{"id":341,"date":"2018-03-08T17:42:18","date_gmt":"2018-03-08T17:42:18","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/uwm.edu\/humanities\/?p=341"},"modified":"2024-05-29T14:36:14","modified_gmt":"2024-05-29T14:36:14","slug":"how-do-you-talk-to-kids-about-race-uwm-researcher-offers-advice","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/uwm.edu\/humanities\/2018\/03\/08\/how-do-you-talk-to-kids-about-race-uwm-researcher-offers-advice\/","title":{"rendered":"How do you talk to kids about race? UWM researcher offers advice"},"content":{"rendered":"

Children are constantly trying to make sense of their world, says Erin Winkler, which makes it important to talk about difficult issues like race. \u201cLittle kids are trying to solve puzzles, see patterns and understand rules. And we\u2019re teaching them to categorize and match things like shapes and colors at this age.\u201d (UWM Photo\/Troye Fox)<\/small><\/i><\/p>\n

Racism remains a problem in America, despite hopes that the country was ready to leave that problem behind and become a \u201cpost-racial\u201d society. But parents still are often using post-racial language in talking about race to young children.<\/p>\n

That, says Erin Winkler, is a mistake.<\/p>\n

\u201cAdults often think they should avoid talking with young children about race or racism because doing so would cause them to notice race or make them racist. In fact, the opposite is true,\u201d she recently wrote in a Buzzfeed post, \u201cHere\u2019s How to Raise Race Conscious Children.\u201d (http:\/\/bzfd.it\/2GLIeKI<\/a>)<\/p>\n

Winkler, an associate professor of Africology and urban studies, has studied the way children absorb the lessons of race, and found that children form racial impressions from environmental cues around them. That makes frank, age-appropriate discussions of race an important part of their awareness of racial issues.<\/p>\n

She is frequently invited to speak to parents and teachers about how to talk about race with children, and has served as a consultant to the National Museum of African American History and Culture.<\/p>\n

\u201cIt\u2019s hard to talk to little kids about race,\u201d Winkler acknowledges. \u201cPeople prefer to talk to older children, who can appreciate the abstractions we\u2019re comfortable using to discuss this complex issue.<\/p>\n

\u201cOn the other hand, parents want to answer their children\u2019s questions.\u201d<\/p>\n

Young children are not blind to race, Winkler points out. They see who is more likely to hold higher-status jobs at their school or doctor\u2019s office, or \u201cwho\u2019s the Disney princess.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cWhen I talk to adults, I encounter this general notion is that little kids are colorblind and don\u2019t have biases,\u201d she says. \u201cAdults are frequently surprised that we see consistent biases in kids who are 3 to 5 years old. And they want to know why,\u00a0 because adults think you\u2019re only biased if you are a bad person or are racist, and how can a young child be a racist or a bad person?\u201d<\/p>\n

Winkler says it\u2019s not a question of good or bad, but rather the way young minds absorb cues from their environment. And this points to the need for adults to help them.<\/p>\n

\u201cLittle kids are trying to solve puzzles, see patterns and understand rules,\u201d Winkler said. \u201cAnd we\u2019re teaching them to categorize and match things like shapes and colors at this age.<\/span><\/figure>\n

\u201cIf children don\u2019t get answers about, for example, why they see disproportionally white people in this neighborhood and black people in this neighborhood, they might think, \u2018There\u2019s a rule no one\u2019s talking about.\u2019\u201d<\/p>\n

If children ask questions about this, adults may become uncomfortable, and may even give gruff responses that make kids think they are in trouble.<\/p>\n

Which brings us to the second issue Winkler addresses: There are systemic forms of racism that are difficult for children to comprehend, but can also be difficult for adults to recognize or admit \u2013 and discuss with kids.<\/p>\n

\u201cParents of color have to be concerned about demoralizing their children with talk of systemic unfairness,\u201d she says. \u201cWhite parents need to consider how to give kids a sense of responsibility, as opposed to guilt and shame.\u201d<\/p>\n

She points out that, in order to speak effectively about race, adults need to first get comfortable talking about race with other adults. That means challenging our preconceptions and attitudes.<\/p>\n

\u201cIf you can\u2019t talk to a 40-year-old about why this is happening, then you won\u2019t be able to talk to a 4-year-old about why this is happening,\u201d she said. \u201cGet rid of the guilt. It\u2019s not your fault that you weren\u2019t taught in schools about how systemic structures of racism have created many inequalities.<\/p>\n

\u201cBut it is your responsibility now to learn about it, to practice talking to adults about it, and to do something about it. Then you can learn to teach children about it in age-appropriate ways.\u201d<\/p>\n

In her talks to adults, Winkler offers practical ideas about how to talk to kids about race. She suggests using the concept of fairness, which is clear and powerful to young children, but also to empower children to respond to unfairness.<\/p>\n

\u201cYou can empower a 4-year-old by pointing out people in the community who are addressing inequality,\u201d Winkler says, \u201cor have them participate with you in efforts to, for example, work with the school library to ensure adequate representation of characters of color in books.\u201d<\/p>\n

Winkler\u2019s approach to talking to children is based on what one researcher called her \u201cgroundbreaking\u201d framework of \u201ccomprehensive racial learning,\u201d which Winkler first introduced in her 2012 book \u201cLearning Race, Learning Place: Shaping Racial Identities and Ideas in African American Childhoods.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cWe\u2019ve been looking at what adults tell kids, focusing on kids as empty vessels,\u201d she said. \u201cWhat we need to do is focus on the kids as active learners and agents, fielding and interpreting messages they are getting from all over \u2013 parents, teachers, media messages, and just what they see in the world.\u201d<\/p>\n

By Greg Walz-Chojnacki, University Relations<\/strong><\/em><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Racism remains a problem in America, despite hopes that the country was ready to leave that problem behind and become a \u201cpost-racial\u201d society. But parents still are often using post-racial language in talking about race to young children. That, says Erin Winkler, is a mistake.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1234,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"footnotes":"","uwm_wg_additional_authors":[]},"categories":[6],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-341","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-news"],"yoast_head":"\nHow do you talk to kids about race? 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