Abstract
Digital technology and interactive media are increasingly popular tools that shape young children's perceptions. They can be used in developmentally appropriate ways to help young children learn about issues of race, diversity, equity, and inclusion (DEI), especially considering that children's attitudes about people who are different from them begin to form at birth. One way in which digital programs for young children can offer significant benefit is by helping them develop the habit of inquiry and reflection that is the essence of cultural humility. A case study of how one organization is working to create DEI digital learning opportunities for young children designed to foster cultural humility is presented. Lessons learned from this innovative process of creating an early childhood curriculum focused on DEI are offered.
TopIntroduction
This chapter discusses the literature in child development that supports the appropriateness of addressing issues of race and racism with young children and further asserts its importance to early childhood educational experiences. It also examines existing resources designed to help educators and parents of young children reduce bias and foster social justice and tolerance in schools and in society at large. Given the increased use of technology in education and the fact that most schools and districts consider digital learning to be an essential part of their teaching and learning strategy (Davis, 2020), the chapter focuses on digital learning resources that support diversity education. A case study of one digital learning resource provider that applies cultural humility in content creation for young children is presented as an example of how multidisciplinary teams can collaborate to design, create, and facilitate age-appropriate learning opportunities for children, helping them make sense of their experiences of racial and ethnic diversity and injustice. This case study offers an opportunity to understand how cultural humility can be applied in an educational context and its potential impact on the work of those who teach and/or entertain children. It is an example of how cultural humility propelled an organization to critically evaluate its products for children and implement a framework for continuous growth as content creators.
Key Terms in this Chapter
Black, Indigenous, and People of Color (BIPOC): A term used to highlight the unique relationship to whiteness that Indigenous and Black people have, which shapes all people of colors’ experiences of and relationship to white supremacy.
Lived Histories: An individual’s or a group’s past events and experiences that acknowledge their own account of perceptions, interpretations, and feelings of these events.
Structural Inequality: A system of privilege created by institutions within an economy. A system in which prevailing social institutions offer an unfair or prejudicial distinction between different segments of the population in a society.
Equality: The state of being equal, especially in status, rights, and opportunities.
Cultural Humility: A personal commitment to the lifelong process of self-reflection and critique, which involves questioning one’s own identity, beliefs, and possible inherent biases to understand and learn about other cultures. A willingness to humbly acknowledge what one does not know, to express curiosity about cultures, and to update one’s understanding based on new information.
Cultural Appropriation: Actions in which one takes an aspect of someone else’s culture and using it for one’s personal interest.
Emotional Ability: Ability to manage one’s own emotions and those of others. Ability to remain calm in emotionally trying situations; ability to evaluate oneself socially and understand how one’s behavior is being perceived by others; ability to understand how other feel and put oneself “in someone else’s shoes”; ability to pick up on social cues and communicate well with others; ability to act from internal motivation.
Race: A set of groups into which humans can be categorized, described by physical traits and geographic origin.
Fairness: Absence of prejudice or favoritism toward an individual or group that provides a leveled playing field regardless of inherent differences.
Ethnicity: A dynamic, constant evolving property of individual identity and group organization, which is the product of actions taken by groups as they shape and reshape their self-definition and culture. Also constructed by external social, economic, and political processes and actors as they shape and reshape ethnic categories and definitions. Constructed out of language, religion, culture, appearance, ancestry, or regionality.
Cultural Appreciation: Actions motivated by desire to understand and learn about another culture in an effort to broaden one’s perspective and to connect with others cross-culturally.
Antiracism: Active process of consistently identifying, describing, and dismantling racism by changing systems, organizational structures, policies, and attitudes so that power is redistributed and shared equitably.
Equity: The absence of avoidable or remediable differences among groups of people, whether those groups are defined socially, economically, demographically, or geographically. Synonymous with “more for those who need it.”
Culture: Learned and shared patterns in behaviors and beliefs that creates identity for those in the group but also serves to distinguish them from other groups.