Children’s Rights, originally uploaded by LindaH.

Alice is blogging about Human Rights Day which is on December 10th. The focus for the last 3 years has been on education :

.. focus on primary and secondary education, through integrating human rights issues into curricula, changing educational processes and teaching methods and, most importantly, improving the environment in which education takes place.

OHCHR
In my last school we tried to help the children think beyond their own situation and to consider children’s needs, rights and responsibilities.

It was done as a whole school initiative, integrated into PSHE, circle time and some of the geography units. This display was from Year 3 and might not be as ‘perfect’ as some. It’s backed on sugar paper, which fades and doesn’t last, it has no border and the spacing is quite random. To me it looks a bit scrappy but, and it’s an important but, this was very much the children’s display. They were deeply touched and quite shocked by some of the things we covered. This was their response and in some ways that makes it much more powerful than a ‘perfect’ display.

This is another winter display with a speaking and listening focus. It comes from the same teacher as the Red, Red Robin display. Click on play to hear what she has to say about this display and how she used it. Don’t be shy If you have a mike on your computer why not click record and leave a comment about this display or winter classroom displays in general?

You can see a larger version of this photo in my Flickr photos or just click on the image here to zoom in. I’m using a service called Voicethreads for this post. If you have any problems viewing it, you love it or you hate it please leave a message in the comments on the blog. Thanks

Red Red Robin, originally uploaded by LindaH.

This is one of those classroom displays that works best on a large wall. The original was floor to (a fairly low) ceiling. This meant that the robins were quite a bit larger than life size!
The display looks impressive but it was fairly quickly done. The wall was backed with sugar paper. It was at the entrance to the classroom where it didn’t get direct sunlight so wouldn’t fade.The bare trees were made from old tights, the leaves at the bottom were re-cycled from the autumn display and the snow was just cotton wool. The titles just printed and cut out.
The main focus was on the making of the robins. This display was in the SERF unit which served a range of ages and abilities within the school. The robins had to be a simple design and yet leave room for the older children to express themselves. I think it has worked well from that point of view.
I spoke to the teacher and speech therapist involved in the display and they felt it was important that it was used as a starting point for lots of speaking and listening work. I love this commitment to making the display a regular part of the teaching strategy. It’s powerful stuff. The display evolved over several days and the children were involved at every stage.They also enjoyed singing the song
Some of the children found change very difficult so working on classroom displays like this gave lots of opportunity to prepare for the changing season.