You can talk to your young person about race. You can do it!

Below you will find suggested activities to accompany the book Our Skin: A First Conversation About Race by Megan Madison and Jessica Ralli with art by Isabel Roxas. You can repeat these activities as many times as you like. Use this in conjunction with the book as a jumping off point if you get stuck or feel lost. Be honest. Stay present, and listen. You got this.


Read Pages 1-6

Print both pages of the coloring template

-       Glue the sheet with the boxes on so that the boxes are facing you on one side of the paper.

On the other side of the paper glue the outline of a person so that, the person is facing you. You should have an image on each side of the paper.

Label the six boxes as following

o   What do you love about yourself?

o   What do you love about your skin?

o   What makes you happy?

o   What are you good at?

o   What does your family call you?

o   Decorate your name!

-       On the side with the outline of a person, you and your young person (or class) will draw themselves. They can either draw themselves as they are today or draw themselves in their favorite outfit. Make sure that skin tone is close as possible. You may need to get skin tone-colored markers if you don’t have them already.

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-    Fill in the 6 boxes with words, drawings or symbols.

   Once the drawings are finished you and your young person (or class) will fold the paper so that the boxes are visible over the drawing of the person ( Hotdog style). 

-       Once sides are folded you will cut along the black line careful not to cut completely through the piece, but treating it as a hinge.

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Now you can open and fold the flaps as you see fit over the image of the person, so that you can always see some aspect of the child, but also see something special about them. 

 


After you complete the activity ask the following questions?

- What are all the incredible things your skin lets you do?

- What does your skin look like in the sunlight?

- What do you love about your skin?

Let young people name as many or as few things as they feel like naming. Pay attention to what comes up and from who? Do you have any students of color in the class? Are they struggling to name things? Or do they love the skin they are in? Just take notice and hold this information. How are you ( the adult) responding?


Take notice if a child feels uncomfortable or if there is a negative response from classmates. Name that.

Before you move on, remind your young person or your class that their skin is a apart of who they are. It is not all that they are.

Read pages 7 -10

- Ask young people if they know how they identify? “Do you know what word you use to describe your skin?” I use ( insert identity here).

  • Or as a class, ask them if they know how they identify?

  • Again let young people answer freely. Use the book as a guide.

- For home use: Ask if they know how their friends identify? “Do you have any friends who use any of these words to describe their skin? What words do they use?

If you are a white person-this is going to feel wrong. This is going to feel like the exact opposite thing you should be doing. You don’t want your kids to see color.Here’s the kicker- they see color anyway. When you act as if noticing difference is wrong or shameful you are sending the message that these differences are bad. But when you name them and celebrate differences, your child will do the same

- Page 11

- Reference the drawing- When the drawing is open, can people see all those things you love about yourself?

- Did you know some people might try to guess some of those things that exist inside you, and sometimes they guess unkind things.

- Let’s keep reading to understand why folks might do this!

After page 12

- Hmm let’s pause here for a minute. Hearing that (reference page 12) - how does it make you feel?

  • Gather some responses, again letting the young people answer freely.

  • Do we think this is fair? Why or why not?

  • -It’s not fair because we don’t truly get to know the person

- We want everyone to be treated fairly and with kindness- but did you know that there are some people who look at your skin color, and decide what kind of person you will be? How do we feel about that?

  • Gather the responses- take stock of where your young person or your class is at. Is there room to dig deeper? Are things coming up that you think you need to work on as a group?

• How are you feeling as an educator or caregiver? It’s okay to be uncomfortable. Don’t shut down! You got this!!!

Read Pg 13-

- Has anyone heard that word: racism before?

  • If you have what do you know about it?

  • If you haven’t- how does it make you feel hearing about it now?

- We already talked a little about this, but do you think it’s fair for one person to have more power than other people? Why?

Gather some responses

  • If your class is really chatty maybe, ask about a time where someone had more power than someone else? What happened? What did that feel like? How did you solve it?

  • Racism can be a tough concept but trying to find connection points based on young people’s real world experiences would be valuable.

- I don’t think it’s very fair either. Let’s learn more about the rules they are talking about in this book.

Read page 14-16

- That’s a lot of different ways that racism can look huh?

o Racism can be big or small- it changes size and shape, so do you think it might be hard to notice? Even for adults? How can we learn to notice it?

  • Yes- racism can be very difficult to understand and see. But the more we practice spotting it, the easier it will be to find and name and fight.

  • If we work together we can hopefully get rid of racism but first we have to see it- and the tricky thing about racism, is it likes to blend in and look invisible. So how do we fight it? Any ideas?

o Get ideas from young people.

  • Make a list on the board or a journal or a notebook. Refer to this collected knowledge regularly.

  • Look at ways people are being treated unfairly- refer back to this conversation. Where does racism show up in other subjects? In other books? NAME IT!

  • This is just the beginning, you’re laying the ground work for justice.

Read page 17

- Can we all practice saying “ That’s not right?”

  • Repeat it 3ish times

- When someone tries to say or do something mean to another person because of that person’s skin color, what do we say?

“that’s not right”

  • Have students repeat.

    We have to practice every day saying “that’s not right”- that will make it harder for racism to hide.