Sunday, November 06, 2005
Learning about Diversity, Disability and Discrimination
Today we taught in JR OWL about diversity, disability and discrimination. What a great class. The youth really participated well and shared their own views and experiences about this topic.
First, instead of a reading, we played a song by Jewel, "Pieces of You". This is quite a serious song, about discrimination, hate crimes. The lyrics are pretty explicit - and the word faggot is used for one verse. Some of the kids started laughing as they found it uncomfortable. I told them that if they couldn't keep quiet, they should step outside during this time period - one boy chose to step outside for about two minutes, then came back in when he had calmed down. (After that he was fine) This song was actually very effective in setting the stage for the topic of the day - and we told the kids that today's subject (as some others in the future) was about a serious topic.
Next - we brainstormed what the word "diversity" means. This was a great discussion - everyone participated well. A great example of diversity was the colours in a smartie box. When one person brought up human diversity, we then talked about the many ways that humans could be diverse (or different).
Third - we talked about how people could be disabled. What does this word really mean? We took our time, and tried to think of really specific examples of each category - so for example, we talked about how you could be developmentally disabled, physically disabled, mentally ill, (with really specific examples like autism, ADD, anxiety, depression, suicidal). Many youth shared stories about their friends and families. For example, one girl's mother works with deaf clients, so she could share about this.
We talked about why it might matter whether someone you know is disabled (a friend or boyfriend/girlfriend). One youth said that if you knew, you could help them with whatever their disability was (I guess she meant to provide them with support). When asked whether they would consider dating someone who was disabled, they mostly said yes, if the person was nice.
I asked if they would know if they met someone if they had a disability. They realized you might not always know. Also we talked about the fact that sometimes things happen in life where you become disabled later in life and you can't always know what might happen in the future.
Next - we talked about discrimination - we asked the kids to identify how you could discriminate against people - overtly (or consciously) - but also by accident (without realizing)... we talked about stereotypes - one boy's example was "if someone is black thinking they might be in a gang".
We also talked about what they could do if their friend or boyfriend/girlfriend was being discriminated against. One immediate reaction was that he would go up to the nasty person and say something to defend his friend. Another youth said "but what if he was bigger and stronger than you?". One girl said she would go to someone in authority to get help. We talked about various non-violent options that might be available, including raising awareness among groups of people, like at school.
Overall it went well - and they were great - even though it was pretty much a solid hour of sitting and talking. All of them participated well and had a lot to say on these subjects.
First, instead of a reading, we played a song by Jewel, "Pieces of You". This is quite a serious song, about discrimination, hate crimes. The lyrics are pretty explicit - and the word faggot is used for one verse. Some of the kids started laughing as they found it uncomfortable. I told them that if they couldn't keep quiet, they should step outside during this time period - one boy chose to step outside for about two minutes, then came back in when he had calmed down. (After that he was fine) This song was actually very effective in setting the stage for the topic of the day - and we told the kids that today's subject (as some others in the future) was about a serious topic.
Next - we brainstormed what the word "diversity" means. This was a great discussion - everyone participated well. A great example of diversity was the colours in a smartie box. When one person brought up human diversity, we then talked about the many ways that humans could be diverse (or different).
Third - we talked about how people could be disabled. What does this word really mean? We took our time, and tried to think of really specific examples of each category - so for example, we talked about how you could be developmentally disabled, physically disabled, mentally ill, (with really specific examples like autism, ADD, anxiety, depression, suicidal). Many youth shared stories about their friends and families. For example, one girl's mother works with deaf clients, so she could share about this.
We talked about why it might matter whether someone you know is disabled (a friend or boyfriend/girlfriend). One youth said that if you knew, you could help them with whatever their disability was (I guess she meant to provide them with support). When asked whether they would consider dating someone who was disabled, they mostly said yes, if the person was nice.
I asked if they would know if they met someone if they had a disability. They realized you might not always know. Also we talked about the fact that sometimes things happen in life where you become disabled later in life and you can't always know what might happen in the future.
Next - we talked about discrimination - we asked the kids to identify how you could discriminate against people - overtly (or consciously) - but also by accident (without realizing)... we talked about stereotypes - one boy's example was "if someone is black thinking they might be in a gang".
We also talked about what they could do if their friend or boyfriend/girlfriend was being discriminated against. One immediate reaction was that he would go up to the nasty person and say something to defend his friend. Another youth said "but what if he was bigger and stronger than you?". One girl said she would go to someone in authority to get help. We talked about various non-violent options that might be available, including raising awareness among groups of people, like at school.
Overall it went well - and they were great - even though it was pretty much a solid hour of sitting and talking. All of them participated well and had a lot to say on these subjects.
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Good (and important) topic. I think that's one of the things I really like about living here is the exposure to other cultures - where we lived before there was basically one race (with a very few exceptions), one religion (well, several, if you count all of the different branches of the baptist church), and one political affiliation. If nothing else, Paul would get a skewed view of the world.
I like the smartie analogy - that definitely works. In a comment on one of my posts, Gary used another nice example. When talking about some extremely bigoted folks he said: "[They] should be put in a room alone and told to paint the prettiest picture they can with only using one color of paint. Lets say White for an example. Without going into details on what color becomes what with each mixture…how would they feel being unable to make anything other than white?"
Sorry - I rambled a bit. This is a subject I feel very strongly about :).
I like the smartie analogy - that definitely works. In a comment on one of my posts, Gary used another nice example. When talking about some extremely bigoted folks he said: "[They] should be put in a room alone and told to paint the prettiest picture they can with only using one color of paint. Lets say White for an example. Without going into details on what color becomes what with each mixture…how would they feel being unable to make anything other than white?"
Sorry - I rambled a bit. This is a subject I feel very strongly about :).
# posted by 
: 5:01 a.m.
: 5:01 a.m.
Good for you! Kids today need these kinds of discussions, discussions that are woefully missing from our educators...et
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