Written by: Rachel Russell
As our school celebrates the cultures of Trinidad and Tobago this month, this blog seeks to assist parents in understanding the importance of teaching your child about accepting cultures that are different than theirs.
Whether our backgrounds may be Chinese, East Indian, African or Caucasian, our children should have the understanding of who they are and also to gain an appreciation of those around them. In a society that is a melting pot, such as Trinidad and Tobago, it may be difficult to typify ourselves in one group. However, this creates a wider forum which enables us to better showcase the beauty of our society through the various heritages that tells our personal ethnic stories.
Mass media has pushed an ideal of what is beautiful and what is not. Children can develop issues with the complexion of their skin, their body types, hair type, eye colour and what they determine are “faults” in their physical makeup.
It is why it is important that from as early as the infant stage, we begin to instil values that can help them on this journey.
Our children do not have to have our experiences. We can let our children start with a clean slate that is free from the misconceptions of old.
In the words of the late Maya Angelou “it is time for parents to teach young people early on that in diversity there is beauty and there is strength”.
As our school celebrates the cultures of Trinidad and Tobago this month, this blog seeks to assist parents in understanding the importance of teaching your child about accepting cultures that are different than theirs.
Whether our backgrounds may be Chinese, East Indian, African or Caucasian, our children should have the understanding of who they are and also to gain an appreciation of those around them. In a society that is a melting pot, such as Trinidad and Tobago, it may be difficult to typify ourselves in one group. However, this creates a wider forum which enables us to better showcase the beauty of our society through the various heritages that tells our personal ethnic stories.
Mass media has pushed an ideal of what is beautiful and what is not. Children can develop issues with the complexion of their skin, their body types, hair type, eye colour and what they determine are “faults” in their physical makeup.
It is why it is important that from as early as the infant stage, we begin to instil values that can help them on this journey.
- Help them appreciate who they are. Affirm their beauty - that God made them perfect and that He loves them in their uniqueness.
- Help your child to appreciate the beauty in other cultures. For example, children can play with action figures and dolls of different races. Have conversations with them about races that are different to theirs, discussing each race’s history and what they bring to our society.
- Be mindful of the words that you speak around your children. I recall once a child told another child in our school that his daddy said “that people of his colour skin was worthless.” Now this is a conversation that the child overheard, but already he began to internalise that because of the colour of his skin he was more superior to this child. Unconsciously, we can make racial statements in our general conversation. Let us strive to change our conversations, especially what is communicated in front of our children.
- Make an effort to expose your children to environments that have varying races. It’s always a joy to be in a space in which children of different races exist and play with each other, not realising that there are any differences.
- Last but certainly not least, do some introspection on yourself to see if there are issues in you as it relates to a particular race. It is so easy, based on our history, to label a people due to our experiences with a few. This is a good time to really start to change some of our mind-sets towards each other.
Our children do not have to have our experiences. We can let our children start with a clean slate that is free from the misconceptions of old.
In the words of the late Maya Angelou “it is time for parents to teach young people early on that in diversity there is beauty and there is strength”.
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