Black History

I'm hearing quite a bit of push back on Black History Month and whether there should be such a thing or not.

The other day I went to two educational supply stores gathering materials for this semester for my children. It dawned on me that Black History month is February and I was thinking....ok this is usually the time that there are at least some materials available and in the past years there is usually a display and some hype about it in January (so that classroom teachers can get materials for Feb). There were no displays. When I asked, I was shown a couple of books that had 1-3 pages of Black people and a few other items that basically had a short blurb about a handful of people. Then there were maybe 4-5 different materials (info cards, coloring books, activity books) with the same few people. I made a comment and the clerk got defensive saying they had soooo many materials. In her defense, the other store had even fewer items. It was even tough to find books or activities with Black children as the characters.

I've been homeschooling my children for 22 years, so people may be confused by my surprise in what I found. It's just that I've never been much for the standard materials. What surprised me even more is that I really think there were more materials available when my older kids were younger than there are now!

What do you think children should to be taught regarding "Black History"?

 

Everything. The Good. The Bad And everything in between.

Unfortunately society, especially in the good ol' US, seems more focused on pushing a false homogenized view of history for quite awhile now which explains the seeming lack of materiel concerning Black History. You will find things like this more often than not however :

http://nypost.com/2016/01/18/kids-book-about-george-washingtons-happy-slaves-pulled-from-shelves/

 

If you'd like, I could contact my Pop about it and get some suggestions from him. He's got a Doctorate in education and knows quite a bit about black history.

 

That would be great!

I was talking with my best friend's daughter. She just finished her Masters in Human Rights Education and she's also interested in finding good sources of information.

I just find the whole thing rather obnoxious. I'm going over the texts that the district provides for the kids and basically they are repeating things over and over again each year...MAYBE just going a bit more in-depth. Yet so many topics are completely missed and then many are barely touched on. Now history and science are considered to be more "fluff" with the new push to Common Core.

 

one of the best threads on this forum is called "respect where it's due" an old friend of mine created it...there is a wealth of information/great stories on black history

I wish we didn't have Black History Month...instead black history should be taught in American History every day...every where...

 

Agreed.

I forgot about that thread, thanks for reminding me!

I'd like to get this one back to what people would specifically like to see taught in the schools.

I'm pretty good at finding resources that are available and making them more child friendly. Unfortunately, most classroom teachers don't have the time, resources, or permission to do the same. I actually think they have a bit more ability to include more with the existence of Black History Month. But the materials readily available are extremely limited.

 

I've reached out to him. I'll post back as soon as I talk to him. Probably be tomorrow.

 

K,

I'm so sorry this is taking so long. Still working on it.

 

No problem. I'm not in a rush. I really appreciate you doing it!

 

Try these;

K, also, I was told to ask you how old your children are?

 

Thanks hon!

They are 12 (almost 13) and 9