Also pushout a book about how black girls are criminalized in schools. I'm a black woman, and i hate how black girls are often left out of the conversation in favor of black men. I teach for them.
I'd like to encourage anyone who wants to buy these books to check around and see if any local indie bookstores (especially if they're owned by POC) have these books. indiebound.org is a very good resource for finding local indie bookstores, and if you don't have any local indie's near you, check ThriftBooks.com for new or used copies. Obviously buy from Amazon if it's the only option, but we should all try to support locals and smaller businesses first whenever we can ☺♥
Thank you so much for giving a transparent view of this topic. Just trying to talk about this topic in my school (with adults or students) is frowned upon. I have so many questions as a white teacher of a majority black high school population and I feel not talking about it prevents learning. I need to learn. I want to learn. These books are my summer reading. Thanks.
BRIDGET RIGGS I’ve found the same thing at my school. We pride ourselves for the diversity of students, but beyond that, it is not discussed. I’m so happy to be part of a book club in our school about this topic. We started reading Equity Audits in the Classroom as a premise for professional development and a book study. We started the school year with about 20 members (out of 60+ teachers at the school). In December we were down to 5. I’m not saying that’s bad. Just that this *is* hard work and very taboo in many areas. If you can start the conversation, even with a very small number of people at your school, you are starting. You are changing your thoughts, actions and behaviors. It benefits your student. Just start. Any way you can.
Book suggestion: "Black Lives Matter at School" edited by Denisha Jones and Jesse Hagopian 💙 I also am adding the books mentioned in this video to my summer reading list.
White people should learn more black history; I’m just reading “The Desecration if my Kingdom”, by Mutesa II of Buganda, which gives a fascinating first hand account of Idi Amin. I may continue to a biography of Amin, because of his impact on history, but really want to read about the second Congo war next. Do you also have some suggestions for books black people can read to pursue anti-racism?
Thank you for the recommendations and the wonderful commentary to go with it! I’m making my way through “Why are All the Black Kids Sitting Together in the Cafeteria?”, and Tatum talks about how important it is for White folks to seek support from other White folks during this never-ending journey, so I just want to thank you for having these conversations and consenting to learn and grow in public. I’m a pre-service teacher, and I’m so grateful to have found your channel! I also want to throw out another obvious recommendation for this list: How to Be an Antiracist by Ibram X Kendi. I learned so much while reading this book, and it was an emotional experience that has truly helped me grow. Thank you for all that you do, Megan!
The kids should be learning, not developing guilt for actions their ancestors did, hopefully one day people will move on from the mistakes of history and become blind to the colour of skin and see people as people. There seems to be some idiotic move to make White people feel ashamed, can't people see this is just going to deepen divisions not strengthen them? Young people should not feel guilty about who they are and where they came from, EVERY race in history has commited atrocities, its just a matter of how far back in history you go. All this focus on racial issues is going to cause racism towards White people and we are seeing this already in America and England, people being beat up just because they are White.
Clicked this notification SO fast!! Thank you, Megan, for all the work you do as an anti-racist educator. Some of these are already on my TBR list and the rest I’m adding now. You inspire me to become more educated and more open having anti-racist conversations. Just Mercy was so hard to read, but SO good. The movie is also amazing but I think I cried through about 90 percent of it, so I need to watch it again for sure!!
Walter Romanoff young kids still show racist tendencies even when they are not aware of them. They learn them even thought they might not understand. That’s why it’s important to have representation and books about racism in all classrooms. Preschool -though college
Megan, thank you so much for sharing these titles. As the daughter and granddaughter of evangelical Christian ministers (Dad in music ministry and grandfather was a pastor/preacher), I grew up in the church and am a born-again believer, but I always wondered why we had so few families of color in our church in San Antonio. As a teacher I have attended lots of seminars and workshops over the years, and one of the most educational in this topic for me was an NEH-sponsored summer institute at KU in Lawrence, KS, called Teaching the Long Hot Summer of 1967 and Beyond: Racial Disturbances in Recent US History. The group of teachers was about 1/2 black and 1/2 white with one Latin American teacher from LA. The institute was taught with such intention covering the deep history in our country of social and racial inequality. It was uncomfortable most of the time, but I am so glad that I chose to listen and learn rather than become defensive and distant like many of the other white teachers in the institute. I made some amazing friends and learned so much from them during these three weeks and since. However, it is hard to talk to my white family about this topic without sounding judgmental, self-righteous or ashamed of my background. I hope to start with the first four books you recommended to deal with my own thoughts, feelings and actions as well as hopefully equip myself to have meaningful conversations with my family. I believe there are few other topics more important for our society to grapple with right now than racism and injustice. So thank you again for sharing this list. I am going to share your video too. Maybe even challenge others to read with me. Have a blessed day! @toocoolformiddleschool
I love this video so much! I especially like how at the end you talk about wisdom, making mistakes, and growing pains. I cringe when I think about some of the things that I used to say or some of the beliefs I used to have. I took a few life-changing classes in college on multicultural education that helped me work through that but I know that I can never be complacent in my thoughts and beliefs. Thank you for these amazing resources!
anyone read - Down Here in the Warmth ? its really good. its about exactly whats going on today -- with the police shootings of black couple, and protests, and mob violence and militia.... but its weird cause its not really about 'race' - its about how those involved deal with the after effects of this senseless violence. vengeance? or.. as marvin gaye said... 'only love can conquer hate' .... - The book is by Euel Arden. it has some violence by the novel is about healing and moving forward as an individual AND as a society. personally i can't stop thinking about the book. i think it would be great reading for high school kids today. no cliche black characters... no cliche characters at all really.
read dauntless by marcus follin, its a harrowing tail of a young boy growing up in the south bronx and the challenges along the way. also the bizarchives is a great collection of short stories written by BIPOC
Do you have any suggestions of books written from the First Nations or Latinx perspectives that could offer help to educators? I feel that books offer a way to gain understanding of other cultures without burdening others.
@@1lapmagic I hadn’t heard this. Do you know why it’s a slur? I thought it was a gender-neutral way of referring to someone of the latin culture without using the feminine or masculine pronoun.
@@jenniferhw8905 it's a slur because it's a bastardization of someone else's language, masculine or feminine words have nothing to do with human gender. You are changing someone else's language to make it right for them from your perspective. That's called racism.
Thank you for this. I’ve read about half of these but now have more books to add to my list! I would also add The New Jim Crow to this list! Just Mercy was the best book I ever read, inspired me to want to be a lawyer a few years ago and now I’m attending law school in the fall! The movie is amazing, I’ve seen in a few times and each time I cry, I laugh, I have all the feelings.
This sounds like an amazing list of books. Here in Canada, I will also add books that include and FNMI (First Nations, Metis, Inuit) perspectives on identity, culture and understanding. Thank you for sharing!
I am going to school to be a teacher. I will be teaching at a predominantly white school and I AM SCARED!! I am hispanic and I went to school and grew up in a hispanic neighborhood. I experienced racism for the first time when I was 18 and "got out into the world" and though I have not experienced it here where I live now it is still something that I think about 7 years later..
Thank you! This was very useful! As a bilingual educator I have not had the opportunity to work with many non hispanic children, however last year I was blessed and had a big eye opening in regards to cultures. Being Mexican I always heard the typical “Mexicans” category but was not really affected by it because well I am Mexican, however when I was in college I did have a peer that was very passionate about the terms , Mexican, Hispanic and Latino. All this did not resurface until this school year when I was blessed to have so many different cultures in my classroom than what we typically get. I had students from Mexico, Honduras, Guatemala, Cuba, Italy, Venezuela and Colombia , therefore I was able to grow tremendously in my knowledge of those places and it was awesome to see my students light up when I would read a book they could see themselves in ! Next year I have taken the opportunity to also teach a monolingual class so I definitely will be starting with some of these books first before I start looking for books that my students can identify with in hopes that I can understand them more. Thank you for all the work you do to help people open their eyes in regards to racism! 💖
I just have to say I LOVE YOUR CHANNEL SO MUCH! Thank you for always providing such useful and well thought out content. You are one of the channels that has inspired me to start my own teaching channel about being a PRESCHOOL TEACHER. Thank you again and keep up the great work! xoxoxo
Thanks for this video. I saw it weeks ago but decided to return to leave a note. Thanks again for doing great work. As an influencer on RU-vid this is impressive. I have been stunned because some of the TEACHER INFLUENCERS that have presented NOTHING related to the world events and conversations occurring right now. Sadly as I have been their subscriber for years but unsubscribed due to the lack of acknowledgement. As your subscriber, I appreciate your effort to influence the work toward equity in education.
I think many of those books should be mandatory for educators. I plan to gift 3 to a teacher at my child's school who gets upset when Black students inform her that her comments are racially insensitive. Her comment is always she "never grew up around black people, I'm from the mountains of PA." She's been teaching 15 years like when are you going to learn and the administration they make excuses too. I never understood the arrogance of not learning the culture you teach; especially from educated people. Thanks for sharing.
Will you please make a video about how you talk about race and social justice in your classroom in a way that is tolerated by your parents and administration? I am going into student teaching and want to teach these topics in my future classroom, but am worried about parents complaining to administration.
Ugh I love how well she can articulate her meaning. It’s so inspiring- I am graduating on Friday (supposed to be I should say, thanks covid) with my bachelors in elementary education & a minor in early childhood education. She has been such a great influence and guide, and I will continue to support and watch her videos! Sending love from North Dakota. Xoxo
Aside from books, I’d recommend “Black Girls Matter: Pushed Out, Overpoliced, and Underprotected” by the African American Policy Forum which you can Google.
Thank you Megan for making this video & compiling this list! I have only been following you for about a week now, and I have learned more from you in this past week than I have in a long time. I have added all these books to my list to read, and this video gave me exactly what I needed: where to start. Thank you for all of the work you do.
Thank you so much for your videos and these recommendations. As a teacher-in-training in the UK, I look forward to reading these, and hopefully a future video with further recommendations for teachers on the subject of Racism, too.
This year at my school we are working in a book study of Equity Audits in the Classroom, that led to a different book study with White Fragility. It has be the 👏🏽 most 👏🏽 personal development I’ve ever been associated with. Thank you for highlighting all the books. I absolutely recommend reading these books in a club or book chat. Discussion of the topics in each text is so important. The perspectives and experiences that other members of the book clubs have brought to discussions is so important to really doing the work with racism. Thank you for this video. So many more books in the cart! Looking forward to the other videos you mentioned. Thank you!
Thank you for this video. We already knew some people aren’t ready to hear this and that there would be some ignorance in the comments. Thank you for speaking out anyway.
I’m going to check out White Awake thanks Megan! Also a saying I know is Assume positive intentions but take responsibility for impact it’s a city year motto :)
Thanks for sharing...I was on the lookout for a few books to educate myself, my bi-racial daughters, and I see that you've recently made a video. I appreciate the reviews!
Thank you for sharing. I am very interested in starting this work with identify my own biases and ancestry, and then building on that. I live in a primarily white area, but I was fortunate to grow up in not a primarily white area. I know I know more about differeny cultures and beliefs than my students (especially with my Art History background) but I know I still have a lot to learn. Thank you, again.
I totally resonated with what you said near the end of the video about gaining the wisdom to not fear speaking out or saying the wrong thing. For me, the fear of causing more harm than good is paralyzing, at times. I’m looking forward to reading some of these books you suggested! Thank you for compiling these resources for us.
Well done you! You are being a positive role model to so many people. I have read some of the comments here and instagram and some people have proven that they have a birth right to be racist and that only they can say what is right and what is wrong. all I can say is you go girl and I wish you every success in your journey and hopefully united we all stand and we can make a difference using our voice and platforms. Huge vital hug sis.
Megan, I’m pretty sure you’re one of very few educators on RU-vid that consistently posts about social justice and anti racism. I am beyond grateful for all the hours you put into your channel. As a para I’ve witnessed the mistreatment of some of my BIPOC students specifically regarding their racial identity. I hope that more teachers (and people in general) take the time to understand the harm they cause when they don’t take time to unlearn biases and prejudice they’ve internalized.
Thank you for content like this! I have a few in my cart as I type this. I’m looking forward to reading and looking deeper into my own thoughts and behaviors.
Thank you so much for taking the time to compile and share this list. You are doing excellent work and are such an inspiration to this high school teacher in Texas.
I highly recommend Dear Church: A Love Letter from a Preacher to the Whitist Denomination in the US by Lenny Duncan. As a white person of Scandinavian background this was very prickly to read at times because it challenged the Christian tradition I grew up in and still belong But Duncan's experiences made me take a long hard look at how "church" continues racism through its traditions. It changed the way I thought about my contribution and left me questioning color choices of items, language usage, etc. with in my own church family. Read it!
Thank you for sharing this list! My family is from South Africa and I remember when we went there each summer little moments of ingrained racism (as well as big ones of course) but for example I remember as a little girl noticing that Black women would always move over to the side when we walked, by so as a white family we never veered off the path they always accommodated us. It’s something so small but I remember it to this day and remember noticing it.
Thank you for posting this. How do you recommend talking to an up and coming 6th grader about this topic? I feel it's important to talk to your kids about the hard topics, but do you know of any age appropriate books for kids?
Rachel Irwin one of the books that she mentioned in the video This Book is Anti-Racist is a great book for youth. Idk if you’ve watched the channel for a while but Megan has tons of videos on how to talk about hard topics with students.
Thank you so much for these recommendations! I am just starting to work on this myself. I tried to start with White Fragility when I was pregnant, and just was not in the right head space for it at the time. I had actually just planned to start with Me and White Supremacy - so I am glad you think that is a good starting point! I also felt like this was kind of a pep talk that I needed, since the work feels daunting.
Thank you for this! Daniel Hill, the author of the third book has an incredible podcast called "Listen In" that he records with Shumeca Pickett and Brandon Green, to BIPOC close friends of his. It is such great content to add to this learning journey.
Thank you for this post. I’ve read maybe a third of these titles in the last year. I’ll look for way to adding the rest to my list and reading them. Pushing myself into this lifelong journey has been revealing and rewarding.
I would love to have an online book club to read these books. I am trying to do and be better, but I feel that on my own, I lack the perspective to truly understand and evaluate ways that I am contributing to the problem.
Thank you for making this video. This is work that I have been dipping my toe in for way too long and I need to just plunge right in. You really did a great job presenting these and made me excited to push the buy now button on my Amazon cart. 😂 From one teacher to another, thank you!
Thank you for sharing these books! I've added the ones that weren't already on my radar to my TBR list. I'll say it again, your book recommendations are some of my very favorite videos. I so appreciate your desire to learn and help others learn.
Teach them to read this and more this is truth. Deut ....Observe and hear all these words which I command you, that it may go well with you, and with your children after you forever, when you do that which is good and right in the eyes of the LORD your God.
Just added a ton of books to my to-read list, thank you! Just a note, though: several times talking about the book about the church, you use the terms "religious" and "Christian" interchangeably. It felt really weird as a religious non-Christian person. The erasure of religions other than Christianity is also white supremacy at work. Hope that wasn't wrong to point out - looking forward to checking out more of your videos.
Megan, this video is really well done. Congratulations. You're giving very thorough and useful information for us to learn and want to go deeper in this subject. I'm French and we also have many incidents due to racist behaviour... We definitely need the 3 elements you mentionned in order to start a more human coexistence.
Piggybacking on this comment -- I'm French too, and I teach English in middle school. As a white person teaching in a predominantly white area I think it's very important that I educate myself and my students about anti-racism. I have a lot of work to do on the specific issues France has with racism (my book list is very long there!) but as an English teacher I'm also very interested in reading American points of view on racism. I've read White Fragility and learned a lot. I think the one I'm really interested about in the books you presented, Megan, is Why are all the black kids sitting together at the cafeteria. I'm very curious about White awake too, but as an atheist with no religious education I don't know if I can take away much from this book. I'm usually very clueless about religion and religious values, I really can't relate with things like redemption for example. Anyway, enough rambling --- thanks Megan for this video and I can't wait for the video with recommendations for teachers! :)
Oh, and I am currently reading For White Folks Who Teach in the Hood. It’s insightful and I’m learning a lot of ways to understand more of what will help my students by me being aware of my own privilege and whiteness. And I am “white”! My skin is see-through because I”m so pale, My bloodline is as white as you can get, and I am totally middle-class who grew up in a middle class suburb with maybe 3 black students in my school. Oh, and my last name is White! LOL! My dream school, that I hope to be hired for the fall is a balance of Black, Hispanic, Asian, and White. A lot of Indian and Vietnamese students. So I am trying to learn as much as I can so I can walk into class being more culturally aware than a rock. I want to be considerate and have students share their experiences without saying, “Hey, you’re Black, why don’t you speak for all Black people.” I want to teach each student as one person with their own values and ideas. I’m the one who asked you where you got the all are welcome signs in other languages and am excited to represent the cultures in my school. You have been an inspiration to think things through. I appreciate you.
I live in TX, where we now get in trouble for teaching about black and white history in a “biased” way. So, essentially, we have to show the white and black perspectives of the Tulsa Massacre neutrally. I mean, come on! So I am really interested in teaching books that are so in your face that students see the injustices without me having to say a word. LOL! I love your Roll of Thunder, Hear My Cry unit and am seriously considering teaching it. I can bring in history and let it speak for itself. I also plan on basing each unit on empathy -- for SEL and community reasons. So I will lay that foundation for my students to see what’s right and wrong on their own. I will be teaching HS, so I can go deep with analysis.
Thank you for this video and the great book recommendations! I also think Why i'm no longer talking to white people about race by Reni Eddo-Lodge is a very good book to read aswell!
I have tried to get into Beyond Colorblind. Honestly as a non-believer the whole emphasis on bringing others to Christ that just permeates the first chapter is just a complete turn off. I will keep giving it a shot, but I am definitely not the target audience.
I’ve been more verbal than my counterparts about racism and privilege. Friends have privately reach out to me to ask how to be more openly anti-racist and how to educate themselves. I am so glad I stumbled across your video. It has a great list of books to start with. I plan to read all of these books and challenge my friends to do the same!
