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Healing Circles

In this touching clip, students share how their teachers engage in restorative justice by facilitating healing circles and making sure all student voices are heard. One student describes how she approached the teacher with some racist comments another student had made, and the teacher addressed it right away by having the students sit in the healing circle and engage in a classroom dialogue about the incident and how they can heal who has been hurt. It is a way of ensuring accountability and building a classroom community for the students.

Tthey go into a circle around the rug… so we talk about how people are being mean and so you look around and see if anybody has a hand up. If their hand’s up, that means they got hurt by you. So you have to say sorry and what you did.