This is a classroom poster I have chosen for showing diversity in class. I choose butterflies because they can have so many forms and colors like children have. But I didn`t think about forms of bodies from the kids or colors of clothes. My suit was to take these characterizations of butterflies for symbolizing the diversity every person has in. Hobbies, our look, our ethnical background, our skills and so many other things defining us as the person we are. Every butterfly symbolize one child. Everyone shall create his own butterfly. I used the wings of them to show which hobbies (butterflies C-electronic entertainment, D-playing golf, H-music, I-books/reading J-table tennis, L-soccer) they have or what they like (butterflies B-flowers, E-rain, K-dots) or what they are interested in (butterflies Aforest/nature, F-animals/cows). These ornaments shall be created by the kids. They give their butterflies a special meaning to them. The butterflies can be extended by pictures from the child or something else. The "room" in which I put the butterflies in shall be seen as the protected institution "school". But as you can see the walls of the room are leaky. So the butterflies come in and out without any problems.
In the end the children can see that every butterfly looks different from the other one, but if they have a closer look, they`ll gonna see that the middle part of the butterflies are equal in form. It should symbolize that we are all humans and a part of this world. Doesn`t matter if the inner part is brown, white, red, orange or whatever.
Brief reflection on challenge 7
Challenge 7 was one of the most interesting challenges to me. I learned so much about how to appreciate and not avoid diversity of people for me as a future teacher. We collected lots of ideas how to integrate the children`s diversity into our teaching successfully (e.g. making an international week with several dishes, dances, musics, games, languages; making a cookbook in which everyone can create a page with a dish and the recipe, he or she likes; doing a blackbox game, in which everyone can bring a typical thing from his culture and the other pupils feel and guess, what it is). The movie " The new boy" helped me to see how I won`t handle such a situation and makes me think about ideas, how I would introduce a new child to my class (a welcome-breakfast, creating a comfortable atmosphere in which questions can be asked, games can be played). I was also very impressed by the movie about the multilingual school in London. They found concept to combine english school standards with the cultures, languages and interests of the kids. Like we did it in this challenge with the pictures, the kids can speak their native language in some situations. It is been seen as an enrichment of teaching.
In conclusion I can say that I get a lot of new ideas and a better awareness for my work as a professional. There is diversity in every group which is formed by more than one person. So we have to deal with it. Don`t see it as a problem-see it as a chance for you and your class.
(The concepts can be found in "Glossary")
