Lizzie Ottenstein Blog Post 3

 Given your understanding of intentional and unintentional racism both through teacher-student interactions and curriculum development, how would you encourage diversity in the classroom?

Children learn by example. When they seem someone older doing something, they almost automatically want to do it too. Whether it’s their parents or guardians, the “cool kids,” older siblings – kids simply want it too, whatever "it" is or however absurd. Kids receive additional messages from their surroundings: television, the Internet, advertisements, etc. We (not just kids) internalize everything we see, whether we’re aware of it or not, and it becomes part of our subconscious. Needless to say, children receive a lot of these messages at school, whether it's from their teachers or peers. In order to promote diversity in the classroom, diversity itself has to be present and talked about. From a young age, children should be in a classroom with kids from a variety of backgrounds, hopefully making friends with kids who are not like them. This will promote a respect and understanding for people different from them at a young age. Additionally, teachers should represent a broad range of backgrounds as well – gender, race, sexual orientation, gender, ability, religion, etc. Every student should be able to look at a teacher is who both like them and another who is not like them. Conversations about diversity should not be at minimum, they should be incorporated into the curriculum. Books read in English class should incorporate stories representing diversity. The classroom environment aforementioned is very idealistic. Until the real world reflects respect for diversity, children will continue to imitate the current world that is not yet there.