Building a sense of belonging in classrooms is an on-going process that involves everything from seemingly small acts to larger more strategic planning.
In recent years, I have been pleased to see an increasing amount of research, books, blogs and podcasts dedicated to the creation of such spaces. Not only does building a sense of belonging feel like the ethical thing to do in a values-driven establishment, but it also influences learning and improves outcomes.
In Motivated Teaching (2020), Peps Mccrea outlines the importance of building belonging when planning for success in the classroom and notes: “The more we feel we belong to a group, the more we invest in its goals and conform to its norms. The less we feel we belong to a group, the less we will be open to its influence, to the extent that we may even oppose what it advocates.”
In A Little Guide for Teachers: Diversity in schools (2021), Bennie Kara – who has previously appeared on the SecEd Podcast discussing issues of diversity – notes the value of being yourself and being open about your own identity with students (and some suggestions of doing so while considering safeguarding and appropriateness).
I am of the belief that progress in diversity and inclusion work will result in happier and healthier staff. And so, in this article, I would like to outline some suggestions for building a sense of belonging in classrooms.
Names
Our names are such an integral part of who we are. Often, they carry stories and histories beyond their literal meaning, and the way we use them in different spaces present different parts of who we are.
Learning the names of our students – and the correct pronunciations or abbreviations – is a non-negotiable when trying to build a sense of belonging in a classroom.
For your first lesson with a class, it is helpful to write a seating plan and then invite students to correct you if you have mispronounced their name or if they would prefer an abbreviation.
Write these phonetically on your seating plan for next time if you feel that is needed and remind the class that, if you get it wrong, you want to be corrected.
This can feel daunting for some students to do and so it is important to model what you would like to see. Introduce your name before you ask students theirs. Perhaps consider an email signature that includes a name pronunciation – the app namedrop can help with this (see further information).
If you are a form tutor and know you have students with names that colleagues may be unfamiliar with, consider sharing phonetic pronunciations with their teachers at the start of term.
Seating plans
I have mentioned seating plans above and know that some educators choose not to use them. But for me they are the easiest way to learn names. Once appropriate accommodations for specific learning needs have been made, I place students in a random order.
I avoid alphabetical order as students will be subjected to this regularly – in fire drills, lining up for assembly, or exams. It is important for them to embrace diversity – of thought and experience – as part of their learning opportunities at school.
It is also best to avoid “girl-boy” seating if you are in a mixed sex setting.
This can be detrimental as a seating plan based on gender alone cannot reflect students’ other needs, such as around self-esteem, attainment, behaviour, or enjoyment. And of course, for transgender students and any students who are questioning their gender such a plan can feel isolating.
Say what you mean and mean what you say
Note that when you are issuing rewards and sanctions, it is not just those you are giving them to who are paying attention. Students will notice what types of behaviours are rewarded or sanctioned and this will help them to understand the climate of your classroom.
In The Inclusive Classroom (2021), Daniel Sobel and Sara Alston, both regular contributors to SecEd, outline the importance of using clear instructions and language to avoid misunderstandings or overloading students, especially some of our SEN students.
They offer the example of telling a student to “wait a minute” and how this could be understood in different ways depending on the student who is hearing it. If what we mean is “I will be with you shortly, I must do something else before I can come back to you” then this is what we should say.
It is important that, as the teacher in the room, we ensure there is no ambiguity about what we want to see in the classroom. This should be in our instructions, issuing of praise and rewards, and use of sanctions.
Explicitly teach belonging
Building belonging may be about tweaks to practice, but it can also be about planning lessons which directly tackle ideas of community, shared environments, diverse identities, and inclusive spaces.
Assemblies, PSHE, tutor time resources and context lessons (for example, teaching the context of USA in the 1960s before an RE lesson on Joseph Fletcher’s Situation Ethics) are all important ways of doing this.
Responding to comments or behaviours in the moment are also valuable ways of growing a sense of belonging in your classroom. If a student uses a homophobic slur or makes a flippant sexist remark, it is important that lessons are paused to address the language and make a teaching moment out of it.
Ignoring such remarks leaves students believing that the issues don’t matter to their teacher and can result in students feeling that this classroom is not a place where they belong.
If you are a senior leader reading this, I urge you to consider your CPD programme to include opportunities for all staff – teaching and non-teaching – to develop their skills in these areas. I have worked with both Brook and Facing History and Ourselves in this capacity and can recommend them.
Use the data wisely
While data may feel like our best friend at times, what the data is and what we hope to do with it must be made clear. There is little worth in the claim that girls performed much more poorly than boys in GCSE dance this year if there were only two girls in a class of 30 and those two girls were also students who struggled with emotionally based school avoidance for 45% of the year.
Equally, we must be aware that some data will have to be considered alongside teacher behaviours and perhaps biases – such as achievement or behaviour points, effort grades or teacher predicted grades.
When we look to plan interventions or action plans for the next academic year, we must consider the role that such biases play and support staff in working to eradicate or reduce these.
Final thought
Building belonging in the classroom is an on-going project and not one that can be achieved by following a checklist. Every student, class dynamic, lesson content and teacher will offer new opportunities for ways to adapt what we do.
We need to be ready to adapt and respond to evolving needs and demands in a way that prioritises a culture of shared learning and community ethos. This is most effective in a school that has a strong values system and an ethos of respect, inclusivity and reciprocity. From small tweaks to progressive strategic moves, building belonging is an exciting and achievable strand of education today.
Sanum J Khan is assistant headteacher at Sir Henry Floyd Grammar School in Aylesbury, Buckinghamshire. Follow her on X (Twitter) @sanumjkhan. Find Sanum’s previous articles for SecEd via www.sec-ed.co.uk/authors/sanum-j-khan
Further information & resources
- Brook: brook.org.uk
- Facing History and Ourselves: facinghistory.org/about/locations/united-kingdom
- Kara: A Little Guide for Teachers: Diversity in schools, Corwin UK, 2021.
- Mccrea: Motivated Teaching, CreateSpace, 2020.
- Namedrop: https://namedrop.io/
- Sobel & Alston: The Inclusive Classroom, Bloomsbury Education, 2021.