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Saturday, September 12, 2009

There's no such thing as (racist) Santa Claus

This week Newsweek released an excerpt of a very interesting study (with an albeit tabloid title: Is your baby racist?) about racism in children.

For next class, I'd like you to read the article here and then do the following in your journals:

1. bring 3 questions you have about the article--or questions that peeked your curiosity
2. list 3 passages or quotes that really grabbed you and briefly explain why you chose them.
3. And finally--I'd like you to share the article with your parents/guardians and have a discussion with them about the article. Some guiding questions: Did they talk to you about race when you were young? Why or why not? Is it appropriate to discuss race with young children? If so, what's the best way to do so? How do we cope with teaching children about race when we have competing black and white images of what fictional Santa looks like (sorry kids, he's not real!)?

Feel free to use the questions above or use your own and then:

4. write a reflection about the discussion you had with your parents. This should be about 1/2-1 page in your journals.

Hope you have fun with this!

Newsweek Article