Case Studies
School
Schools are community hubs, sites of friendship and cultural exchange, and the place for us to articulate our values about how to live well.
The Journeys project has revealed schools to more than statutory institutions and sites of academic learning. The maps made as part of Journeys demonstrate how schools are also hubs for the community and the places where children come to hone their values in dialogue with others. The Linking Network were a key partner for this project, and we recruited schools that had previously participated in schools linking. Some of the impact of this is visible in the maps from one of these schools. One child in particular describes this in their interview: ‘so we have like link school, so we go with a different school. I learned someone else's life in the link school. I met a friend.’ Two others use images of the friendships formed through schools linking in their maps. It’s clear that, for this class in particular, being a linking school has been important for the individual children, but has also become part of the narrative of the school in its commitment to building relationships with different communities. Beyond this, school as a place for cross-cultural encounter was a common theme for many of the children who took part in Journeys.
Case study 1 (TH02): Kadi
Kadi enjoys playing out with her friends and learning about other cultures and her own. She used her map to depict an image of the street where she lives and her route to school, flanked by the local chippy, a church, a playground, and many red brick houses. She explained in her interview why she felt it was important to welcome others to her school:
“When new students come, we welcome them and like show them around the school. Sometimes, if they, like, don’t know where the toilets are, we, we, we would show them. […] Because in this school, we’re all one big family. And we, we don’t care like, if we’re all, we’re all different, and we’re not all the same, because God made us like that, and if we were all same, and we all had the same name, then that would just be chaotic.”
In describing her school as a welcoming place, Kadi suggests it is the shared responsibility of the all pupils to enact this value, and this is taken for granted in the way she writes ‘we welcome’. In her interview, Kadi talked about the importance of her Muslim faith, and also about how she enjoyed visiting the local church with her class, and hearing the stories told there. This suggests that learning about other faiths is an important part of the school ethos, but the above quote goes further and indicates that this sort of pluralistic value is something that children can really put into practice if they choose. Kadi’s faith clearly informs her wish to welcome others, and also makes her curious to learn about people different to her. This is a great example of the ways that school communities can offer unity alongside a celebration of difference, and that schools allow children to actively participate in enacting these values.