Cooperative Learning and the 21c British Muslim

Seminar follow-up

Thank you to participants – external and internal – at Harrow Primary School; a very engaged crowd of teachers, fresh from the holidays and eager to start a new year.

“…allows children to learn from and respect each other’s views.”

 –Noor, Harrow Primary

This 3 hour Interactive Seminar introduced units from our new course “21c British Muslim: The Solution?” This new 6 hour CPD course is tailored to meet unique requirements Muslim students in the UK have in relation to Social, Moral, Spiritual and Cultural education. As such it serves private Muslim schools and state schools with a substantial amount of Muslim pupils. Units presented yesterday included:

UNIT 1: REFLECTIONS ON CULTURAL ISSUES

According to Lesson Objectives, students doing this unit in class will:

1. …define a range of values and activities through negotiation (What does “wearing a cap mean? What’s a cap? Who wears caps? What’s the signal it sends?”).
2. …define which values and activities are “Islamic,” “English” or both.
3. …negotiate the meaning of these terms in each case
4. …through negotiation precisely define which aspects of values and activities that are “Islamic” or not.

The Unit includes multiple variations such as what is British vs. Christian, Ethnic vs Islamic.

“We could play around (this) and use it for every subject…”

Zainab, Harrow Primary

UNIT 2: WHAT NON-MUSLIMS SAY ABOUT ISLAM

According to Lesson Objectives, students doing this unit in class will:

1. discover which areas of Islam are focused on by non-Muslims
2. discover which are seen as positive and negative by non-Muslims
3. reflect on reasons for these opinions

– and bring to bear a number of “hard” skills:

1. use skimming and scanning techniques
2. identify key points in a text
3. effective note taking
4. Prepare an oral summary by recapping and restructuring information to promote understanding and memorization.

In teams: What is this?

UNIT 3: MUSLIM CONTRIBUTIONS TO CIVILISATION

According to Lesson Objectives, students doing this unit in class will:

1. …reflect on the practical relation of Muslim inventions to today’s technology (connected to various subjects).
2. …discover the greatness of Muslim intellectual heritage and civilizational contributions.
3. …feel pride and a sense of worth and self-respect.
4. …perceive that Islam historically has promoted scientific and technological discovery and enquiry.
5. …relate the above to the current situation of Muslims in the UK.
6. …reflect on what this means to their own future lives as Muslims in Britain.