AN entire school joined together to celebrate diversity.

Children at Westleigh Methodist Primary School in Leigh learned about the importance of respecting differences and being proud to be yourself.

The school dedicated time to activities designed to encourage the youngsters to think about identity and culture, accepting others, building resilience and resisting peer pressure.

Year 5 teacher Abbie Whittle, said: ‘We wanted to get the children thinking more about equality and we decided to do this as a whole school as we thought this would have the most impact.”

She added: “We’re a diverse school so it’s really important that children learn both to respect others and celebrate differences and that they build their own self confidence so that they’ll aspire to achieve. We want them to know they can rise above social and gender stereotypes and achieve what they want to in life.’”

Teenagers from Wigan Council’s youth group, BYOU, for young people who are lesbian, gay, bi-sexual, transgender or questioning, supported the work by running a question and answer session for Year 4 pupils on equality and stereotypes.

Cllr Jenny Bullen, Portfolio Holder for Children and Young People’s Services, said: “Believing in equality and abandoning stereotypes at a young age is a great foundation for the children to build on, I hope what they’re learning at this age will help them become confident, kind and caring young people.”

Younger children learned about Elmer, the colourful patchwork elephant, to remind them that everyone is unique, whilst other activities included learning how to say hello in different languages, reading stories featuring characters who are proud to be different, having discussions about career, family and social stereotypes and all children in school dressing up in clothes representing the career they most aspire to the future.

Pupil Lexie McCormick, 9, said: “We’ve learned that it’s ok to be different. You should be who you want to be not who other people think you should be.’

Classmate Gracie Anderson, 9, added: “We’ve learned that there are all different sorts of people. Some people do different jobs, some speak different languages and some people have different families, but it doesn’t matter, it’s all ok.”

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