Schools funding to fight extremism
Schools Secretary Ed Balls has announced £4.68 million of funding to help schools prevent violent extremism.
He said schools would be given a toolkit to help teachers discuss terrorism, racism and bullying with pupils.
Mr Balls said the initiative was a direct response to a call from schools for support and advice to tackle extremism.
"This is not about asking teachers to be monitors and to be doing surveillance, that's not their job. But if something concerns them, we want them to know who to turn to for help," he said.
Concerns mentioned by schools during their discussions with the Government include pupils taking far-right literature into the classroom, a primary age pupil talking in the playground about the "7/7 martyrs" and a supply teacher leaving a book in a school library which contained a passage about martyrdom.
But despite the extreme examples quoted within the toolkit, Mr Balls said the initiative was about prompting discussion, not snooping.
"There are very rare examples of children under 11 showing early warning signs," he admitted.
He said the Government had started working with secondary schools 12 months ago but primary schools had asked to be included in the discussions.
"Dealing with violent extremism is nothing new for the UK and we have learnt from past experience that a security response is not enough.
"We need to address the underlying issues that can drive people into the hands of violent, extremist groups and encourage local communities to come together to expose the flaws in extremists' arguments."
