Sunday, December 7, 2014

Anti-Bias Activity


Baby Pictures

THEMES             Bodies, Families, Our Class

OBJECTIVIES     Recognize and celebrate one’s own physical features

MATERIALS       Baby photographs of each child, a photograph of each child. Glue, scissors, index cards and laminate paper.

DESCRIPTION   Collect pictures of each child as a baby. At circle time, tell the children you have  pictures of them as babies. Say, “I’m going to hold up the baby pictures, one at a time. Look at it carefully and see if you can guess who it is.” When the children make a guess, ask them to explain their reasoning. Then set out the baby photos and the current photos of the children. Invite children to match the baby and current photo. Display the baby photos and current photos side by side on a bulletin board in the classroom. If you are concerned about damaging or losing the baby photos, make a color photocopy of them and/or laminate them.

VARIATIONS     1. Include baby and current pictures of the teaching staff…a must!

                           2. Make a memory matching game by gluing a photocopy of each picture onto a  blank index card. Laminate the cards. Lay them out face down and invite children to find a match.

Answer the following questions:                                     

1.          I choose this activity because I enjoy looking at pictures from the past, pictures bring back memories. I also thought it would be cool to see how easy it would be to match up the pictures.

2.          I feel that this activity is for children that are at least three years old. I believe this because of what I read on pg. 17 and 21 in our RW book. It states on those pages that three year old “can name, identify and match people according to their physical characteristics”. I would think that children that are five to eight years old would enjoy this project a little more, get more out of it.

3.          I believe that this activity is an appropriate theme because it is an activity that helps the children see that everyone has their own physical features. Different is good and ok.

4.         The three concepts I believe relate are: Recognize, appreciate, and respect the uniqueness, beauty, value and contribution of each child, Provide children with a positive experience exploring similarities and differences, and Foster positive self-esteem and a positive self-concept in children.
I believe that this meets anti-bias goals because this is an activity that promotes differences and how everyone is different and that it is a good thing to be different.

The Two Children’s Books I chose are:
I chose these two books because I like that they have picture of really people not cartoon people. I liked that they are about "me" books. I would read the stories to the children when I introduce the activity and then I would place the books out for the children to read. The first book is about all of our body parts and it features children of many different backgrounds. The second book talks about how we are as different as night and day. And, guess what? They love it.
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What I Like About Me!
Citations:
Roots & Wings, By Stacy York, Right 2003
Handout - "Anti-Bias Activity Goals"

Monday, December 1, 2014

Film Review


I picked “The Lion King” for my Film Review. Released in 1994

I did watch this movie as a child many times. All I remember is that I watched it and I liked it.

Watching the movie now what I noticed was that Scar looked like a bad guy (stereotyping). The hyena looked and acted stupid and weak (stereotyping).

What a child might absorb from this movie is that it has a love story in it. It is funny and sad movie. A normal kid movie.

Some of the controversy could be that a brother kills a brother for power and greed. The female lions depend on the males for redemption. Scar is evil looking and Simba is beautiful, which could be seen as stereotyping.

I don’t feel that there was any blatant racism in the movie. Maybe you could talk about the hyenas and race but I don’t think so because Whoopi Goldberg was a voice of one of the hyenas and I don’t feel that she would have taken on the role if it had anything to do with racism.

The Washington Post (July 28, 1994) stated a few of the same things I did. Which was that he talked about how the female lions depend the male lions and how Simba was beautiful and Scar was not. The article also stated that the lions could not take care of themselves without Simba. They can’t help themselves. Helpless. He (Steve Twomey) also stated that he actually didn’t see any of those problems. What he did see was “a funny movie with mind-blowing animation”.  

I very much agree with him. I think the movie has many funny parts and great animation. I really don’t believe many children will see anything more than a movie that is about animals. That has sad and funny parts to it.