“Why bring it up?” Pushing back against White supremacy

“Why bring it up?” Pushing back against White supremacy

by Sachi Feris The other day, my dad was showing my children a video of his wife’s daughter’s circus performance and my three-year-old asked, “Are they girls or boys?” “They look like they’re wearing costumes that ‘girls’ more commonly use…but…

Raising children who sparkle: Gender, patriarchy and interrupting Shame

Raising children who sparkle: Gender, patriarchy and interrupting Shame

by guest blogger Jardana Peacock What if our children were allowed to be who they really are? In Nina Benedetto’s book. About Chris, a children’s book that re-tells the true story of a pre-school transgender boy, Benedetto asks readers to…

White bias and dolls: Helping children create meaning around race and gender

White bias and dolls: Helping children create meaning around race and gender

by Sachi Feris A friend once told me the following story: She and her daughter, a blonde-haired, White, three-year-old, were surveying her large collection of dolls. “All of the dolls are blonde,” her daughter observed. “It’s true,” my friend affirmed,…

What I tell my son about the sexist media

by guest blogger Janet Alperstein After attending “Fiddler on the Roof” my eight-year-old Jewish Day School-educated son, made it his business to memorize the verse about the sons in “Tradition:” “At three I started Hebrew school, at ten I learned…

My Family Builders: Talking race, gender and family structures

My Family Builders: Talking race, gender and family structures

by guest blogger Shannon Cofrin Gaggero Note: This is not a sponsored post. All opinions are those of the author. I’m always on the hunt for children’s books and toys that are diverse and feature individuals and families beyond the typical “white-and-heterosexual-as-norm” narrative. We…

Race conscious talk as a daily practice: A day with my 11-month old

Race conscious talk as a daily practice: A day with my 11-month old

by Sachi Feris This is an account of the daily opportunities I have to be race conscious versus “color blind” with my children. My 11-month-old baby loves ducks. So when he woke up fussy from a two-hour morning nap (on…

My daughter’s rainbow dress: “In support of all queer and gay people”

My daughter’s rainbow dress: “In support of all queer and gay people”

by Sachi Feris My daughter was two-and-a-half in the fall of 2014 when Michael Brown and Eric Garner and Black Lives Matter were all over the news. During those months, I wrote a post entitled, “How I would talk to…

Undoing the myth of White=beauty: Reading Snow White to my daughter

Undoing the myth of White=beauty: Reading Snow White to my daughter

by Sachi Feris A friend had been staying in our apartment while we were on vacation and left some Disney-version fairytale books from her Spanish class for my then-two-and-a-half-year-old daughter. Among them, “Snow White and the Seven Dwarves” which my…

“People decide for themselves how they want to identify” or dismantling the gender binary with my children

“People decide for themselves how they want to identify” or dismantling the gender binary with my children

by Sachi Feris The other day I overheard my mom reading a board book of “first words” to my eight-month-old son. On the first fold of the book, she read: “girl” and then “boy.” “When we read,” I told my…

Staceyann and Zuri Chin’s Living Room Protests: A conversation with Staceyann

Staceyann and Zuri Chin’s Living Room Protests: A conversation with Staceyann

by Sachi Feris Performance artist Staceyann Chin and her four-year-old daughter, Zuri, have been modeling powerful conversations about positive racial identity, gender identity, children’s rights, human rights, and many other important topics over the past year. These conversations are child-centric,…