I made a post a few weeks ago about how I was going to teach a moral education lesson about racism, should have phrased it differently, but basically here’s what went down. (spoiler, it went incredibly well)
First I asked the kids, “What is a foreigner”, we talked for a few minutes, they said all the obvious stuff, “someone who isn’t Japanese” “Someone who doesn’t speak Japanese” and so on, so then I put up a picture of Rui Hachimura, and asked if he is Japanese. They said yes. I put up a picture of a random Japanese friend of mine born/raised in the U.S. never been to Japan, doesn’t speak word of Japanese. Yes, he’s Japanese. Put up another picture of a Russian friend of mine, born and raised in Japan, speaks Japanese, barely speaks Russian. No he isn’t Japanese.
Explained that to them, they basically came to the realization that you can’t judge someone’s nationality by their appearance, and nationality and ethnicity are not always connected.
Then we spent a few minutes talking about what stereotype they have about foreign people, which ones match me and which ones don’t, which match them, and which don’t. So like “American people love cheeseburgers!!” ok who likes McDonalds? Like half the class rose their hands, “OOO I didn’t know you were all American” ha ha ha, yay we’re all having a good time.
Move on to a situation of, a half French, half Japanese child born/raised in Japan, his friend says speak French, come on, you’re a gaijin, speak French!……….Ok, what’s the problem with this scenario here……discussed that for a while.
Next, I went for a reddit story ahhahaha, someone goes to a restaurant, staff tells them WOW YOURE SO GOOD AT USING CHOPSTICKS, that person gets super pissed and complains about it on social media later. What’s wrong here.
They came to the conclusion that the staff was belittling the person, and if they want to be kind, should just say hi, how are you or whatever….and also that the foreign person was a little too angry, but if it was a common occurence they could understand the anger building up.
Then they asked me what kind of racism/micro-aggressions I had experienced in my time here, told a few stories, and then I had them write their little “reflection sheets”
The vast majority of what they wrote was amazing,
Some samples
I was eating at a buffet, and they put out a bunch of fresh crab, and my mom said “we better go get that crab before the Chinese customers take it all” at the time I laughed, but now I think back on it, it was wrong.
When the ALT came last year, I always tried to pet his hair because it looked soft, and I always thought foreign people liked physical contact, but now I think I should ask first.
This lesson was funny!
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and so on and so forth.
Nothing super controversial, but we all had a good time. and my principal/assistant principal were happy. Good enough for me
41 comments
Glad that went well for you OP. Hopefully you also came out with some lessons learned about what is racism, stereotyping, etc.
Overall sounds like the kids had a positive non-pushy/unbiased lesson.
I love this. Great job.
Superb lesson, IMHO.
Great job and good examples, especially in the way you explained and introduced certain things so that the students themselves realized their mistakes and prejudices. This is much better than straight telling them, “This is wrong,” “Don’t do that., etc.
Great way to approach it – assuming everyone is human and fallible, and exploring from there. Humour really helps keep it gentle. Letting them figure out and question their own presumptions. No one likes to be lectured, but everyone has something to learn.
You did really well. Way to go
Fantastic stuff, loved the way that you framed it for them to self reflect rather than just pointing out racism/xenophobia
This was a great way to frame the concept of racial stereotyping and micro aggressions. Just saying “don’t do that” isn’t enough and will just confuse people as to why they shouldn’t. Relating it to themselves is more poignant.
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You did an amazing job! Really setting an example here. I do hope that your teachings last and don’t get shadowed by other local teachers who might promote stereotypes unintentionally (just a mild assumption).
Kudos for you. Imagine I gave you a reddit prize 🏆
W lesson in my eyes. Well grounded and comprehensive for the age range. Kudos to a job well done
Well done.
Racism is really bottled up and “othered” in this country. Sounds like your students had a real reflection experience in your class.
One step at a time!
As much shit people tend to give teachers here, that is some great value that might legit influence some kids life going forward. Sometimes some lessons just stick in the head, especially when the students realize their own mistakes.
Good job!
Amazing work!!!!
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Wow, super impressed — great job! Lucky students, yours
I think this is an amazing lesson and also your examples were really spot on!
When I think back to the original post, it was mostly about the content… But I don’t remember reading anything about you!
Good teachers can teach anything well. I guess you’re a good teacher. 👍
Thanks for the read
I think it was a great lesson. Thank you for sharing, and good job! Sorry, I haven’t read your previous post. But I hope you that you stay in teaching and do more of this. Good luck in your career!
Sounds like you did a great job!
Nice job!!
Very smart!
Must admit I wasn’t sold on your first post but it turned out very well, great job!
Wish OP taught landlords
Damn that was a good lesson, kudos to you. Hopefully the principal decides that this lesson needs to be standardized and taught every year to every students. This is exactly what needs to be instilled to all young Japanese students.
Excellent teacher. Sounds like it was skillfully done.
👏👏👏👏👏👏👏👏
Good! I’m glad it went well!
Put OP on the schoolboard, hot damn.
This is so well done! Outstanding job.
My gf (who is biracial) born and raised in japan was telling me stories of her childhood. One day(mid to late 1990’s) she got back to the classroom and saw some kids standing on one side of the room and some on the other. Thinking it was a game she asked, “What’s going on?” Then they told her that they were trying to decide, as a class, if she was Japanese or not. Those that thought she was would stand on one side and the Not’s would stand on the other.
Her own friends and class mates 🙁
This is great! You’re an awesome teacher
This is so heartwarming. You’re doing good in the world, keep it up
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Couldn’t have chosen a better way to do it myself, and I’ve done something similar but not quite the same on four separate occasions in six years. It’s an important chance to have a positive effect. Well done.
Isn’t the crab thing, like pretty true?
You sound like a great teacher!
Sounds like you did a great job. There was a lot of pushback in the other thread about calling these types of things ”racism”, but they are. Not all racism is malicious or intentional. Some of the things discussed were even well-intentioned, but based on stereotypes (eg bringing an English menu to a foreign-looking person that reads Japanese or doesn’t know English). That all _is_ racism.
But the framing is also really important when you’re trying to help people learn about racism. Just flat-out calling someone a racist tends to put them on the defensive and shuts down conversation. The approach you took sounds very similar to what my company did for “unconscious bias” training, just maybe a bit more conscious in this case. Get you to reveal the stereotypes and biases you may not have even realized you have, and then talk about the impact those things have. (Notice that intention never enters the picture.)
Anyway, sounds like you did a really good job!
this should be made into a youtube video so more people can learn
Great lesson. I wish every school in Japan had someone like you.
Its good you covered all this because I doubt they bother to cover this in social studies classes (with the Japanese teachers).
They really should add this type of lesson to their curriculum. Especially with more and more half kids being born every day (my own included) and more and more foreign people coming to live in Japan.
In my particular case, Im lucky because there are quite a few foreign kids and half kids at my kids elementary school, so those kids and teachers are more aware of social issues like these.