Idea: teach students to look at society through art and heritage
Interaction, commotion and sometimes arguments as well. Semih Solmaz, pre-vocational secondary education teacher of people & society and history in Ridderkerk, wants all of that in his citizenship lessons. He now succeeds even better with the online tool 'Digital tear-off calendar citizenship'.
Image: Angeliek de Jonge
Semih Solmaz recently had a special moment in one of his VMBO classes. “We talked about the fact that almost no streets in the Netherlands are named after women and how strange that actually is. I came up with the example that we would name the corridors of the school after students. The boys unanimously agreed that more corridors would be named after girls to compensate. Then I realized once again how important it is to keep insisting on equality, diversity, freedom and other social themes in education, so that students do not start thinking in boxes. ”
Solmaz, lecturer in people & society and history at Farelcollege in Ridderkerk, uses the Digital tear-off calendar citizenship for his citizenship education, a free online tool in which art and heritage are linked to eight citizenship themes such as equality, solidarity, democracy and identity. “I normally use for people & society Gamma from Malmberg. This is a great method, but I have noticed that I cannot pay enough attention to important citizenship issues. I often use additional material, videos or texts that I personally find special and that can initiate interaction in the classroom. ”
So when Solmaz was asked last year by the makers Kunstgebouw and Erfgoedhuis Zuid-Holland to help think about the digital tear-off calendar that was still being developed at that time, he didn't hesitate for a second. Together with other VMBO teachers, he gave feedback on the content and format and made sure that the videos, photos and assignments matched the experience of VMBO students as much as possible. The result is impressive, he thinks. “The great thing about the tear-off calendar is that it stimulates students to actively participate, think and react. And that is exactly what I want to achieve in my citizenship classes. ”
Semih Solmaz: "Students are allowed to say anything in my class, as long as they don't insult each other."
Does that sometimes lead to heated discussions? “Yes, but as a teacher you shouldn't be afraid of that. Education is not just sitting still and listening, especially in pre-vocational education. Education is working towards something, by talking, discussing and sometimes arguing. Then it is indeed sometimes hard, but students are allowed to say anything in my classroom, as long as they do not insult each other. If a student has a different, extreme opinion and keeps it to himself because he thinks it will not be accepted, you cannot start a conversation with him and you cannot show students another side and make them think. ”
Disgust
The Solmaz school is located on the border of Rotterdam-South and Ridderkerk, in a neighborhood with people from many different cultural backgrounds. “I was born in the Netherlands, but my parents are from Turkey. I grew up in Brabant where I have not always felt accepted, but here I am really at home, between all those different cultures. Yet here too I see an aversion to other population groups among young people. They are in the phase of identity formation and then want to identify with something: one group is okay, the other is not. ”
Solmaz has seen a video clip on the block calendar at the lesson on globalization that he will certainly want to use in his lessons soon. In The DNA Journey people who are proud of their origins discover that they have DNA from different races. That opens their eyes. For example, a Kurdish person finds out that she has Turkish roots and a chauvinistic French woman is told that she has more English DNA than French. Solmaz: "I am very curious how my students will react to this in the future."
Lumpy
Solmaz is sometimes concerned about the bubble in which his students find themselves increasingly. “It is becoming an increasingly difficult battle to pull students out of this and to involve them in school and society. They prefer social media and do their own thing and they don't always believe that school can mean something to them. ”
The Digital tear-off calendar for citizenship went live at the end of October for all VMBO teachers who want to use the IWB to discuss citizenship themes. “With the eight themes you can make at least eight great lessons, but I'm not going to do that consecutively. If I deal with the Holocaust, then I can additionally attach a lesson about equality in the tear-off calendar. The tear-off calendar is a nice addition to my lessons. ”
Check the digital tear-off calendar, type as login: citizenship.
