Young children notice and think about race. Studies have shown that infants begin noticing skin color and showing preference by race as early as 3-6 months, and by 3-5 years of age, they are already beginning to internalize racial bias. As early childhood educators, we understand how vital a role we play in fostering anti-racism and supporting positive racial identities in young children.
While we strive for creating a classroom environment that is centered around inclusivity, kindness, and tolerance, there is always room for growth, to learn, to do more, to do better. We’ll be reflecting on what we can do to promote anti-racism at Joyful Noise going forward, including staff trainings, and incorporating more teachings and conversations about race, diversity and culture into daily lessons.
Below are links to resources that we think are very valuable as we seek ways to do better.
Articles/PDF’s:
Three-Month-Olds, But Not Newborns, Prefer Own-Race Faces: https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC2566511/
Our Children, Our Workforce: Why We Must Talk About Race and Racism in Early Childhood Education: https://www.childcareexchange.com/…/our-children-our-workf…/
Children Are Not Colorblind: How Young Children Learn Race: https://inclusions.org/…/2017/11/Children-are-Not-Colorblin…
Raising a Race-Conscious Child: https://cupofjo.com/2020/06/raising-race-conscious-children/
Talking About Race- I Am a Parent or Caregiver: https://nmaahc.si.edu/…/talking-…/audiences/parent-caregiver
Stages In Children’s Development of Racial/Cultural Identity & Attitudes: https://www.uua.org/…/derman-s…/1206_233_identity_stages.pdf
Five Ways to Reduce Racial Bias In Your Children: https://greatergood.berkeley.edu/…/five_ways_to_reduce_raci…
Becoming Upended: Teaching and Learning About Race and Racism With Young Children and Their Families: https://www.naeyc.org/…/m…/teaching-learning-race-and-racism
10 Tips For Teaching and Talking to Kids About Race: https://www.embracerace.org/…/embraceracetipsenglish-(2).pdf
Talking Race With Young Children: https://www.npr.org/…/7167…/talking-race-with-young-children
Books:
Diverse Book Finder: https://diversebookfinder.org/
Children’s Books to Help With Conversations About Race and Racism: https://www.kdl.org/…/childrens-books-help-conversations-ab…
10 Tips For Reading Picture Books With Children Through a Race-Conscious Lens: https://www.embracerace.org/…/10-tips-for-reading-picture-b…
31 Children’s Books to Support Conversations About Race, Racism and Resistance: https://blog.usejournal.com/31-childrens-books-to-support-c…
