English version


Multicultural understanding and human rights

Storyline practice 2005, Sinsen skole

60 students in their final practice period in their education programme took over Sinsen school for one and a half weeks in February 2005. Their pupils were from 6 to 16 years old (primary and lower secondary school). Subjects that were involved were Social Studies (History, Geography and Social Science), English and Religious Studies. All classes made storylines. The overall themes for the storyline work was like the year before at Nordstrand skole 2004 , "multicultural understanding" and "human rights". As part of the preparations for this practice period, Steve Bell gave storyline courses to students and staff at the Faculty of Education. See photos.
A central aim with this work is to foster multiculturell understanding by challeging the pupils' values and attitudes towards tolerence and equality. Most of the student teachers at Sinsen school chose to use a storyline named the 'Rainbow Street'. This is an approach based on a storyline made by Steve Bell, called 'New Neighbours'. The story is about a street that mirrors the multicultural part of Norway. In the Rainbow Street you'll meet people with different religious beliefs and cultural backgrounds. The different grades at Sinsen school focused on different disciplines and items relevant to their various curriculums. This resulted in a variety of events and incidents in the streets as shown below. Some students also made multimedia presentations..
You can see the presentations and the films below!

Click to enlarge the photos!

Storyline in grade one

The street before the families moved in.

Characters


Children in grade two, 2A, made The Star Street. Each group of children made their familiy and each child made one family member each. A family from India moved into the street. One day somebody had written 'bad things' on the wall of their house. The children discussed who could possibly have done it and what they could do to comfort and help the family. They wrote letters as you can see above.


In class 3B the children made fifth grade characters at a school named Lykken. The class was the lucky winner of a cruise with a ship that stranded on an isolated island that they called Alt og Ingenting øya. Hoping to be seen from an aeroplane they wrote HELP with white coconut powder in the sand on the beach. Among other things they worked with how to survive on the island. Then a group of people showed up on the island. The people on the island acted in a hostile manner towards the newcommers. The pupils in the school class tried to show the people that the were friendly. After a while the island people invited the newcommers to a party.

The street, day one.
Class 3A made a street with families. A familiy with a dissabled child, Ari, moved into the street. Ari used a wheelchair. He could not enter houses with stairs and could not use the playground. On behalf of the families living in the street the children wrote letters to the mayor and asked him to help Ari. Click to see the letters and an envelope


Grade five made a Rainbow Street with families from different countries. One day a frightening incident occurred in the street. A family that just moved into the street became victims of blind violence. This was reported in several radio programs.


Grade six made a multicultural street named Rainbow Street. One day racist slogans are written on the walls of the houses in the street. Among other activities the children wrote letters to the editor of Rainbow Street News to tell the opinions of their families. Here you can see the letters.



In class 7B an English family moved into Rainbow Street. The neighbours wrote welcome letters in English. One day somebody has written racist slogans on the walls. The class arrange a demonstration against racism and they pass through the Common room singing the Norwegian song 'Tenke sjæl' ('Think for yourself'). They hold brief antiracist speeches.

Grade 7A make a street in England

Biographies in English


In the Rainbow Street you see above in class 8B homosexuality and human rights were one of the themes. One day somebody had parked a car in the street with slogans directed against gay people. The families discussed the incident and wrote letters to the editor in the newspaper.

A street in class 8A.

The families move in

Families and biographies

Rainbow Avenue, 10B

Fatima Iqbal Aslam

Bio- card in english

Ali Iqbal Aslam

Making portraits and biographies

Presentations in english

All the grades in lower secondary produced multicultural streets. Some of the streets were in England which gave the students extensive opportunity to write and speak English. In the street the student teachers arranged incidents which in different ways challenged the students and made them work with human rights questions. The pupils wrote letters in the newspaper on behalf of their families. They produced radio programs and they discussed.


In class 9B they also produced films to present incidents focusing on human rights. During four school sessions the pupils both learned the film technique and produced the films. To see film: It was not us who did it!

Marit.Storhaug@lu.hio.no