The Global Centre for Pluralism (GCP) believes that “schools can be incubators for truly pluralistic societies”. Last week they released “Talking About Racism in the Classroom” a policy brief, in collaboration with the Canadian Commission for UNESCO. The brief reports on activities of the GCP with regard to its recent anti-racism work and provides policy recommendations for “addressing anti-black racism in Canadian schools”.
The policy brief is “intended for Canadian policy-makers and school leaders seeking to address anti-Black racism in education systems”.
immigrantchildren.ca applauds the work and also extends an invitation to and a wish for expanding anti-Black racism to the early childhood arena. We know that even very young children form beliefs about the differences they see in children and adults in their world. Infants can differentiate faces; they recognize familiar ones and are puzzled, if not angered or feared by the ones they don’t.
The recommendations of the policy brief address professional development, curriculum and strategic planning, below. All of these apply in early childhood care and education.
Some work has been done in this regard in Canada, and we early childhood practitioners and advocates need to do more!
Resource worth revisiting: Children Are Not Colorblind: How Young Children Learn Race
Further reading: Check the ‘Racism’ category on this site.
