Life Gives You Lemons...Peel 'em!

~Quotes~


To get us thinking about why we form prejudices, please take a look at a few quotes from Noel's (2008) Developing Multicultural Educators:

"Many people react to discussions of stereotyping, prejudice, and racism by denying that they hold any stereotypes or have any prejudices."  (p. 43)

"Beliefs such as these deny the presence of stereotyping, prejudice, and racism within society and within ourselves and indicate a lack of understanding about the role prejudice and the other concepts play in our daily lives, beliefs, values, attitudes and practices."  (p. 43)

"The prejudice and racism that are embedded within society, that are in part constitutive of society, have framed the society in which we live."  (p. 43)

"In coming to understand our own identity, we must recognize the indelible impact that stereotyping, prejudice, and racism have played in our identity development."  (p. 43) 

"...Our identities have been forged with and fused with that of our society, including the stereotypes, prejudices, and racism within that society."  (p. 44)

"The basic answer to the question of why we stereotype is that we encounter so much information and so many experiences every day that we are not able to assimilate all of it.  Put simply, we are overloaded by the world.  In order to keep from being cognitively overwhelmed, our brain has developed the mechanism of stereotyping, of creating categories to sort large amounts of information."  (p. 45)



~Article~

So...now what?

Now that considerations have been made as to why we stereotype, please read the following article, Talking to your Child about Hatred and Prejudice (2001), which is helpful in discovering the developmental stages children go through in recognizing differences.  You will find tips on speaking to children about differences (and not avoiding this).

Talking to your Child about Hatred and Prejudice

http://www.adl.org/issue_education/hateprejudice/print.asp





~Activity~

One idea in this article is summarized in a step-by-step activity below:

Activity: (can be used at home with neighborhood children or in schools/churches)
Materials needed:

• Bowl of lemons (enough for 1 per child)
• Knife (adult use only)
• Wet-naps!

Process:

1. Gather group of children and give each one a lemon.
2. Ask children to get to know your lemon. Smell it, touch it, roll it, throw it in the air, notice any
   markings or dents.
3. Collect all the lemons, and place them back in the bowl. Ask the children to find their lemons among the bunch and take it back.
4. Ask the children how they recognized their lemons. Children might reply, “Mine was the biggest.” “Mine had 2 dents.” “Mind had a few tiny spots at the bottom.”
5. Launch a discussion about how people are just like these lemons: different shapes, sizes, shades of color, different “dents and bruises.” Ask children for examples of differences they see in school, at church, on the playground, in the neighborhood, on the bus.
6. Collect the lemons a second time. This time, peel the lemons and return them to the bowl without their protective skins. Now ask the children to again find their lemon. They may say, “But they all look the same!” This opens the door to discuss how people, too, are just the same inside, even though they look so different on the outside.

"While it may take only 15 minutes and a bowl of lemons to teach young children about diversity, it takes a conscious effort and a lifetime of attention to ensure that lesson is remembered. As parents, we must provide that commitment."

quote from: http://www.adl.org/issue_education/hateprejudice/print.asp





Questions for consideration and discussion:

~ Once the topic of differences is brought up, where do we go from there?

~ The article mentions adults often speaking of other groups in a pleasant way to their children when they are alike themselves, such as "See...they do _____, just like we do".  Is this a good or bad idea?  Where may it lead?

~ Do you agree that we are all prejudiced by nature as some suggest?  Do we all naturally notice differences?  Does that mean those differences are bad?

~ Many suggestions were brought up in this article in order to help young ones recognize that differences are ok.  What about young adults?  What strategies have you found that can be used to open up discussions to other age groups who may be further along in their development of ideas?

~ What if what we are teaching goes against the child's upbringing or what they constantly hear at home?



Resources

Noel, J. (2008). Developing multicultural educators (2nd ed.). Long Grove, Ill.: Waveland Press.

Stern-LaRosa, Caryl (February 2001). Talking to your Child about Hatred and Prejudice. ADL: Anti-Defamation League. July 8, 2011, http://www.adl.org/issue_education/hateprejudice/print.asp.