Windrush Child Updates

It's worth looking at the BBC's Bitesize for some extra detail on the book. There's a nice illustrated plot summary of the story (contains spoilers if you haven't read it...)

Details here of Windrush.

Windrush Monument

I passed through Waterloo a few weeks ago to head for the GTE Conference.

Waterloo is home to the National Windrush Monument. 

This was unveiled in June 2022 by Prince William so is a relatively new addition to the station.

We read 'Windrush Child' by Benjamin Zephaniah with Year 7 students and have done for the last 4 years.

Free Windrush Resources

Visit the Windrush Foundation website for a whole range of free resources for educational use. These are going to be rolled out over the next year.

A free event will take place to launch these.

SUNDAY 21 JANUARY 2024, 7pm to 9pm

This free online event launches a year-long rollout that will offer opportunities to schools in Britain, and elsewhere, first-hand knowledge of the late Sam King’s seminal work. The suite of seven resources will show Windrush as just one, among many other chapters, of British post-WWII history. The resources include more than 500 pages of materials, and feature stories also of the lived experiences of Windrush passengers. Further research and publications will follow.


Members of the Windrush Generation are those who arrived on June 22, 1948, at Tilbury Docks, on the Empire Windrush, but excludes passengers who arrived after June 1948 on other ships or by BOAC (BA). 

The Empire Windrush made only one return journey to the West Indies in 1948.

Windrush Foundation’s seminal education resources will help educators to teach the facts about Windrush and will explain its true meaning. Numerous distortions of the late Sam King’s idea have been publicised over the years and it is hoped that this suite of resources will debunk those falsehoods and conflations.

Get your Eventbrite tickets from this link. I have downloaded the free eBooks.

Thanks to Arthur Torrington for the information.

The National Windrush Monument

This was unveiled in June at Waterloo Station.

We will be exploring more about Windrush with Year 7 after half term.

We have just had delivery of extra copies of 'Windrush Child' for the new Year 7 cohort.

Image: Sally Parkinson

Windrush Child

'Windrush Child' is a book by Benjamin Zephaniah which follows the story of Leonard. His father was one of the passengers of 'Empire Windrush' and when he is 10, Leonard joins his father along with his mother, travelling on the 'Arosa Star' to start a 'better life' in the UK.

The book follows Leonard's life, the ups and downs of life in Manchester, school, racism, attacks on his family, but also the kindness of neighbours, a work mate and ultimately finding love.

The book ends with events mirroring the Windrush Scandal - which is still ongoing. I have blogged about the book previously, and my plans to create this unit as part of a range of work around decolonising the curriculum and adding a colonialism lens to topics such as food and globalisation.

For the first teaching of the unit, I was able to get a bargain price on a book for each Year 7 student from Bookpoint.

I put together a 28 page booklet to help guide the reading, along with support from my colleague who teaches both Geography and English. This was printed as a booklet, with an image of a landing card from the Goldsmith's project on the back.

Along with some context and details on the author, there were also spaces for students to jot down key events in each of the chapters along with a factfile on Leonard - the main character.

As the unit has gone through, I have amended the booklet and changed a few of the questions and emphases - there is plenty of reading and further references at the back of the booklet as well.

The recent DfE guidance on political impartiality has added an interesting dimension to the teaching of this unit, as there is inevitably mention of the Home Office destroying landing cards which would have proved citizenship, deporting people without good cause, and the famous vans suggesting to migrants that they should leave - except the Windrush migrants had lived here and paid taxes and paid into pensions, raised families, worked for the NHS and were then treated terribly.

A few extra activities also worked particularly well - my colleague Helen Melville had great success with students writing 'Chapter 33' - what happened next, with some really creative outcomes. I am also preparing to create a new display on the work that we completed based on the book which will offer opportunities for interactivity with those who see it.

In response to requests, here is Version 1 of the booklet that I created. There will be some amendments made to this before I teach it again, with some clarity over some of the tasks. 

Thanks to students for their feedback on the module. It will certainly be repeated next year.

Windrush Child - Student Workbook from GeoBlogs

I'd welcome feedback from those who see this post, or who use the booklet.

Immigration and Empire

This is an important podcast for any #geographyteacher covering migration in a British context. Ian Sanjay Patel’s overview of postwar British migration policy and its links to empire is essential listening @UCL_SPRC https://t.co/YO1Q3E37JG

— Decolonising Geography (@DecoloniseGeog) April 17, 2021

Adding this book to our departmental library.

A global history of post-War migration and the changes in Britain since 1945. 

'Windrush Child' - other arrivals

We are working through first teaching of the 'Windrush Child' book, based on Benjamin Zephaniah's own family history and the experiences of the Windrush Generation.

The Spotify playlist has been growing, as we have moved through a few different periods of the book, and music is referenced.

It can be seen (and listened to) here.

In the middle section of the book, Leonard's family move to share a house with a family called the Barry's.

They are from Ireland and we are told that they also moved to England for "a better life" and more options.

The Irish diaspora has taken many different forms over the years and occurred for various reasons historically.

There was large scale emigration during the 1940s and 1950s.

This University College Cork website refers to the 1950s in Ireland as being described as a period of "doom and gloom" or "the lost decade".

Agriculture, the traditional mainstay of the Irish economy, continued to decline throughout the 1950s. The state dedicated insufficient effort to developing new industries to fill the gap created by the demise of, in particular, of the small farm rural economy. As a consequence, little work was available for thousands of young people coming of age. Unemployment remained high throughout and it was estimated that from 1949 to 1956, real national income rose by only 8 per cent, at a time when the average increase in European equated to approximately 40 per cent.

Final trivia for you:

I was reading today that Bob Marley's wife was called Rita, the same name as Leonard's mum.

'Windrush Child' continued...

Year 7 are continuing to explore the book...

I posted on Twitter recently about a new unit which I am developing based on the Benjamin Zephaniah book 'Windrush Child'.

This has been going quite well, and there are likely to be a number of posts as I work through it for the first time. I've already started to add a few more elements to it and notice some clarifications that are needed for the original booklet that I created, for the 2nd edition in the next academic year.

As always, as soon as a new unit is started, stories begin to emerge which are related to it. It's amazing how often that happens.

Several weeks ago, the continued issues of the Windrush Generation to get proper compensation for their plight was on the front page of one national newspaper.

Barbados also declared itself a republic.

Princes Charles was there and as part of his speech he referred to the legacy of slavery in the Caribbean (which includes Jamaica):

"From the darkest days of our past, and the appalling atrocity of slavery, which forever stains our histories, the people of this island forged their path with extraordinary fortitude.

"Emancipation, self-government and independence were your way-points. Freedom, justice and self-determination have been your guides."

We also explored the importance of the lion to students, as the main character is told by his grandma that "lions always roar".

We referenced the imagery of the lion.

Rastfarianism is a religion which developed in Jamaica, and there is a character in the book called Brother Book who has the characteristic dreadlocks, which are also sported by Benjamin himself. Here's Bob Marley.

"Iron Lion Zion"

Present day musical legacy in Barbados is being maintained by Rihanna: who was declared as a National Hero as it became a republic.

Finally, here are some Windrush stories which I also referred to: