Stop Child Abuse and Bullying Project

Dear supporters,

As we mentioned last time, we were able to host our first diversity and inclusion workshop summer series in Kyoto City!

Over the two sessions (sadly the third was cancelled due to a typhoon), children discussed themes of unconscious bias. Participants from many schools attended, which we were able to really use to our advantage, as most children had never met before.

To begin, I gave the children a quiz about myself, addressing simple topics such as my favourite colour, hobbies/interests, and my future goals or dreams. Before revealing the answers, I asked the children why they had chosen those answers, and slowly introduced how they might have been showing unconscious biases based on my looks, background or previous answers. I was able to share how during this quiz, their unconscious biases were fairly harmless, however there are many instances when these unconscious biases could lead to situations like bullying.

Parents/guardians in attendance really helped to facilitate these conversations. Without much prompting, they happily shared their own experiences of how others unconscious biases had made them feel, or even instances where they had also had unconscious biases of others.

This type of open dialogue is crucial to create a healthy diversity and inclusion learning environment - our goal is to have children openly discuss without fear of judgment, and even if they are not comfortable sharing their thoughts, take those conversations and apply what they have learnt in daily life, acting as "active bystanders".

We openly discussed ways in which we could stop or prevent unconscious biases, and ended the series with a strong sense of self, celebrating our own differences that make us unique! Some students even attended alone, which made me excited to know that some students are willing to step outside of their comfort zones to learn more about such an important topic!

We are hoping to continue this series throughout the winter and spring holidays, and even on weekends.

As always, we appreciate your continued support!

Dear supporters,

In April, we brought yet another workshop to Kumamoto City, this time taking the approach of diversity education through Q&A style discussions. Participants were asked to prepare questions (in advance) to ask a person they had never met. They were given some basic information about the person, such as their gender identity, race and age, and asked to prepare “expected answers” based off of the information they were given.

The children (aged 7 and 8) followed up with a super interesting discussion, and I was thoroughly impressed with their open minds, and ability to realize any unconcious bias that may have come into play!

We are also excited to announced our first "summer series" of workshops in Kyoto! The three sessions will be aimed at children aged 7 to 15 years old. This will be our first series of workshops, and we are hoping that children can gain a more in-depth learning experience, covering topics such as discrimination, bullying, conflict resolution, and how to be an active bystander.

As always, we appreciate your continued support, and are looking forward to updating you in the upcoming months!