How to celebrate Culture Day

Culture Day is an event that has been long in the making with the aim of celebrating the diverse range of cultures in our student body and our community as a whole.

Upon walking onto campus on Wednesday I was greeted by a cacophony of colour with the buzz of excitement and anticipation permeating the air.  There was a very different feel compared to a “normal” day as Wednesday 11 October was Croydon High School’s first ever Culture Day!

This is an event that has been long in the making with the aim of celebrating the diverse range of cultures in our student body and our community as a whole. It is vital our students develop important life skills, such as empathy, critical thinking, and intercultural competence. It prepares them to thrive in a world where diversity is not just appreciated but celebrated. Alongside these goals our team of student organisers also wanted to show everyone that celebrating our cultures can be fun, to say they achieved this is a vast understatement!

The day started off with students gathered in their form rooms where they revelled in seeing the outfits their peers were wearing. As they explained the cultural significance of their attire they were introduced to our first activity of the day, cultural greetings. As fitting for the start of the day students were split into groups to research and learn different greetings from a wide range of places and societies including a handshake from Botswana, the 3 forms of the traditional Wai from Thailand, the Maori Hongi and even the correct version of what is mistakenly called the “Eskimo Kiss” which is the Inuit Kunik. They then shared their new greetings with the classmates and revelled in the wide ranges of ways people can say hello to each other!

During both registration and period 1 year groups assembled in the hall for photographs in their cultural dress. See below for just a small sample of the photographs taken during this session!

Back in classrooms we continued on our cultural journey by looking at definitions of the term culture that had been gathered from different world perspectives.  Our students broke these definitions down and highlighted what they felt was important and what surprised them about how much “culture” encompassed.  One particularly poignant definition was provided by anthropologist, Wade Davis, and led to some insightful discussions taking place.

Armed with the knowledge of what culture means, we then delved deeper into how cultural diversity is being impacted over the world.  This took the form of investigating and discussing the impact of globalisation and the unintended consequences of how it has promoted some cultures as being superior to others.  The students debated the advantages and disadvantages of globalisation and were able to recognise that it has had a hugely positive impact across the globe but hidden behind this it has led to the decline and, in some cases, loss of many important cultural norms and traditions.  To finish off this session the students were introduced to the Xhosa language, where 3 different clicks are incorporated into everyday speech, and Slybo which is an entirely whistled language used in the Canary Islands.  This led to a discussion on the effect of language on a culture and society and how it is predicted that over 50% of the world’s languages will no longer be spoken in just a few more years.

All of this happened before break time, when the students were able to interact with their peers from other forms and take in each other’s cultural outfits once more and talk about what they had learnt during the morning.

The day did not slow down there as there were two more sessions taking place before lunch.  For one, students split into their houses and experienced what it was like to interact with someone if they had no understanding of your cultural norms and traditions.  To do this each student was assigned a coloured sticker, each coloured sticker had a set of “cultural rules” that dictated how they greet people, a cultural taboo and an attitude towards another group!  The greetings and taboos were designed to conflict with each other, for example one culture greeted by simply crossing their arms, another by touching their thumbs to those of the person they were greeting, whilst some groups had a taboo where they could not touch anyone else and others touched the person they were speaking to every time they wanted to say anything.  After learning and practising their “rules” in their groups they were told to interact with as many people as possible, whilst their teachers observed their interactions.  After a few minutes of this they were led in a discussion by staff about how their interactions had gone, which group had they got on best with, which groups did they dislike and why?  As they discussed these questions the cultural rules of each group were revealed and shed light on how they had influenced their interactions.  By the end it was obvious to all that if you did not understand another culture it is all too easy to mistake the intention of their actions, that people can be polite in different ways, can greet in different ways and that we should stop and think before we make assumptions.

In our other session we had the honour of welcoming back four of our alumnae who kindly volunteered to come back and speak to the students about their views on culture.  They included Shermya Modupe who is currently studying for a BA in culture, media and creative industries at King’s College London.  She performed a heartfelt and emotional spoken word poem that addressed the cultural roots of her name and the history that was contained within it.  As she spoke the Hall fell silent and everyone hung on each word she spoke until her conclusion where the room erupted into applause!  Next up was Tasia-Jade Bogle who is currently reading Law at UCL, she addressed the audience on not only her heritage but also her experiences in joining the school at 6th form after having attended a state school until Year 11 and the differences in these experiences.

Following these inspirational talks were Larissa Kennedy and Chimmy Ngoma – you can read about them in their individual alumnae spotlights on our school website.  These two inspirational role models are currently actioning change in the world of diversity, inclusion and culture. Chimmy was able to introduce our students to examples she has used whilst training and speaking to leading global organisations whilst simultaneously being able to connect with our students on a more personal level having been a Croydon High student as well as Head Girl! One, of many, highlights in her address was speaking about the study of a tribe called the “nacirema” and their rituals, which seemed bizarre to the entire audience until Chimmy revealed that Nacirema is simply American spelt backwards!  The strange rituals she had described were actually everyday routines, such as brushing your teeth, all of which we do in the western world but when described a certain way, in a certain context seemed bizarre to us. Larissa spoke to us about the positive impact that culture can have on our world and her travels to Africa and South America. We were shown examples of their cultural norms and ways their culture has positively impacted the world around us. In particular it was fascinating to see how in Chile graffiti was used to send messages of solidarity around the community as opposed to some of the examples we tend to see in our local area. Sadly, Larissa’s talk was cut very slightly short by the fire alarm going off, evidently her speech had blown our minds and the fire alarm sensors must have picked up on this!

To end the day, we had the most amazing Cultural Showcase performed and organised by our very own students.  It was a mixture of song, dance, poetry, cultural fashion and everything in between.  I was particularly impressed by the confidence of our Junior pupils who performed on stage with such maturity. Our whole student body represented all of the continents of the world in one of the most uplifting and positive experiences I have been fortunate enough to witness over the course of my teaching career. It was so amazing that I cannot do it justice in this piece of writing.  So I will be asking some of our students to write a piece for a future edition of our newsletter and they will be able to tell you in their own words just how impactful it was.

I can however share some photographs of the event below and thank everyone who was involved in the organisation of the day.  It really was a whole school effort where everyone from students, support staff, teachers, alumnae and parents contributed to some unforgettable experiences.  I for one am extremely proud of our students and how well they received the day, it truly was one of the highlights of my teaching career.

Culture Day proved to be very memorable for all in The Junior School from the parade in the morning to the afternoon showcase, there was something for everyone to enjoy. The girls particularly enjoyed listening to guest speaker Millie Mensah, who attended Croydon High in the Junior and Senior School. Here are some photos from the parade on the field.

Look out for more details of Culture Day in the Junior School in the first NewsLinks after half-term.