, but the simplest ones to make are 1-page mini zines. Here’s a good tutorial. Chella calls mini-zines ‘Paper Buzzfeed Listicles’ and bigger zines ‘paper Tumblr’ – they’re analogue social media, and they’re fun.

First Becky and Chella asked the pupils to choose their favourite topic they’d explored that day, and write top five things they wanted their classmates to know, then three reasons it was important to them, and come up with a doodle or emoji that would convey this issue. Becky showed her example using the Debra Zebra story to explain how to ask for pronouns and apologise for mistakes. This formed the six pages of the zine and the covers, and we got folding and cutting our zine templates while Boo, Caz, and Helen passed out snacks and juice for a working break – these kids were on a roll! They were so energised and empowered, and their work was really impressive – even over such a short amount of time! There were some good metaphors – one pupil used a conversation between a cartoon potato and a peeler to talk about consent, and another drew one of her favourite fairy tales, Rapunzel, but with a reclaimed ending. The group decided to call their zine collection, which they will complete, share and develop into presentations and murals, the SAGA Saga, after one pupil’s discovery of the phrase Sexuality and Gender Alliance in their online readings about equality, and after the Norse word for story.

 

The session concluded with Chella inviting pupils to begin a round of powerful final thoughts from each pupil, secondary teacher and volunteer sharing something starting with either ‘I hope…’, ‘I enjoyed…’ or ‘I feel…’  – and we had some lovely thoughts all the way back to the start of the project, and excitement about the ways pupils felt empowered to carry on the project’s aims now and in future. It was a fantastic afternoon, and we are looking forward to how their work carries on back at their schools!

 

The Primary Workshop

In the primary workshop we gave the pupils gender-based scenarios that we felt they might come across at school:

• You are working in a group with 2 girls and 2 boys. The boys keep taking the lead, making the decisions and dominating the conversation. What do you do?

• You are a girl and you enjoy playing games and creating a PowerPoint on the computer. One lunchtime, you are working on something and a boy comes over and takes over from you, saying he is just showing you how to do it. What do you do?

• You are a boy and your friend has just hit you on the arm and told you you’re no good at running. You begin to cry. Another friend comes over. What happens next?

We asked the pupils to create a drama showing the scenario and what they would do next. We had a really interesting discussion about their experiences of these situations and what they did.

Using the scenarios and discussions as stimuli, we asked the pupils to come up with a philosophical question. These were some of the questions generated:

• Why is blue seen as a boys’ colour and pink seen as a girls’ colour?
• Are boys and girls allowed to express their feelings equally?
• Why is it sometimes difficult for boys and girls to be friends?
• Do boys talk louder to make themselves heard?
• Why do people sometimes get teased for doing things that the other gender does?

The question they choose was: ‘Why is it sometimes difficult for boys and girls to be friends?’ The pupils said that sometimes they were teased for playing with someone of the opposite gender and people would say that they had a crush on them. They felt that it was unfair and that everyone should be able to play with who they wanted to, regardless of gender. They thought they would be more aware of it in school and would challenge people if they heard teasing.

Our second part of the workshop was to think about the role of the pupils next year as Gender Respect Ambassadors. We came up with a job description:

1. To challenge gender inequality.
2. To mediate arguments relating to gender.
3. To run workshops to help people understand about gender respect.
4. To create materials to raise awareness – posters, songs, PowerPoints.

Our Vision:

• We will challenge others if we feel they are being disrespectful.
• All genders will be playing happily with one another.
• We will have equal participation.
• We will listen respectfully to each other.
• We will ensure our environment and materials reflect gender respect.

Teacher Blog: Carol

Debate Club

Week 4

The students have been exploring gender issues that they think exist at school:

They then generated some ideas that they could do to challenge these issues:

This week they held a boys cake sale for Sport Relief:

 

Gender Respect – Youth Effect: Friday 4th March 2016

Our national conference ‘Gender Respect – Youth Effect’ was a great opportunity to network with liked minded, passionate people who work with young people to give them a voice and help them to understand their right to respect, regardless of gender. The wealth of experience and the variety of professionals present enabled thought-provoking and stimulating discussions.

The day commenced with the inspirational and passionate feminist writer, Laura Bates. She is author of ‘Everyday Sexism’ and founder of ‘the everyday sexism project.’ The project promotes gender equality and is a place for people to record stories of sexism that occur on a daily basis. Laura spoke about how people can be complacent, and just accept that this is the way things are. She goes into schools and delivers talks to encourage people to speak out when they have been treated unfairly. Laura’s talk was shocking at times and contained statistics that were depressing, but she ended on a positive note, talking about how things are changing and people are feeling more able to speak out against inequality.

Feedback from participants was very positive. Project teacher Stephen said ‘I was pleased to part of the day that could potentially change the lives of so many that face inequality. Similar to Laura I would like people to challenge inappropriate actions and comments that are so offensive and hurtful to other people. It needs to start with the young and it was good to see a workshop on Early Years Education. While disappointed that very few men attended the morning session, it was pleasing to hear the message that men are important to addressing change and that they should see themselves as people who can reach out to other men who are responsible for unacceptable behaviour.’

The day continued with an overview of the Gender Respect project and the scoping study, followed by a choice of 4 workshops:

1.   Sexual Harassment and Masculinities – Interactive & practical ideas – how to facilitate discussions about these issues, encourage empathy, and enable safe, appropriate interventions.
2. Challenging gender stereotypes – Practical ideas for lessons which develop critical and creative thinking and enable primary-aged pupils to make real choices in areas such as sport and careers.
3.  ‘Doing Gender’ – How young children develop ‘masculinities’ and ‘femininities’ and how we can provide an EYFS environment that promotes gender equality. This workshop will give participants an opportunity to discuss the theory around how children develop gender identities and reflect on practical approaches across the EYFS curriculum.
4. Period Positive Schools – A fun, informative and interactive workshop sharing results results and resources from Chella’s research on how to include all ages and genders in menstruation education.

These workshops were well received by all and involved lots of thought-provoking discussions.

In the afternoon, Jo Sharpen, children and Young People’s Project Coordinator spoke about the Chilypep project ‘Against Violence and Abuse (AVA).’ This project works with young people who have been affected by domestic abuse. It was interesting to hear about how professionals can work with children and young people through an empowerment and participation model to shape services and provision. It was inspirational to hear from some of the young people involved in the project. Project teacher Stephen said ‘It was good to hear how the project in the afternoon had empowered so many once victims to be strong leaders of change.’

Participants chose from 3 workshops for the afternoon:

1. Where do we go from here? – An opportunity to explore the YWAVE research findings and develop ideas and pledges from services/professionals/communities. A discussion around the legacy of the AVA project in Sheffield.
2.  In My Shoes –  Interactive session exploring young people’s experiences and perspectives when engaging with multiple services and professionals in relation to domestic abuse.
3. Participation and Empowerment – A look at models for working with young people. Opportunity to critically think about our practice with young people, examine the benefits and learn new strategies that can be incorporated into our work.

The day was a great opportunity for networking, encouraging one another and learning about the work of different organisations. Project teacher Stephen said ‘I would like the day to be seen as a growing platform of change across society and especially education. We need men and women to work together to address inequalities on all genders. We need to measure the success e.g. by more men working in early education, nursing, caring professions, politics and other STEM professions. We also need to measure a significant difference in the number of violent and abusive crimes against people within our communities.’

How did people describe the conference?

Teacher Blog: Stephen

Gender Respect Pupil Conference: What happened next

The four school council members who attended the pupil conference were buzzing on the train home to Barnsley. I wasn’t sure if this was just a feel good factor or a sustained desire to bring about a change.

You can see what they planned to do on this film from the pupil conference:

By Thursday of the following week, they were knocking on the nursery door with a list that they had already completed. They explained they had started a presentation, made a poster for around school, were working on leaflets and now needed our Headteacher to allocate a whole school assembly.

Our Headteacher was delighted and taken aback by their passion. He quickly provided a date for an assembly for them to work towards. Dearne FM, the local radio station, were at school the next day spreading the news about how eager the children were to address Gender Respect.

Today they were very professional, confident and worked clearly in a team to share the message to the rest of school. I’m delighted that the ‘pupil voice’ is now discussing more than dressing up days and fundraising and that children are supporting their own community by voicing their feelings and desires.

It was interesting that after numerous days working together, the boys didn’t show for one of the lunchtime sessions. The girls said that the boys had needed a day to play out and that they had let them. The boys in effect had left the girls to write and design so they could play out. However, the boys still wanted a say when it came to decision making.

It generated a discussion and I reminded them that we are all in it together with a shared responsibility. You cannot opt out and yet still want a say. They understood the message and recognised that sacrificing playing out is part of teamwork. They agreed that after the assembly they would meet one lunchtime a week.

They still have the passion for Gender Respect and I’m looking forward to seeing the impact across the school.

Teacher Blog: Stephen

 A safe place to show my socks

One of the boys who comes from a family with a history of aggressive behaviour is enjoying the carpet area. He has four pairs of socks on brought from home. He takes them off one by one. The staff are curious by the third layer. He then reveals the final pair. Pink and white. I ask him his favourite colour. With a smile and with pride he shouts ‘It’s pink.’

How pleasing that nursery is a safe environment where he can be himself. How sad that he conceals the socks prior to nursery.

Proof that we need to support boys who feel that they can’t be themselves.

Gender Respect Pupil Conference: Friday 19th February

We were delighted to welcome 2 primary and 2 secondary schools to our Gender Respect Pupil Conference. The day started with introductions and some drama games. The first involved walking around the room ignoring one another, showing no respect to anyone. Gradually, the pupils were encouraged to show more and more respect to one another, ending in high fives and friendly hellos. The other game they enjoyed was acting out different careers, sports and household chores. One person stood in the centre e.g. doing the ironing, and someone asked them what they were doing, They responded by choosing a different action e.g. I’m washing the car. The pupils were very engaged in this activity and were especially keen on greyhound racing!

After the warm up, we split into primary and secondary workshops. Both workshops looked at these questions:

What is gender equality?

What can we do in our schools?

We came back together at the end of the day to share our thoughts and ideas. We were overwhelmed by the passion and enthusiasm these young people had and we’re really looking forward to hearing about how their projects are going.

 

Gender Respect Pupil Conference: Secondary Workshop

In the secondary workshop pupils divided into two groups and drew life-size outlines of a male and a female. To begin with, they were asked to focus on the appearance of a ‘typical’ boy or girl, with clothes and accessories. After being asked to think about what a girl or boy might say, the ‘typical’ gender jobs and what a ‘typical’ boy or girl might think, the pupils began to think deeply about how these stereotypes might affect the way someone views themselves.

To enable them to think about the effects of stereotypes more specifically, they were asked to fill in a three-way table, thinking about how stereotypes affect a persons sense of self, a persons relationships and job prospects. A theme that was prominent in both group discussions was the idea of someone not being able to be who they truly are due to pressures from society;

‘They have to conform to society.’

‘Comparing yourself to friends.‘

‘You are always under pressure to maintain an appearance.’

‘Feel like they are putting on an act.’

‘Acting cocky to get noticed.’

They were then showed a video called ‘The Man Box’, which included quite a disturbing story, to which all the children watched in a very mature and respectful way. The children were asked to write down what the video made them think and feel, which included words such as disgusted, shocked, frustrated and angry.

From all the things that had been discussed throughout the day, the pupils were asked to reflect on gender respect problems within their schools and how to tackle them. One group in particular wanted sexism to be treated equally to racism within schools and the rest of society.

The children impressed me with their enthusiasm and passion for gender respect, as well as treating sensitive issues with maturity and regard. It was clear that this was an issue they really cared about and want to help tackle. The students said that they really enjoyed meeting other schools and learning from one another.

Gender Respect Pupil Conference: Primary Workshop

In the primary workshop, the pupils were shown a series of images and phrases showing stereotypical and non-stereotypical images of jobs, emotions and sports. They were asked to choose one that they felt interested in. We had some great discussions about women in the army, boys dancing, men and women playing football and boys crying. The phrase ‘You throw like a girl!’ proved to be an interesting one too, with one boy pointing out that this was a compliment as girls throw very well!

We then did a continuum line with ‘agree’ and ‘disagree’ for the following statements:

‘Boys are embarrassed to do dance.’

‘Boys are all good at DIY.’

 

There was an interesting gender split with the dance, with the boys saying that they would not be embarrassed to do dance. The general feeling about DIY was that some boys are good at DIY but some certainly are not!

 

Next we thought about what was good about being a boy/girl/either. Here are some of their thoughts:

Girls: dance, being smart, people don’t judge you when you cry, you can wear trousers and skirts.

Boys: Straightforward, self-confident, being smart, dance, nerd, exercise, maths.

Either: long and short hair, ability to do sport, sensible, make up.

 

We discussed the pressures and difficulties of being a boy/girl and wrote them on post it notes around an outline of a body. These included;

 

‘Boys get teased for dancing.’

‘It’s harder for girls to do football because they’re not as good as boys.’

‘Girls should get the right amount of money for doing the same job.’

‘Some boys think that they’re superior to everyone else.’

‘Boys find it hard to cry in front of other people.’

‘In other countries, boys go to school and girls have to stay at home and work.’

They then ranked these pressures from most to least important, using a diamond 9 shape.

Using these ideas, the pupils worked with their schools to create an action plan of something that they felt needed addressing in school. 2 groups wished to create a play to act out in assembly, looking at respect for one another and challenging teasing. The 3^rd group wished to organise a dance competition to encourage more boys to have a go at dance. We look forward to hearing about the success of their ideas.

Comments from the teachers:

‘The day was a great opportunity for children to meet others from different schools and outside the authority of Sheffield. They didn’t know each other and yet soon started to share their ideas. The performances/ presentations were meaningful and pupil led. Our school council members have also chosen to be ambassadors and wish to champion respect for the school. They want to address attitudes they see towards female dinner staff from children and also encourage other pupils to challenge controlling behaviour when a child is told by another child they can’t join in because of gender, race or age. They want to start with an assembly and posters and will meet weekly. It was interesting that they choose an area in which staff at school have previously discussed but haven’t had an opportunity to raise with the children. I feel that they can have a real impact with this work.’

Stephen

 

‘I found the day really exciting as the children were so interested and had such good ideas. It gave me lots of hope for good things happening in the next generation and I can’t wait to hear what happens in the schools.’

Abbey

CRESST Peer Mediators’ Conference

Kathryn and Heather ran a Gender Respect workshop at the CRESST conference for peer mediators on 7^th January, 2016. We ran the workshop 3 times with 3 different groups of children in Y5 and Y6 from 10 schools in South Yorkshire.

Our aims were:

• Explore what it’s like to be a boy or a girl in South Yorkshire
• Identify attitudes we have about boys and girls
• Think as peer mediators how we can make it fairer.

We used the same images of sports, careers and emotions that we had used in the scoping study as stimulus for discussions. We used continuum lines with agree and disagree about a view or attitude that emerged to generate further thought and discussion.

These are some of the attitudes that we drew out from the lively discussions:

Sports:

• Many girls want to play football at play time but don’t because boys are too rough.
• When we asked boys ‘Is this true?’ some replied ‘Yes, because we’re more competitive than girls.’
• Football is a boys’ sport. Boys are tough and can be aggressive.
• Girls are not as good at sport.
• Girls can be stronger than boys and they can play football as well as boys.
• Some boys like dancing and are good at it.
• Boys can be embarrassed to be friends with a girl.
• Some schools had girls only football at play time. Other girls said they did not want this. They wanted to play with boys but for boys not to be so rough and obey the rules.

Careers:

Strong views were expressed about equality, that men and women should be able to do every job.

• Boys and girls can do every job.
• It’s good to see a woman pilot and men looking after children.
• Usually women do childcare. They have carried the baby so they are more in touch. However, men can look after children too.
• Comparisons with the past. Men used to go out to work and women stayed at home. Now more women go out to work.

Emotions:

• You sometimes see women being angry, but they’ve got good reasons to be angry. They do not get equal pay and are often treated unfairly and not with respect.
• It’s unusual to see men cry but they all agreed that it’s acceptable for them to cry.
• Boys and men act really tough. If they cry, they think they’ll look weak.

We asked the children: ‘If you had super magical powers and had one wish, to make things fairer and kinder between men and women, girls and boys what would that be?’

•  Girls and boys can play together
• Don’t judge people by if they’re black or white
• Girls are the same as boys and everyone is treated fairly
• Girls and boys are in the same team in any sport
• Make girls confident to do sports
• Make more jobs accessible to different genders
• Freedom of choice
• Change attitudes
• To make sure men and women get treated equally and have the same rights
• Boys and girls shouldn’t judge each other by what they look like
• Everyone having the same opportunities
• That men and women should share their feelings
• To make every man, woman and child get along so everyone should stop bombing and attacking people.
• For people to aim for their dreams

Finally, we asked them ‘As a peer mediator, what could you do to make it fairer?’

• Talk to the school in an assembly, about genders getting along with being friends and making sure you are able to do what you want to do. E.g. being able to play football if you are a girl.
• Don’t judge a book by its cover
• To make sure you’re not taking sides
• Don’t judge people by their gender
• Giving people the opportunity to play
• Make girls try to play sport and not make boys make fun of them
• Play together fairly. Treat people respectfully. Practise together.
• Collaborate more
• Listen to other people’s opinion
• Encourage people to believe in themselves and do what they want with their life
• Use encouragement to build their confidence
• Make a rota (that’s clear) for girl’s football on a certain day, same with boys, ‘We have a rota but whenever I look at the football pitch and there are always boys, the same boys.’

Our reflections

We really enjoyed the workshops and felt very encouraged by the opinions of the young people. We realised we had the benefit of being with a selected group of hand-picked 10 and 11 year olds, trained in listening and mediation. The children were forthcoming in their views and able to discuss their differences. They had strongly held views about the importance of equality – between men and women, boys and girls, black and white. This held true for occupations, emotions and relationships. We were very interested to hear that some girls and boys did not like the banter about ‘Girls are best. No! Boys are best.’ which they said was very prevalent in their schools. ‘Because we are all human beings. We want to be treated like human beings.’ However, in the everyday experience of playground football, girls expressed their reality of exclusion. This held true across all 10 schools represented. It may be boys had not heard this before and discussions like this could make a difference, especially as peer mediators are mostly engaged because of conflicts at play times. However, some boys’ view that they were more competitive than girls seemed insightful, and may reflect an underlying culture.

Thoughts for the future of the Gender Respect project: We were encouraged that some children spontaneously suggested holding an assembly on gender equality. We hope their teachers will be able to support them in this. This idea may be developed at the young people’s conference later this month. All the children said they would love to come to a Gender Respect student conference if there was one in the future.