by Baba Bomani Armah, Master Teaching Artist

In 2020 I’m sure we are all on some level trying to define what is “normal.” What is our routine? What do we do on a daily basis to create the world we want for ourselves and others? One way we create “normal” is by the stories we tell. One not besieged by the issues us grown-ups see on the news each night and in reality each day. We are always worried about politicizing children. About exposing them too early to the horrors of the real world. We spoon feed them reality while dunking them head-first into a land of make-believe and fairy tales. How can we tell stories to create a new normal? 

We love it when kids start to tell their own stories. That stage around 3 or 4 when they start telling those meandering tales with no real plot. The story line follows the same path as the child’s eyes when they are looking up and back, trying to access the creative parts of their brain. Our first reality, where we learn about love and heroism, is in this make-believe. Telling stories affects how we see each other. The stories we know, but never remember being told to us, are the ones that secretly plan out our personality.

As I sit here trying to decide how to write about PreK learning, in a world where all learning is turned upside down because of national events surrounding how we see and take care of each other, I see how storytelling relates. I want the words that I write and the lessons I develop to lead to a world where we care for each other and see each other for who we really are. Many of us are taught to give soul and agency to two dimensional characters we read about that we never extend to three-dimensional real people who look nothing like us. While sitting in my 3 year-old daughter’s room it becomes evident what my wife and I think will help her on that path. Stories of people who look like her, have similar backgrounds, tastes and desires. This is to fortify her in her own confidence and culture. She is also surrounded by books of situations she might never see and people who aren’t in her community. That is to expand her imagination and hopefully make sure she can extend empathy to those who seem nothing like her.

Studies show that children who read develop more empathy than children who don’t. It’s the natural extension of storytelling, where Mamas and Babas tell morality tales to prepare children to be kind when necessary and fearless when it is called for. It is storytelling that will stop children from growing into adults who see people not like them as “others.” And it is the lack of diverse stories being told that stunt the growth of the majority and the minority.

I’m reminded of a story my wife Vanessa tells of seeing a white mother and child at a bookstore. The child picks up one of the rare books with lead characters who have obviously African features. The child’s mother tells her to put it back. “Those books aren’t for you,” she says. What an odd and destructive thought. Africans around the world who are blessed to read are usually surrounded by books with characters who don’t resemble them. It’s part of our indoctrination into the dominant culture. Vanessa fears, as I do, that too many parents see no value in their children learning about the rest of us.

Looking at the percentage of stories you can find with Black leading characters at all lets one know quickly which fictional lives matter. In an age of reckoning with the fact that black lives do not matter to a large portion of America, you start to ask yourself why and how you can make a difference. I am horrified imagining that Black households might still be in the 1960’s as far as their children’s book collections. Reading stories helps children develop empathy. It’s probably hard to think Black lives matter if they are “characters” you don’t even talk about until you meet Dr. King in grade school. What can we do, as parents (our child’s first librarian and storyteller) to create a new normal? Here are some suggestions for great books my daughter has in her collection:

Thank you Omu (Omu is the Igbo word for Queen)

by Oge Mora 

Sing to the Moon

by Nansubug Nagadya Isdahl and Sandra van Doorn

I Love My Hair!

By Natasha Anastasia Tarpley

Illustrated by E.B. Lewis

Please, Baby, Please

By Spike Lee & Tony Lewis Lee

Illustrated by Kadir Nelson

The most important books are the ones my children will write, so I make sure we start doing it as often as possible. An activity I’m going to start doing more often with my daughter is having her create a children’s chap book. It will be like every other beautiful book on her shelf, just written by her on paper bound with staples. A place for her to draw her spirals that are a million things other than that, and to read the words from the letters she has made up or simply doesn’t have the fine motor skills to draw correctly. But at the end of the day she’s written a book. She’s told her story. A story that needed to be told. Another step in normalizing this crazy world.