This week has been National Inclusion Week and we have been celebrating everything we do at Merry Hill to ensure we are an inclusive school.
In our assembly on Monday we learnt the difference between equality and equity.
Equality means that everyone has the same chances or gets the same treatment. Everyone is treated equally.
Equity means that everyone has the same chances – just like equality – but equity also means considering different people’s situations so that they really are treated fairly.
If 3 children of different heights went to watch a sporting event but found that they couldn’t see over the fence, what could we do to give them a fair chance of watching the event?
If they all got the same number of boxes to stand on (equality), it would not be fair as one child can still not see over the fence.
If they all got the number of boxes that they needed to stand on to be able to see over the fence, they would all have the same chance of seeing the sporting event with their own individual situations and needs being taken into account. Now that really is fair!
We have talked about many of the resources and strategies we have at Merry Hill to ensure everyone is included in the classrooms, outside on the playground and at lunch times. Some of the things we came up with included:
- our mindfulness areas in the classroom
- writing slopes and pencil grips
- fiddle toys and our fiddle boxes, funded by the FoMH
- visual timetables
- scaffolds and prompts to help us achieve something we find tricky
- having a special place in the line, e.g. line leader
- adaptations at lunch time, such as having a different tray or a designated place to sit
- visiting the sensory room and using the resources in our class sensory bags
- prompts in our learning tool kits to help us remember phonic sounds and harder to read and spell words etc.
In our classrooms we read the story ‘Who Are You?’ written by Smriti Halls and illustrated by Ali Pye – ‘A joyful celebration of the pieces, places and people that make us who we are’. We shared what made us special and unique, to include our families and backgrounds, festivals and celebrations, the clothes we wear, the places we have lived or travelled to, our favourite foods and activities etc. We then designed a piece of a jigsaw puzzle to represent ourselves. The class jigsaw puzzle that we created reminds us that we are all individuals who are different, special and unique, but we are all valued and included in Bear and Giraffe class and at Merry Hill Infant School and Nursery.
- Have conversations that celebrate individuals and their differences
- You can listen to the story “Who Are You? by Smriti Halls being read online https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1Xp0LEY3YQ4
- Visit the library and see if you can find other books to enjoy that celebrate inclusion
- Encourage your child to recognise what they need to help them be successful at an activity