Building an inclusive and anti-racist curriculum in English

Rachel Webley, English Lecturer/ Teaching and Learning Coach, Birmingham Metropolitan College

When adding an image to my lesson slides, I always aim to reflect the diversity of my learners. However, it takes an awful lot of scrolling before I find a suitable one.

As an educator I believe that visibility and representation matters. If learners don't see themselves reflected in their learning, will they believe that it is relevant to them? If we only see the world presented from one perspective, how will we recognise the contribution and achievements of those who are marginalised within society?

Embedding an inclusive and anti-racist curriculum involves more than the use of diverse and inclusive images. My goal is to move beyond visibility and strive for representation; to present learners with a curriculum that identifies and celebrates contribution, represents diverse perspectives and experience, and encourages them to explore written texts with empathy for others.

Within my English department, our autumn term topic is ‘conflict and remembrance’. On the surface, it’s a very traditional topic, however, we were determined to use texts which highlighted the contribution and experience of people from marginalised groups. We paired extracts from the diary of Florence Nightingale with an extract from the autobiography of Mary Seacole, the first autobiography written by a free Black woman in Britain. We explored the wartime experiences of Anne Frank and Walter Tull, the first British-born black army officer in the British Army. We also examined the different perspectives of the WW1 Christmas Truce through a letter from a British army officer and a fictional account of an Indian Sepoy, an infantry soldier.

Our intent has always been to establish a sustainable approach, not a ‘bolt on’ confined to Black History Month or other awareness days and months with limited tangible relevance to the curriculum. As English teachers, developing linguistic skills has taken prominence. However, exploration of more diverse and inclusive texts in both writers and content has enabled learners to consider historical and world events in a way that helps them frame and develop an understanding of current inequalities that they or others may be facing.

The search engines are learning. Simple adjustments in my search terms, more frequently yields the type of diversity I am looking for. In the same way, simple adjustments in what I teach yields a curriculum more representative of my learners, helping them to see and be seen.