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Emily Clark

Making Play Work for Anti-Racism

The article "Interrogating the 'gold standard': Play-based early childhood education and perpetuating white supremacy" by Kinard, T., Gainer, J., Valdez-Gainer, N., Volk, D., & Long, S., 2021 as published in the Theory Into Practice Journal opens with a powerful vignette that highlights a well-known play pattern in early childhood settings; three little boys playing a game of good guys and bad guys. In this case, the three good guys are white children and the bad guy is the African-American child.


boys play superheros

Kinard et al. (2021) use this vignette to draw attention to a larger problem in the field of early childhood education: the way that play can perpetuate racial biases and stereotypes. "Mirroring the criminalization of Black males in society, anti-Black re-enactments like this often go unnoticed or unproblematized, whether they occur in the block center, home center, or during “free” play, particularly when we do not acknowledge that children develop and enact perceptions about race in their earliest years (Hirschfeld, 2008)." (Kinard et al., 2021). The authors make a compelling case for why we need to pay closer attention to the ways in which seemingly innocuous games and activities can have a profound impact on how children understand race and racism, and they challenge educators to take a more active role in addressing these issues in the classroom.


Kinard et al. review the research on the pervasive and damaging anti-Black and white supremacist messaging on young children. They argue that the racially charged play they observed is not an isolated incident, but rather a reflection of the wider societal messages that children receive. They suggest that when children engage in play that reinforces racial biases and stereotypes, they are essentially replaying the messages they have absorbed from their environment.


They argue that when teachers are not actively engaging in anti-racist work during play, they are complicit in perpetuating these harmful norms. However, the authors also acknowledge that play can be a powerful tool for promoting anti-racist work when teachers actively engage with children to challenge and disrupt harmful cultural norms. They suggest that teachers can create a more inclusive and anti-racist environment by intentionally selecting play materials and activities that reflect diverse cultures and experiences, and by actively challenging any racial biases or stereotypes that may arise during play.


The authors make it clear that any effort to address anti-Blackness in early childhood education must begin with several critical acknowledgments. First, that anti-Black violence is a real and pervasive problem in and out of schools, and that even our youngest children are not immune to its effects. Second, that many of the constructions of play, choice, and innocence that are introduced in early childhood education programs are actually Eurocentric in nature, and may not reflect the experiences or values of children from diverse cultural backgrounds. Third, that even in play-centered early childhood classrooms where teachers consider themselves anti-racist, anti-Black violence can still be embedded. They argue that this is because anti-Blackness is deeply ingrained in our society and culture, and it can be difficult to recognize and address without intentional effort.


The authors recommend several actions in support of pro-Black teaching:

  • Self Work: A commitment to understanding and dismantling our own biases, specifically, "deepening our abilities to identify and counter anti-Blackness in our practices, policies, and day-to-day interactions," (Kinard et al., 2021) as well as work on developing more authentic knowledge of the contributions, achievements, and values of people of color.

  • Pro-Black Curriculum: The development of a humanity-centered classroom in which Black people are celebrated; where all children have their awareness raised about anti-Black injustices and are given strategies, resources, and narratives to counter those messages. "In this way, a foundation is laid for children to bring pro-Blackness into their play, recognize and respond to anti-Blackness, and for teachers and children to engage in discussions about both," (Kinard et al., 2021).

  • Verbal Mapping: A dialogic tool to support educators to create justice centered spaces in which they can co-create meaning with young children in support of anti-racism. "Verbal mapping can create spaces for teachers to identify and respond with care and love to children’s reinscription of racial violence either in-the-moment or upon later analysis of interactions," (Kinard et al., 2021).


Finally, the authors suggest that the term, "playwork" may be a better fit for the purposeful and challenging play that counters anti-Blackness. "Playwork, therefore, requires us to think of play in all of its complexities: 'fun but . . . painful, hard, tense, dissonant' (Kinard et al., 2018, p. 223), 'touching and alarming' (p. 227). It is what children do when they narrate their imagined lives, incorporating old and new experiences learning to act and react in a racialized world." (Kinard et al., 2021).


Kinard et al. leave us with a series of powerful questions for reflection:

"Is pro-Black curriculum foundational and daily? Do I intentionally help children recognize anti-Black injustice and learn strategies for acting against it? Do I enter children’s in-the-moment interactions with an eye for justice, knowing how to respond using verbal mapping and other strategies in ways that do not send unjust behaviors underground but help students analyze them in productive ways? How might children’s playwork reflect these foundations as they engage in the hard work of trying out justice-based actions? How might my playwork reproduce anti-Blackness and/or sustain children of Color? " (2021).



References:

Kinard, T., Gainer, J., Valdez-Gainer, N., Volk, D., & Long, S. (2021). Interrogating the “Gold standard”: Play-based Early Childhood Education and perpetuating white supremacy. Theory Into Practice, 60(3), 322–332. https://doi.org/10.1080/00405841.2021.1911587


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