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Schools will be on the front line in the Government’s battle to eradicate terrorism, Ed Balls, the Schools Secretary, said today, as he announced £4.68 million of funding to help teachers to try to prevent violent extremism.

An anti-extremism “tool kit” will be given to teachers as part of the strategy, with advice on how to run discussions about terrorism, racism and bullying with their pupils.

The announcement came as it was revealed that some pupils had brought far-right literature into the classroom and that one supply teacher had left a book in a school library with a long passage about martyrdom. Another primary aged pupil talked in the playground about the "duty of all true Muslims to prepare for jihad war as we grown up" and referred to the "7/7 martyrs". The examples are contained in the new guidance for schools.

Mr Balls said that the idea — a central plank in the Government’s Prevent strategy to combat terrorism — was a direct response to a call from schools for support on tackling extremism.

He denied that his department intended to use teachers as spies. “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.

The “learning together to be safe kit” encourages teachers to support pupils whom they think could be vulnerable to extremist ideas and suggests activities for creating links to the local community.

Education is at the forefront of the Government’s strategy to abolish the terrorist threat. Ministers want to citizenship lessons to be taught in madrassas (mosque schools), introduce Muslim-to-Muslim mentoring schemes and broadening the school curriculum to include teaching about Islamic culture, history and religion.

Mr Balls said: “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, to reject cruelty and violence and promote our core British values of tolerance, liberty, fairness and respect of the rule of law.”

Christine Blower, acting general secretary of the National Union of Teachers, said that for the objectives to be achieved, trust had to be maintained in schools.

“No teacher will ignore obvious information about a specific, real threat, but it is vital that teachers are able to discuss with and listen to pupils, without feeling that they have to report every word.”

She added: “Tiny, violent political groups can present a significant threat to large numbers of people. Terrorist threats have to be tackled. The significant section within the guidance on the curriculum argues for much greater professional freedom to be allowed to teachers who are on the front line of promoting community cohesion.”

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