Intellectuelle

Does story time at your library bring in a more diverse crowd? How about the nearest zoo? The mall? The beach? A parade? YMCA?

That's without some of the kinds of field trips that might be too much for her tender years ...

Sherry, While the proposition will be difficult, it is necessary. Since you are homeschooling you have the option to choose different books and movies about African-Americans. Field trips to museums and cultural centers are also good and can expand your daughter's appreciation for all of God's creativity in the making of humans. Perhaps there are places you can volunteer with your little one, where she can be of help to others, who are not like her. My daughter-in-law does this with her kids-go to her blog: School@home.blogspot.com for that idea. One illustration I used with my now grown children it that of a flower garden. The flowers are different in color and shape and size, but God made them all and together they make a beautiful garden.
Finally, make sure she is not picking up ideas from any adults she encounters. Even in church people speak about their own prejudices. It is hard work but certainly worth it.

Sherry, my guess is that probably the more directly relational the exposure, the better. My daughter (5) has made comments to the effect, "I don't like _______, I don't like her face." Or, "I like _____ better than _____; she looks better." (Funny, this hasn't come up with my sons!)

We've talked about this, of course, and have pointed out that there are other things to appreciate about people besides their looks, and we work on offering respect regardless of whether we "like" someone or how they look or what they do. Actually, I've found that her words often sound more "serious" than they apparently are; she will still have a great time with someone whose looks she expressed lack of preference for. But I also encourage her to, for example, play with a child she says she doesn't like (unless there's a good reason for her not to!)

Most of us probably hold various prejudices ourselves, even if subtle, and might express it in ways that we don't realize but that our kids pick up on. I try to watch my own attitudes and speech so that I myself am modeling what I want my kids to learn.

Barbara,

We have watched movies, read books, etc. about people from all different cultures, but apparently something in one or more of those made my little girl somewhat prejudiced against black people in particular. She know a few black people, at church and at our homeschool co-op, both of which are as culturally diverse as the local elementary school. So it's not homeschooling that's limiting her exposure to other cultures. It's where we live. She would meet a lot more people from South Asia if she went to public school, but not African Americans.

All colleges have culture fairs.
If you are near a large city, there should be touring African drumming or dancing fairs.
You could visit Juneteenth or Martin Luther King celebrations.
When we moved from one state to another, we rejoiced that a church of our denomination was just a few blocks away. But when we visited there was not one person of color there. And they refused to even try to think about how to accomodate our handicapped child. We went looking for a church with some blacks in leadership positions for our adopted black children to see. For some reason the church we joined is filled with adopted people (including the pastor) and the homeschooling group we joined was filled with adopted kids, some black.
There are some good books out about black inventors like "The Real McCoy". If you ever watch TV, you might rent some episodes of the Bill Cosby family show. Also show or movies about other countries. She desperately needs to see a bigger world. Oh, right, I'm sorry, you have been doing that. How about some fun vacations to more culterally diverse areas? I love San Francisco.
And please introduce her to George Washington Carver who became my hero in the fifth grade and who I still love. I named one of my sons after him.
I'm glad you're concerned about this.
Oh, ha! You could easily adopt a healthy black baby from TX.

Sherry, I sounds like you have done a great job in exposing your little one to many different people. Homeschooling is helpful in this respect also, as you are able to tailor your activities to what is needed. Keep on with what you have been doing. Your daughter will learn attitudes from you and your husband.
One thing that I found helpful when I had exhausted my own ideas, (often!) was to ask God for creative ideas. He was faithful to show me ways to reach my kids. This was a frequent prayer for me when my children were young.
Your daughter is only 8, she is learning and will learn from your behavior, how you react to others. So hang in there and model the attitudes you want her to have. She will learn. And ask God to shape her attitude toward others. He can do so much more than we even expect or understand.

I forgot to mention that educational stores have some gorgeous asian, hispanic, and black baby dolls. Wouldn't they make a good Christmas present?
Once I was preparing a whole set of ethnic dolls to donate to the church nursery, and a bunch of boy teens came in and started playing with them and talking about which doll looked like who. It was so fun to watch them teasing each other and not even realize these football players were playing with dolls. And it was fun to see this multiracial group around my kitchen table. God has really blessed me.

Or, you could think about moving or switching churches. If you what your daughter to have exposure and relationships with people who are different than her, that comes from sharing life with them, not just attending cultural fairs and being "entertained" by them.

Or, short of moving, maybe asking yourself some questions about your peer group and being intentional about building friendships and relationships with Black people. Children model what they see their parents doing. And, if they don't see you interacting and forging friendships with Black people, they aren't going to learn it on their own.

Thanks everybody. You have some good suggestions. However, I think this issue is bigger and harder than we can probably solve here. Tam, is right: "if they don't see you interacting and forging friendships with Black people, they aren't going to learn it on their own." However, changing churches is not an option right now for many reasons, and the truth is that our church is as multicultural as any church in the area with many adopted children of various ethnic "persuasions" and several families of Indian (Asian), Hispanic, and other backgrounds. But only a few black children, and no black adults, attend our church. I have friends who are black, but Betsy-Bee probably doesn't think of them as different in the same way that some of the characters she sees in books and movies are different because their cultural background is very similar to ours, major suburbia.

Anyway, interesting discussion, and one that needs to happen more and one that needs prayerful action. I'll let you know if we try any "experiments" and if so, how it turns out.

"if they don't see you interacting and forging friendships with Black people, they aren't going to learn it on their own." is the only real answer.
But there are stop gap things to do. Since you have black friends, draw the connection between the real people and the media representations. Also, I think there is a question of perceived beauty which is very much a learned thing in terms of race and culture. Homeschool project can be finding magazine models of different races, are there black ones that your daughter experiences as "beautiful"? Talk about why, talk about what makes a person beautiful. Think of the opportunities to address more issues than race....

Hi Sherry,
While I appreciate everyone's well-intentioned suggestions (they are helpful), one consideration you might keep in mind is not to unintentionally impress on your daughter that people of different races are subjects to be studied and commented on, dolls to play with, or TV representations.

Tam's suggestion is by far the most on target. Who do you know personally? What can you do to find more friendships outside your immediate environment?

One value that our church has come to emphasize is a love for the city here in St. Louis, where most of our poor black population live. Some of our members are intentionally moving into the city. I'm not suggesting that you move, only that perhaps spending time finding friendships in the city might go a long way. It might take your whole church forging a friendship with a mostly black church, a homeless shelter, a crisis pregancy center, or a mostly black public school.

If that sounds like a lot of work, it probably is! :)

You could maybe inch in by movies. Have you watched Akeelah and the Bee? I'm trying to remember if it's PG ... you'd have to see when it becomes age-appropriate. But whenever it becomes appropriate it's just a plain old good movie. The main character is a black girl growing up on the wrong side of the tracks who has a gift for spelling ...

Take care & God bless
Anne