Talking to Others:

Talking About (Different Types of) Racism

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This lesson in action:

Lesson Objectives

Students will be able to:
  1. Describe four different ways that racism shows up in our lives and society

Learning Standards

  • LfJ 12. Students will recognize unfairness on the individual level (e.g. biased speech) and injustice at the institutional or systemic level (e.g. discrimination).
  • LfJ 14. Students will recognize that power and privilege influence relationships on interpersonal, intergroup, and institutional levels and consider how they have been affected by these dynamics.

Learning Activities: If you have 15 minutes

Greeting:

If someone could predict your future, would you want yours predicted? Why or why not?

Reading:

“We are better able to resist the negative impact of oppressive messages when we see them coming than when they are invisible to us.” – Dr. Beverly Daniel Tatum, 2017

Ask Students:

  • What does this quotation get you thinking about?

Initiative:

Use slides 8-12 to define the levels of racism for your students.

Ask Students (Slide 16):

  • Can you think of other examples of each of these types of racism?

Learning Activities: If you have 45 minutes

Initiative:

Explain to your students that Dr. Camara Phyllis Jones at the Harvard School of Public Health wrote a famous article where she used a story called the Gardener’s Tale to explain how these different types of racism work.
You might decide to read this article with your students:

Read the full article

You might decide to show this YouTube video telling the Gardener’s Tale:

View the Gardner's Tale video

Ask Students:

  • Describe how this story illustrates one of the levels of racism.

Learning Activities: If you have 2 hours

Ask Students:

  • What could the gardener do to make the garden more fair? 
  • What does that mean for real life?
  • How well (or not well) do you think this story captures the way racism works in our society?
  • Why do you think many people are so reluctant to talk about racism and how it works in our society?

Debrief (Slide 19):

  • What did you like about today’s lesson?
  • Did you learn anything new about yourself or anyone else?
  • What could make it better?
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