Bully-Free Future

Diversity by Hide and Seek

Remember when your mother used to hide your vegetables with applesauce to make them more palatable? 

For many kids-and adults for that matter-the hint of their parents teaching the mere mention of diversity will cause their eyes immediately roll upwards and the volume on their iPod magically increase.

 But, as your parents learned there are ways to make things go down a little easier-and without a ‘spoonful of sugar’.  The trick is to figure out how to make the applesauce.

1. Put diversity in context-no one likes to be lectured and your kids are no different.   Incorporate other cultural traditions into holidays you already know.  Look for similar holiday, i.e. New Years, Harvest Festival, December holidays.  This can take a little work, but there resources that help you put it all together.
2. Use kids books –books can be an invaluable tool to expose kids to different people, cultures, traditions, ‘abilities’ and choices. Think back to the story of Cinderella and ask yourself if you dreamed about your prince or ‘love’s first kiss’ to remind you how much these stories influenced you, taught you about the world and set examples on how things work.   There is a Cinderella story in virtually every culture.  In China, Cinderella befriends a fish which the stepmother cooks.  You kids might be interested in the shifts in this story from other cultures.  The kids will get the message that although the language and settings are similar the differences, i.e. that diversity are pretty cool.
3. Turn a critical eye to the media-the media is still a hot bed of stereotyping-subtle and not so subtle with both positive and negative stereotypes.  And this practice is not unique to Americans.  At the Athens Olympic Games, the Chinese media warned the public not to expect too much out of their track and field team.  Their view was that while the Chinese excelled in sports that took skill and finesse like gymnastics and diving, Chinese people couldn’t run.  They were very surprised when Liu took home a gold medal in the 400 meter hurdles.  As you watch TV and movies with your kids make sure you acknowledge beauty in talent in a variety of people.  You can combat the ‘only blonde is beautiful myth’. 
4. Learn with your children-make it a family project.  Cook-and eat –dumplings from China, Korea, France, Poland and Russia.  Dumplings are not only fun and delicious but they are ubiquitous around the world.   Again, you kids will get the message that there is not one perfect dumpling but each have unique tastes, smells, textures, etc.  The leap to making the connection that there is not one perfect type of person isn’t so great when you think about it on a full stomach! Learn another language; meet new people making an effort to seek out people who you may not ordinarily socialize with.

The upsides of incorporating diversity into your everyday life are significant.  Decades of social science research has proven that kids who are exposed to different people, places, traditions, etc are far less likely to become bullies or tolerate bullying behavior.  Kids will learn that different is just different, not better or worse-just different.  Since kids who are ‘different’ are often targets leveling the playing field materially affects the amount of bullying behavior.

Besides, learning about other countries, cultures and people is fun-and we all need more of that!

 With Respect,

Deb

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