Black History Month

We are pleased to have begun our whole school theme of exploring Black History Month which runs throughout the month of October nationally. This year at Norfolk House, one of the items on our School Development Plan is to develop

open-mindedness through promoting diversity in both learning and resources across the school to reflect best practice

This year we are re-assessing the diversity within our curriculum, resources, and environment to ensure we are reflecting and celebrating a range of cultures, genders, and identities and as a school, we are looking at promoting equality and diversity with our first focused Black History Month.

Why now?

The dedicated month to highlight black history was envisioned originally more than 30 years ago in the UK as a way to counter the perceived invisibility of black people and to challenge the negative stereotypes that were often the only manner black people were pictured in popular culture.

Many believe Black History Month is important now more than ever before, especially in light of the recent Black Lives Matter movement, the Windrush scandal, and the resurgence of the far-right in the UK and beyond.

Black History Month UK is opening awareness of stories as chronicled and retold of BAME (black, Asian, minority, ethnic) people’s seminal achievements and innovative contributions to the social, political, and cultural development and well-being of the United Kingdom. This year’s theme from the BHM:2020 organisers is

Dig deeper, look closer, think bigger

All children will participate in assemblies and lessons with class teachers and specialist teachers that explore the hidden histories of black people in the UK. To ensure children have access only to materials that are suitable, any research done by the children will be paper-based. The EYFS children will focus on sharing stories and learning more about the culture of people they know.

To celebrate the children’s learning over BHM, a display will be created in each classroom that showcases some of the children’s work this term. Look out for our twitter/Facebook feed that will show these in the week before half term.