Multicultural Monday #3--A Perfect Prize and Some Resources

So this week as I was trying to think what I wanted to share with you for Multicultural Monday, I got a very nice package in the mail. Around Earth Day, I entered the contests on Natural Kids Team. Well, I won one of their amazing giveaways (again). This time it was from The Enchanted Cupboard. It ties in perfectly with The Colors of Us project that we did last week! So I wanted to share it with you. It is called Dolls of the World and Earth Box. And I have to say that Hazel loves it and couldn't wait to start playing with it.

She loved putting the dolls in and out of the box. Plus we talked about the different colors of the people like the different colors of paint we made last week. We also talked about the box representing Earth.

While here I want to mention that Natural Kids Team blog has a Mother's Day Giveaway going on.

Ok, now to share some resources for you. When I was teaching I discovered Teaching Tolerance. They offer a magazine which is free for teachers. You can also view the pdf version on line for free! Their website is also a good source for classroom activities for various ages.

And of course there is ADL -- The Antidefamation League. They are a group that works to educate and advocate to fight bigotry of all sorts in the U.S. and abroad. I know they would do presentations for our school when asked and there are local offices and a place to find them. They also have an Action Center where you can get ideas of how to fight through legislation--most of the actions are contacting legislators about issues. Always a good lesson for any age child. Their site also provides current news on the issues they are fighting.

Another great resource is NCCJ -- National Conference for Community and Justice. This is an amazing organization that provides some really wonderful programs for children--mostly teenagers as well as adults. They take on all the -isms and try to fight them. They also have antibullying programs. I had the pleasure of being an advisor one summer in their ANYTOWN program. This program is amazing!! It is for teenagers and you have to apply for a week of it. Basically it is an overnight camp that takes teenagers from all over a region with different backgrounds and teaches them about all the discrimination and how to fight them. I know I got a lot out of the week as an advisor and am sure the kids did as well.

These resources will help some of you with more than one child or who are teachers.Since I know I'm not in the classroom anymore and I'm teaching a much younger child (three instead of teenagers), I try to think about what is important to me that she learns. For me it is about equality and treating everyone as an individual--not making decisions because of skin color, sexual orientation, disability, economic status, etc. I feel I do a pretty good job of modeling this for her and we also use our religion to help since I really try to let her know I believe God made all of us and loves all of us.