Introduction
What is Anti-bias Education?
According to the ADL, anti-bias education is "an approach to teaching and learning designed to increase understanding of differences and their value to a respectful and civil society and to actively challenge bias, stereotyping and all forms of discrimination in schools and communities. It incorporates inclusive curriculum that reflects diverse experiences and perspectives, instructional methods that advance all students’ learning, and strategies to create and sustain safe, inclusive and respectful learning communities."
This tab is a collection of books and articles available at the Lakewood campus, other web resources, and books to read to children that promote anti-bias thinking and discussion.
Red Rocks and Web Resouces
Anti-Bias Education for Young Children and Ourselves by ISBN: 9781938113581Publication Date: 2020-05-26Becoming a skilled anti-bias teacher is a journey. With this volume's practical guidance, you'll grow in your ability to identify, confront, and eliminate barriers of prejudice, misinformation, and bias about specific aspects of personal and social identity. Most important, you'll find tips for helping staff and children learn to respect each other, themselves, and all people. Over the last three decades, educators across the nation and around the world have gained a wealth of knowledge and experience in anti-bias work. The result is a richer and more nuanced articulation of what is important in anti-bias education. Revolving around four core goals—identity, diversity, justice, and activism—individual chapters focus on culture and language, racial identity, family structures, gender identity, economic class, different abilities, and more.
- "Children Have the Fairest Things to Say": Young Children's Engagement with Anti-Bias Picture BooksThis qualitative case study investigated how an early childhood teacher and young children in a public White-predominant kindergarten classroom engaged in critical discussions of anti-bias issues including racism, White privilege, gender stereotypes, gender nonconformity, sexism, and homophobia. Through the use of interactive read-alouds using anti-bias picture books, the study's findings revealed that (a) the children could participate in thoughtful interactions during anti-bias read-aloud sessions and showed their complex understanding of race and gender issues; (b) the children needed substantial support to engage in activism against social injustices; (c) the children displayed a variety of responses to the discussion questions and activities related to gender-themed picture books as most children had difficulties resisting gender binary conceptions and stereotypes while some children, especially boys, were strongly empowered to embrace gender-nonconforming practices; and finally (d) some children internalized and enacted anti-immigrant, anti-Blackness, and racial/gender discriminatory actions to which the early childhood teacher often failed to either disrupt or intervene.
- Teaching about Identity, Racism, and Fairness: Engaging Young Children in Anti-Bias EducationAnti-bias education is an optimistic commitment to supporting children who live in a highly diverse and yet still inequitable world. Rather than a formula for a particular curriculum, it is an underpinning perspective and framework that permeates everything in early childhood education--including a teacher's interactions with children, families, and colleagues. Anti-bias education developed from the need to identify and prevent, as much as possible, the harmful emotional and psychological impacts on children from societal prejudice and bias. Its four core goals reflect research about these negative influences: (1) Identity; (2) Diversity; (3) Justice; and (4) Activism.
- Understanding Anti-Bias Education : Bringing the Four Core Goals to Every Facet of Your CurriculumLearning experiences include opportunities for children to understand and practice skills for identifying unfair and untrue images (stereotypes), comments (teasing, name-calling), and behaviors (isolation, discrimination) directed at themselves or at others. Because you have decided that these understandings and skills are essential for children, you provide literacy and numeracy discussions and activities in your classroom. Since many of the children are now gathering around, she invites everyone to join in the challenge. How can I learn what these are and provide accurate information and counter misinformation and stereotypes? * How can I use this topic to support and strengthen children's innate sense of justice and their capacity to change unfair situations to fair ones? * What learning materials do I need to gather to incorporate an anti-bias perspective into this curriculum topic?
- Understanding Race and Racism Among Immigrant Children: Insights into Anti-bias Education for All StudentsThis study examines relationship dynamics between young immigrant children in an afterschool program, and the ways in which these children become involved in racial discrimination and exclusion whereby one group perceives itself as majority. In order to explore and understand these children's narratives and behaviors in an in-depth and comprehensive way, this study utilizes a qualitative case study approach. Employing a sociocultural theoretical lens as an analytic tool, this study provides insight into how young immigrant children whose first languages are other than English are aware of linguistic and cultural differences among their peers in the afterschool context, and how they develop their social attitudes toward these differences, include or exclude children, and negotiate power in their relationships. The findings extend the discourse of racism beyond the Black–White framework, increase awareness and understanding of how racial discrimination plays out between young immigrant children, and highlight the need for anti-bias education for all students.
Discussions on Sensitive Issues by ISBN: 9781785602931Publication Date: 2015-10-07It is important that early educators view sensitive topics not as problems, but as subjects that are part of our global society. Early educators need to engage children in conversations in which to consider and share diverse perspectives. Early educators also should examine their own experiences when addressing these serious issues. This volume contains chapters that invite conversations about sensitive issues to help educators, children and families use real-life experiences to construct knowledge about their world and other people.
- The Education TrustA national non-profit advocacy organization that is committed to advancing policies and practices to dismantle the racial and economic barriers embedded in the American education system through our research and advocacy.
- Guide for Selecting Anti-Bias Children’s BooksA guide listing different factors to consider when deciding on the literature in a classroom so the including books can promote anti-biased education.
Board Books for Children
Antiracist Baby Board Book by Call Number: [ECE] Picture Book KENDI Antiracist Baby 2020 [Ages 0-2]ISBN: 9780593110416Publication Date: 2020-06-16A #1 New York Times Bestseller! From the National Book Award-winning author of Stamped from the Beginning and How to Be an Antiracist comes a fresh new board book that empowers parents and children to uproot racism in our society and in ourselves. Take your first steps with Antiracist Baby! Or rather, follow Antiracist Baby's nine easy steps for building a more equitable world. With bold art and thoughtful yet playful text, Antiracist Baby introduces the youngest readers and the grown-ups in their lives to the concept and power of antiracism. Providing the language necessary to begin critical conversations at the earliest age, Antiracist Baby is the perfect gift for readers of all ages dedicated to forming a just society. Featured in its own episode in the Netflix original show Bookmarks: Celebrating Black Voices, Good Morning America, NPR's Morning Edition, CBS This Morning, and more!
Love Makes a Family by Call Number: [ECE] Picture Book BEER Love 2018 [Ages: 0-4]ISBN: 9780525554226Publication Date: 2018-12-24This fun, inclusive board book celebrates the one thing that makes every family a family . . . and that's LOVE. Love is baking a special cake. Love is lending a helping hand. Love is reading one more book. In this exuberant board book, many different families are shown in happy activity, from an early-morning wake-up to a kiss before bed. Whether a child has two moms, two dads, one parent, or one of each, this simple preschool read-aloud demonstrates that what's most important in each family's life is the love the family members share.
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Picture Books for Children
Our Skin: a First Conversation about Race by Call Number: [ECE] Picture Book MADISON Our 2021ISBN: 9780593382639Publication Date: 2021-03-16Based on the research that race, gender, consent, and body positivity should be discussed with toddlers on up, this read-aloud board book series offers adults the opportunity to begin important conversations with young children in an informed, safe, and supported way. Developed by experts in the fields of early childhood and activism against injustice, this topic-driven board book offers clear, concrete language and beautiful imagery that young children can grasp and adults can leverage for further discussion. While young children are avid observers and questioners of their world, adults often shut down or postpone conversations on complicated topics because it's hard to know where to begin. Research shows that talking about issues like race and gender from the age of two not only helps children understand what they see, but also increases self-awareness, self-esteem, and allows them to recognize and confront things that are unfair, like discrimination and prejudice. This first book in the series begins the conversation on race, with a supportive approach that considers both the child and the adult. Stunning art accompanies the simple and interactive text, and the backmatter offers additional resources and ideas for extending this discussion.
Julián Is a Mermaid by Call Number: [ECE] Picture Book LOVE Julian 2018 [Ages 4-8]ISBN: 0763690457Publication Date: 2018-04-23Winner of a 2019 Stonewall Book Award In an exuberant picture book, a glimpse of costumed mermaids leaves one boy flooded with wonder and ready to dazzle the world. While riding the subway home from the pool with his abuela one day, Julián notices three women spectacularly dressed up. Their hair billows in brilliant hues, their dresses end in fishtails, and their joy fills the train car. When Julián gets home, daydreaming of the magic he's seen, all he can think about is dressing up just like the ladies in his own fabulous mermaid costume: a butter-yellow curtain for his tail, the fronds of a potted fern for his headdress. But what will Abuela think about the mess he makes -- and even more importantly, what will she think about how Julián sees himself? Mesmerizing and full of heart, Jessica Love's author-illustrator debut is a jubilant picture of self-love and a radiant celebration of individuality.
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