Teach your child to LOVE the skin they’re in!
February is dedicated to Love and Heritage with Valentine’s Day on the 14th and a month-long celebration of Black History. New research in child development indicates children cultivated in racial pride and engaged in family activities promoting racial knowledge, experience increased academic success.This is the month to start a tradition of Love and Heritage with your children, grandchildren, or kids in your care. The Nest Matters wants to share tips that will teach your child to Love the skin they’re in and instill pride in their Heritage.
- Create a Family Creed a system of principles and beliefs. A family creed is normally less than 25 words and defines why your family exists. Geoffrey Canada, President and CEO of Harlem Children’s Zone established a student creed, “I will go to college; I will succeed,”. This creed is stated in the hallway as children line up each day. Creating a family creed, believing in it and practicing it with your children or grandchildren (regardless of how young they are) is a great way to instill Pride in your Heritage. Here’s a link to get you started
- Learn about Local Heritage Visit some places where the whole family can learn about the history of the area from a cultural perspective. Go visit Stiles African American Heritage Center in five points, or enjoy some Latino Americano art exhibits at La Museo de las Americas on Santa Fe. You can also explore books at a the Blair-Caldwell African American Heritage Library and be surrounded by the richness of history, literature, art, music, religion and politics of African Americans in the West. Knowing Denver’s history from a cultural point of view is a second great way to instill a sense of Pride in your Heritage.
The City of Denver offers a list of places to see - why not take a family field trip?
- Read a book together - and talk about it! There are some beautiful picture books that children can relate to and that place their experience at the center of the story. Some of our favorites are “I Love My Hair” by Natasha Anastasia Tarpley, and the poetry and art book “In Daddy’s Arms I Am Tall” by Javaka Steptoe. Taking the time to look at the artwork and discuss a book with characters like your child, or that your child can aspire to be like is our third suggestion for instilling Pride in Heritage. There are publishing companies dedicated to producing books at every reading level with characters from all different cultures. Check out Lee and Low books.
- Write your own story - You don’t have to trace your roots back 300 years to find interesting stories to tell. Why not spend a week snapping photos of your own family in their regular routines and write the story of you? Young children love seeing pictures of themselves and their families. Print pictures and work with your child to caption each and tell the story of a typical week in your lives together. Honoring the routine parts of your lives makes them important and helps your child to recognize the culture of the household they live in. Number four on our list of ways to instill Pride in Heritage. You can take make a book your child will love and treasure with tape and staples, or take a digital file to Kinkos to print and bind, but there are also places like Kids Publish where children can publish stories on line, or have their story made into a real book and sold on Amazon!
- Create a Family Tree - Seeing how people are connected is another way for children to learn about their immediate heritage. How exactly is Aunty Jo related to your child? Which side of the family is that uncle from? And what about those family members who aren’t blood relatives, but are family just the same? An exploration like this can help your child appreciate the bonds they have to others, and enrich their appreciation for the community that surrounds them. And it is our fifth idea for instilling Pride in Heritage. There are lots of on-line sites like Ancestry.com that you can use if you want to trace your family history back in time, but you can also find simple and free sites like Family Echo where you can put your own history in and not have to pay for additional research services.
- Create autonomy and independence - Allowing children to think independently and make choices gives them the ability to find their interest and develop self-identity. Encouraging pride in oneself opens the door to instilling pride in their heritage. Create environments infants and toddlers will love...
♥ picking out their own outfits and learning to dress and undress themselves
♥ choosing the order of their bedtime routine: brush teeth before pajamas
♥ helping with household chores
Vanderbuilt University has some suggestions for helping all children
become more independent through daily routines.
- Expose your family to events and activities that celebrate cultures Exploring the world we live in and discovering the sounds, tastes, smells, and feel of other cultures will help them to appreciate their own even more. New experiences and new friends can lead to opportunities to try new foods, see new traditions and learn about the world. Find reasons to celebrate how we are alike and how we are different. When meeting someone else’s culture, children are more likely to ask about how “we” do it, and why “we” don’t have that same celebration. This is an opportunity to instill pride in heritage and exposure to other’s heritage and traditions at the same time!
- Praise your child’s effort and not his or her personality: How you comment on your child’s accomplishments or failures can change their views about themselves and their world. Rather than praising their personalities “You are so smart” or criticizing them “You are so stupid”, praise their efforts or strategies and cultivate their mindset: “Look, you tried very hard to put your shoes on the right feet”. Children that receive comments to reinforce their problem-solving strategies are less likely to give up or walk away from a struggle. Teaching your child to take pride in their accomplishments is a key component in developing pride in their heritage.
The Baby Center offers 10 ways to build the self-esteem of 2 year olds.
explanation of what encouragement is and can do for kids.
- Shades of Black: A Celebration of Our Children: Sandra L. Pinkney’s Shades of Black uses real life photos to explore beauty in skin color. “I am the smooth brown in a chocolate bar” and “I am the velvety orange in a peach ”are descriptive ways to teach your child there is no “good” skin, or “bad” hair, just different shades and styles of beautiful. Let them see and know black comes in many unique shades and is always beautiful beyond measure. Instilling how to love the skin you’re in promotes a sense of pride and connection to your heritage.
- Turn Homework into “Your History”: When there is a homework project due, help find the connections to those in the field who look like your child. When assigned a report on the 1920’s, why not explore the history of Jazz and talk about the contributions of African American musicians? When given a science fair project, why not help re-create the Gong and Signal chair patented by Miriam Benjamin in 1888 and learn about black women inventors? Help your child to know and have pride in the heroes in every field that they share a heritage with.
Biography . com is a quick resource for finding just about anyone!
- Find the Richness in Family Recipies : Food is such a huge component connecting people and heritage. Collect family recipes from Grandma, and help your child to learn at the hip of the family chef. Traditional recipes are so important to preserve, especially those that center family celebrations. Help your children learn the “real” way to make that pie, and to make “mama’s stew” the way that they have always been made. Then take those old-school fried foods and rich buttery meals, and find ways to create every-day versions that will keep diabetes and heart disease away.
Black America Cooks has some wonderful recipes for healthy eating
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