February is a time we set aside each year to celebrate Black History Month (BHM).
With all the racial tensions and civil unrest over the past year, now is a good time to highlight and teach children about diversity in your early childhood education program.
Child Care Aware of America recently published the below four strategies for incorporating diversity, equity and inclusion into your early childhood program on an ongoing basis.
Lesson Planning
- Invite families to tell their own history.
- Children and their families can share pictures, stories, etc. that showcase their culture and traditions.
Environments
- Ensure that your class is represented in your environment.
- Children should be seeing pictures of themselves and of people in their culture that are currently making history.
Conversations
- Talk about the new Vice President and how she is the first female, first Black and first Asian-American Vice President of the United States.
- Discuss someone with whom children can make a connection, but also be explicit in honoring that individual’s culture and/or ethnic group.
- You can also start with conversations children bring up during large group and learning times and build upon them.
Make Connections…Quickly
- Try not to spend too much time on a lot of overstimulating details when talking about a particular person or event.
- Remember, short and sweet with young children. You can use the acronym K.I.S.S. (keep it short and sweet) to help you remember.
No matter what the holiday or observance, be sure to think about how you can celebrate in an inclusive and developmentally appropriate way with young children.