Citizenship at key stage 4    (Year 10-11)

• Begin a class discussion by reviewing agreed ground rules for discussion. What are the ground rules? Do any need to be amended?
• Working in groups, pupils write down the various countries with which they have a personal connection. They use different-coloured self-adhesive notes to indicate those countries where their relatives or friends live now and where they, their relatives or friends used to live before they moved to the UK, eg Surjit's gran lives in India, Paul's cousin lives in Canada, Joseph's family came from Kenya. Pupils stick the notes onto a large map of the world and note connections with Commonwealth countries.
• Ask pupils to work in pairs to discuss how they describe their identities. It may be appropriate to draw on work from key stage 3 at this point. How does this relate to where they were born? What is their perception of the ethnic composition of the population in their local community. Draw the discussion together as a class and use available statistics to see how their perceptions relate to the true composition of their locality. Then ask pupils to consider the UK as a whole. What do they know about the origins of the peoples in England or the UK?
• Individually or in small groups, pupils select one group of immigrants to the UK to investigate further. They should have access to a range of information sources, reflecting the diversity of peoples in the UK, including recent, historical and locally relevant examples, eg refugees from Bosnia; the Vikings and the Romans; post-war migration of African-Caribbeans in the twentieth century. Pupils study where these people originated, and when and why they came to the UK, eg as invaders, as slaves or servants, as refugees. Why did they choose to come to the UK? This activity could form part of a school-linking project, enabling pupils to compare their research with that of pupils at a school in another part of the UK in a different geographical, ethnic or socio-economic context.
• Review with pupils what they learned at key stage 3 about the Human Rights Act and the situation regarding refugees. They consider why individuals and groups are forced to migrate to protect their human rights. Pupils summarise their findings and share these as a class.
• Pupils reflect on what they have investigated and discussed in this section. They consider how it feels to be a newcomer to a group, at school or in their community. They list ways in which someone new or different can be made to feel welcome and included in the school or the community.
• Extension activity: opportunities to draw on, or link with, history. Pupils could study twentieth-century history of regimes that tried different forms of 'separate development', ethnic cleansing and genocide as responses to racial conflict and inequalities, eg the Holocaust, apartheid in South Africa, ethnic cleansing in the former Yugoslavia. Pupils could explore: how individuals protested against such regimes; the influence of Mandela in South Africa; the pacifist approach adopted by Gandhi against the British Raj. Using imaginative writing, pupils can explore the ideals and motivations of people who struggle against social injustice.

• Ask pupils to discuss why racism is wrong, eg any form of discrimination is unacceptable, including on the basis of race, culture, religion, ability, gender, etc; racism may involve violent crime; people should be treated equally and fairly regardless of race; racism is against the law. Ask them to give examples of incidents involving racial discrimination that they have heard or read about in the local or national news.
• Using a range of scenarios as a focus for discussion, ask pupils to consider whether or not they think the scenario involves racial discrimination or racist activity. Scenarios could include:
• a Sikh boy being teased because he wears a turban
• a British National Party magazine, which contains cartoons making fun of Asian and black people, being passed round
• a black pupil deliberately tripping up a white boy and the white boy hitting him
• an Asian shopkeeper complaining because pupils from the school are constantly being rude to him
• people constantly telling derogatory jokes about the Irish to an Irish girl
• a black pupil whose parents live on benefit being told 'You lot just come over here to sign on'
• Pupils build on their conclusions from the above scenarios by reviewing a range of video clips, either from the news or from a video such as My England. They work in groups to identify the issues raised.
• As a class, review the pupils' decisions and findings. Ask them to talk about whether they found it easy to make their decision on whether or not racist action or behaviour was involved. Did they use any rules to help them make their decisions? Why do people act in racist and discriminatory ways?

• Ask pupils to use newspaper articles and other sources to find out how the law protects individuals or groups against racism and discrimination. Pupils choose a topical example, eg the Race Relations (Amendment) Act 2000, introduced to place a positive duty on public authorities to promote racial equality; or the Commission for Racial Equality, which monitors race equality and champions test cases. Using a range of sources of information, including newspapers, websites and reports, pupils find out about the Macpherson Inquiry, which came about as a result of the murder of Stephen Lawrence. What happened? Who was involved? What actions have been taken as a result? Pupils share and discuss their findings.
• Alternatively, pupils explore how the European Convention on Human Rights and the Human Rights Act 1998 protect us from discrimination and harm. Focus on the issues surrounding asylum, linking them with activities in unit 1 'Human rights'.
• Extension activity: visitors could be invited to the school to provide different perspectives on racism, the law and responses to the law, eg a police liaison officer could talk about race and policing issues, a local authority representative could explain local responses to the Race Relations Act, or a local MP could discuss how issues of racism and other forms of discrimination are addressed in parliament.

• Ask pupils to consider what they would do if someone was treating them unfairly or committed a racially motivated crime against them.
• Individually, then in pairs or groups, pupils reflect on what they have learnt in this unit and list the 10 most important things that they think should be taught in schools about diversity and tolerance and about challenging racism and inequalities. The class list could be taken forward to the school's curriculum committee.
• In small groups, pupils consider what they would do in various given scenarios:
• they are out with a group of friends and one of them makes a racist comment
• they witness a fight involving a group of Asian pupils attacking a white man
• they see young pupils writing racist graffiti on a bus shelter
• they see a black Muslim woman being jostled by a group of white girls
Pupils think about what they could do as individuals. Who should they tell? Who could they ask for help and advice?
• Pupils review the school's policy on dealing with racist incidents. Does it cover all the forms of racism that pupils might encounter? Does it make clear what all those involved should do, eg the victim, observers, those to whom it is reported? If the policy is inadequate, pupils make recommendations on how it should be amended. They consider how to incorporate into school policy and practice the ideas and strategies developed through this unit, including providing support for pupils who might be victims of racism.
• As a class, pupils reflect on what they have learnt. They discuss how, other than through schools, mutual respect and positive understanding between communities can be promoted.