Diversity...Training

[TotallyWicked]

Hello Ladies and fellow Greeks!

I'm coming to you asking for some ideas from any teachers out there. I am currently working at a youth program in suburban Chicago. I honestly didn't like kids so much but now I love them! The program is intented to serve low income children and teach them skills to perform well in school.

Sounds good, but one of the MAIN difficulties I've had is getting all the kids to actually...interact with one another. The majority of the kids are either Black or Latino (and a good number of the Black students are Jamaican), but they don't seem to care to get to know, let alone learn from one another.

I am intending to start some exercises to help them help each other (e.g. the kids teach other Spanish and English). I know alot of the removal comes from their upbringing (I've met their parents, not the friendliest people on earth), but I know there's a shot since some kids hang out with whoever, while others clearly separate based on the color line.

If any of you have tips on how to do this effectively, please feel free to share, I think what would also help me is if I heard stories of you ladies' upbrining/interaction in elementary/high school/college/grad school with other races and ethnicities.

Thanks!

[NinjaPoodle]

Glad you changed your mind about the kids I'm going to pass this on to my teacher friends and sorors and have them post or I'll post their responses.

[PhDiva]

Here are suggestions I used when I taught jr. high in Los Angeles:

1. Organize an "Afro-Aztec" Festival which features African and Latino(Indigenous Aztec) dancers, cultural foods and interactive games.

2. Create a model UN board where each child must research information on Latin American and African countries. When I did this, we used a board in my classroom and each student had to fill in the blanks with the material they gathered from their research. They had to make flags for the particular countries, clip pictures showing cultural dress and images of the country's landscape. They also wrote a brief paragraph about the system of government, nat'l language, population and major religions.

3. Depending on their ages, I selected students to be trained as race relation ambassadors. They received training from the United Way and then met with an inter-racial group of students at lunch to talk about their culture and eventually they began to discuss their feelings about one another. I only allowed students who showed genuine interest and the maturity to handle the topics to participate.

I hope this gives you a start.

Good luck,
PhDiva