Here's a slow, incremental step:
Quit teaching Black History month in kindergarten and early grades.
Doing so just calls out to kids that there must be something different about people who have certain degrees of melanin for skin color.
MLK? George Washington Carver? Frederick Douglass? Teach about them as great Americans; not great black Americans.
Kids don't need to learn to categorize racially.
Perhaps around Grade 4 the history of slavery and resulting badness etc etc is appropriate to fold in to a curriculum.
that's a noble sentiment, but it's sticking your head in the sand. kids see what is going around them, they overhear the news, etc. pretending that race doesn't exist or isn't important is going to clash with what they know.
not saying anything to kids about race isn't going to work, IMO. neither is too much enforced racial awareness. the solution is to be thoughtful and tailor the message to kids. i really liked this piece:
Rebecca Peretz-Lange
I've been seeing lots of posts by really thoughtful folks encouraging people to talk with their white kids about race/racism. There's such beautiful intentions behind these posts, and we as white folks absolutely need to be taking an active role in stopping the pandemic of racial violence at its developmental roots, in our kids. That's why it's so painful for me to see suggestions for conversations that might *not* effectively improve kids' racial beliefs, as intended, and might even make them worse. I'm getting back onto my soapbox to share evidence from cognitive science that
*NOT ALL RACE TALK WITH KIDS IS HELPFUL.*
I'm not saying "don't do it" -- you should!! -- I'm saying that it can very easily backfire. We need to take use evidence, not just our intuitions, to determine what will be effective, given that racism is so easy to inadvertently pass along. Here are 5 different ways that these conversations can inadvertently reinforce racism among young white children (ages 3-8ish), with suggestions for what to say instead:
1) Research shows that young kids' racial beliefs align with the beliefs *they think people around them hold*. The impulse to conform, beliefs-wise, is generally helpful, because it helps kids follow norms and fit into society, but unfortunately it means that *if kids think lots of people are racist, they will also be racist.* So, teaching young children that racism is common can normalize it in dangerous ways.
INSTEAD OF: "Lots of people, and lots of police, are mean to Black people." [establishes a norm of racism]
SAY: "In our family, we like having friends who look all different from each other!" [establishes a norm of appreciating diversity. read on for suggested ways to talk about police and racial disparities]
2) Research shows that kids prefer people who are similar to themselves. Kids absolutely see race, so I'm not saying that by pointing out racial differences you'll will be showing them something they don't already see, but you WILL be amplifying their existing tendency to prefer people who are like them. Research shows that *simply verbally labeling groups is enough to trigger children's tendency to prefer people who are like them.*
INSTEAD OF: "See your skin? You're white! We're white!"
SAY: "You and [Black friend] both love ice-cream!" [highlights shared traits. there ARE great ways to talk about racial differences -- read on to #5 which encourages telling kids about structural differences in people's lived experiences -- but simply labeling groups without any additional context isn't the ideal approach]
3) Research shows that verbally labeling groups of people using noun-phrases (like "Black people") leads kids to view racial groups as biologically "real" categories, promoting prejudice. It's HOW you talk (using race labels), not WHAT you say (good/bad things) that makes the impact here: Even if you're saying neutral or positive things, *labeling racial groups with nouns leads children to view racial groups as biologically real* (and to view someone's race as informative about their intrinsic nature and abilities), promoting prejudice.
INSTEAD OF: "Black people are being treated worse than white people" [important message but still uses nouns to refer to groups of people]
SAY: "This boy, Michael, is Black, and was treated very badly" [adjectives referring to specific individuals. using a specific personal story can actually be very powerful, even though I know we want to convey that racism is systemic and pervasive. for ways to talk about pervasive differences between whole groups of people without triggering kids' intuition that these groups are biologically real, read on!]
4) Research shows that kids prefer "higher-status" groups -- or groups that they see having more social power or having more/nicer stuff. *Pointing out to kids that some racial groups are systematically higher-status or lower-status can therefore lead kids to prefer higher-status groups and be prejudiced against lower-status groups.*
INSTEAD OF: "White people live in nicer neighborhoods than Black people" or "Black people are in jail way more than white people"
SAY: Don't highlight status differences without providing any explanation for them -- see below.
5) Research shows that kids automatically come up with explanations for WHY some groups are higher-status and others are lower-status. Specifically, the explanation they intuitively come up with is that lower-status groups must be intrinsically inferior (biologically less intelligent or innately worse somehow), rather than extrinsically disadvantaged (structurally excluded from opportunities and resources). Children's minds assume that any status differences between groups are explained by groups' intrinsic natures, rather than by groups' extrinsic circumstances. Therefore, *pointing out status differences between racial groups (in wealth, power, treatment, incarceration, etc.) will lead children to assume that lower-status groups are intrinsically inferior, promoting prejudice.*
INSTEAD OF: "Police are hurting Black people but not white people." [children will assume that the reason for these patterns is Black people's intrinsic inferiority or violent natures, esp since white children tend to trust systems/authorities as meritocratic]
SAY: "Police are hurting Black people but not white people. Why do you think that is? I'll tell you: it ISN'T because Black people act differently than white people. It IS because the police are being unfair, and the laws are unfair, and that's really really bad." [listen to your child's explanation for the inequality, explicitly deny the intrinsic explanation for the inequality, provide an extrinsic explanation instead, and explicitly call the extrinsic reason unfair and bad]
Final note: The *specific language* I'm recommending has not been vetted or evaluated as an anti-racist intervention. These are my personal suggestions based on my review of robust and well-established findings from the field, and my educated guesses about what will be effective. Given the urgency of the current moment, and the suggestions I've seen floating around that are even less evidence-based, I thought remaining silent was more harmful than sharing these suggestions. But please know that science is slow, nonlinear, and complicated!
