Issues inSpencer

Tamara Teacher Education, Summer 2022 9

Using Children’s Literature to Advance

Antiracist Early Childhood
Teaching and Learning

Tamara Spencer
Saint Mary’s College of California

Abstract
All too often, race and equity are not discussed in early childhood contexts
for fear that children are too young or innocent to grapple with such
topics. In this yearlong action research study, I examine how children’s
literature can be used to implement an antiracist pedagogy in early
childhood classrooms. Through the enactment of a critical children’s
literature teacher inquiry group, I examine the relationship between
the use of diverse children’s literature and a teacher’s development
as a social justice educator. Over the course of the academic year, the
eight teachers received books written for young children that explicitly
addressed diversity, equity, and justice. Through participation in
the inquiry group and the opportunity to deeply examine children’s
books, teachers further developed into their identities as educators
committed to social justice. This research sheds light on how teachers
can be actively engaged in a teaching practice that disrupts patterns
of inequity by bringing meaningful and relevant content into the lives
of all the children in their classrooms. Findings also provide recent
examples of antiracist early childhood texts.

Tamara Spencer is an associate professor in the Teacher Education

Department of the Kalmanovitz School of Education and the Justice,
Community, and Leadership Program of the School of Liberal Arts at
Saint Mary’s College of California, Moraga, California. Email address:
ts19@stmarys-ca.edu
© 2022 by Caddo Gap Press

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10 Using Children’s Literature to Advance Antiracist Teaching

Keywords: antiracist pedagogy, children’s literature, early childhood

literacy

Introduction
In recent years, early childhood teacher education programs have
turned attention towards advancing preparation practices to support
antiracist early childhood classrooms (Allen et al., 2021). Kendi
(2019) argues that the opposite of racist is not ‘not racist.’ Rather, the
opposite is antiracist, one who actively works to eliminate systemic,
organizational, and political racism (p.8). An early childhood educator’s
identities anchor how one perceives and enacts entry into the profession
(Nieto & Bode, 2012; Tatum, 1992). While my entrance into the field of
early education predates the term antiracist, I did enter the professional
with a particular commitment towards teaching in school communities
where the students shared my identity as a Black, Indigenous, Person
of Color (BIPOC). My Black family shares the perspective that Harris
(1992) notes, that one’s ability to read embodies “the power of literacy
to effect essential political, cultural, social, and economic change” (p.
276). Thus, for my family and many other Black families, early literacy
development signaled meaning beyond oneself towards a practice that
symbolizes liberation, joy, and freedom. Therefore, in my history and
within the context of early childhood teaching and learning, children’s
literature plays a prominent and recurring role.
To be an antiracist early childhood educator requires a deep
understanding of how racism is operationalized and enacted in the
lives and experiences of children. Early childhood literacy curriculum,
policies, and research is a human artifact and reflects the ideologies
and assumptions of humans who define what does and does not count
as valued. Approximately 83% of the teaching workforce in the United
States is White, despite a nation with significant projected growth of
non-White populations between 2014-2060 (Colby & Ortmon, 2015).
Escayg (2020) writes, “White teachers, through the element of White
privilege, reinscribe dominant racial meanings by constructing a
classroom environment that reifies Whiteness as the standard and as
the norm” (p. 3).
The careful selection of children’s literature, both in the home and
school environment, has long been understood as a hallmark of a young
child’s emergent literacy experience (i.e., Heath, 1982; Newman, 1996;
Strickland & Morrow, 1989). As children’s literature plays a central
role in a child’s classroom literacy development, this article examines
how it can be used to support antiracist pedagogy in classrooms. Using
an antiracist pedagogy framework, I describe the findings of a research

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Tamara Spencer 11

study that sought to understand how children’s literature could be used

to support educators’ understanding of culturally responsive pedagogy
and how it might be instrumental in the development of an identity as
social justice educators in California classrooms. Only once educators
have examined the longstanding structures of inequity that dominated
early literacy pedagogy are we prepared to, then, consider the pivotal
role books can also play in enacting an antiracist pedagogy in early
childhood classrooms.

An Antiracist Framework in Early Childhood

While the field of early childhood education, both in its scholarly
and professional arenas, has long valued multicultural and “anti-bias”
perspectives (Derman-Sparks et al., 2020; Souto-Manning, 2013), the
idea of an antiracist framework in early childhood is considerably less
examined. The field has long used critical theories and post-modern
perspectives to challenge broader systems such as developmentally
appropriate practices (i.e., Greishaber & Cannella, 2001; Yelland, 2005),
yet less explored is the everyday racism occurring in classrooms. Oluo
(2019) defines racism as “any prejudice against someone because of their
race, when those views are reinforced by systems of power” (p. 26). The
lived experiences of young children remain profoundly unequal.
To be an antiracist early childhood educator, one must accept that
someone can be child-centered and unintendedly practice everyday
racism with young children (Kailin, 2002). According to Kendi (2019),
an antiracist is “one who is supporting an antiracist policy through their
actions or expressing an antiracist idea” (p. 13). Policies and curricula
have long positioned language and literacy development as a tenet
within our field. And, reading books aloud to children is considered one of
the most valuable aspects of the early literacy environment (Bredekemp
& Copple, 2009; Sulzby & Teale, 1991). Hoffman and colleagues (2015)
aptly point out that “not all read-alouds are created equal” (p.8). They
point to the following considerations when selecting a text to read aloud:
thematically rich issues, round characters, illustrative quality, rich
language, and an engaging and complex plot. An antiracist approach
examines how a white-supremacist ideology is “operationalized in the
field of early childhood education, as well as in classroom spaces, defining
what is ‘valuable’ knowledge, ‘appropriate’ behaviors, and teaching
practices” (Escayg, 2019, p. 3). Thus, given the significance of children’s
literature in the early childhood classroom, the tenets for considering
quality children’s literature must be critically examined, as well as the
values and assumptions that undergird text selection and use.

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12 Using Children’s Literature to Advance Antiracist Teaching

While the use of the term antiracist to describe one’s practice is

somewhat recent to early childhood educators, the field has used the
term “anti-bias education” since the 1990s (Iruka et al., 2020). Derman-
Spark and colleagues (2020) recognize anti-bias early childhood
education as a commitment to diversity and cultural competence in
a world that is inherently unequal. Within this framework, anti-bias
education (ABE) is:
based on the understanding that children are individuals with their
own personalities and temperaments and with social group identities
based on families who birth and raise them and the way society views
who they are…ABE developed from the need to identify and prevent,
as much as possible, the impacts on children from societal prejudice
and bias. (p. 4)

Escayg (2012) critiques ABE as failing to foreground race as the

dominant organizing principle in racial inequities in the United
States. Escayg examines how ABE’s guidelines are positioned within
a framework that is informed by developmentally appropriate practice
and one that has an inconsistent history that some characterized
as marginalizing non-Eurocentric ways of knowing (Greishaber &
Cannella, 2001; Yelland, 2005). When this critique is paired with early
literacy instruction, an antiracist framework requires an approach to
text selection that provokes a critical understanding of race and racism
and its relevant impact on the selection of texts in a child’s purview.

A Legacy of Racism in Books Written for Children

Storytelling and storybook reading are shared across homes and
classrooms, offering a critical human vantage point to encode the
lived experience, of oneself, or others (Heath, 1982). As Dyson and
Genishi (1994) have long contended, “stories are an important tool
for proclaiming ourselves as cultural beings. In narratives, our voice
echoes those of others in the sociocultural world - what those others
think is worth commenting on and how they judge the effectiveness
of told stories” (p. 5). While children’s books serve a central role in
early childhood literacy development, a critical examination of how
self and others are storied in children’s books reveals a market that
is pervasively middle-class and White (Souto-Manning, 2013; Tschida
et al., 2014). Thomas (2016) notes that “over 85% of all children’s
and young adult books published feature White characters—a statistic
that has barely moved since the 1960s” (p. 116). Children’s books are a
cultural tool that, when critically examined, reveal the ideology of those
who publish the books and contexts in which they had intended use.

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Tamara Spencer 13

While books published for children in the United States first

appeared in the early 18th century, mass publication did not begin until
the mid-20th century (Stevenson, 2011). With efforts to compete with
the Soviet Union in the space race, publishers developed a heightened
interest in books intended for children’s education and amusement
(Pinkerton, 2016). Up until this point, children’s books only portrayed
the stories of White children or, if BIPOC were represented, it wasn’t as
humans but instead it was “as inferior in some way—comical, primitive,
pitiable, or in need of paternalistic care” (Bishop, 2011, p. 225). This
double legacy of both absence and distorted representation persists in
the books that are published today. Thomas (2016) notes that “over
85% of all children’s and young adult books published feature White
characters—a statistic that has barely moved since the 1960s” (p. 116).
Thus, children’s literature is an artifact of the American experience and
White supremacy. And, as Kendi (2019) notes, “Whiteness—even as a
construction and a mirage—has informed [White people’s] notions of
America and identity and offered them privilege, the primary one being
the privilege of being inherently normal, standard and legal” (p. 38).
Books for young children harbor racism, albeit in different forms
but, “it is about how racist ideologies persist in the literature of
childhood, frequently in ways that we fail to notice on a conscious level”
(Nel, 2017, p. 4). Books written for young children are often shrouded
in nostalgic language and principally subjective in the matter of whose
stories are told. Anti-blackness, for example, can be seen in the omission
of Blacks, misrepresentation or dehumanizing characterization of
Blacks, or the perpetuation of myths or stereotypes about the Black
community (Bishop, 2011; Mo & Shen, 2003; Pescosolido et al., 1997).
Hughes-Hassell and Cox (2010) state:
Children of color absorb many of the beliefs and values of the
dominant White culture, including the belief that it is better to be
White. Stereotypes, omissions, and distortions, combined with an
image of White superiority, play a role in socializing children of color
to value the role models, lifestyles, and images of the beauty of White
culture over those of their own cultural group. Countering the story of
White superiority is critical to the positive growth and development of
self-esteem and self-concept in children of color. (p. 214-215)

Reading aloud literature to children is often characterized as

the ideal context for emergent, foundational literacy development
(Heath, 1982; Strickland & Morrow, 1998). NAEYC et al. (2021) cite
reading aloud to children as the skill most essential for building the
understandings and skills essential for later reading success. And yet,
despite the star-status children’s books receive in early education, the

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14 Using Children’s Literature to Advance Antiracist Teaching

lack of representation of BIPOC in books targeted at young children

remains staggering. Board books, with their wide thick pages, format,
and predictability, are designed with the youngest readers in mind
(children birth-age 3). And yet, as Hughes-Hassell and Cox (2010)
research inventory of these books reveals, “board books that feature
people of color are rare and often present inauthentic and monolithic
representations. Even rarer seems to be the creation of board books by
authors and illustrators of color” (p. 211). Thus, the omission of both
representation and authorship yields what Nel describes as “how race
is present especially when it is absent” (p. 4).

Antiracist Literacy Teaching and Learning

All too often, race is not discussed in early childhood contexts for
fear that children are too young or innocent to grapple with such a
complex topic (Tatum, 1992). Indeed, a common myth perpetuates that
the minds of young children are either blank slates when it comes to
race, incapable of racist actions, or only exposed to racism when it is
learned in the home (Winkler, 2009). And yet, studies reveal that
children develop an acute understanding of racial differences at an early
age (i.e., Derman-Sparks & Ramsey, 2011; Tatum, 1992). What starts
in infancy as a cognitive awareness of racial variation, evolves into
curiosity and deep awareness, of racial differences in their daily lives
and their actions, reactions, questions, and interactions with children
and caretakers (Derman-Sparks & Ramsey, 2011). Simply put, when it
comes to talking to children about race, no time is too early.
Growing up in a Black family and now as the mother of two young
Black girls, I can affirm that our racial identity is simply in the oxygen
of our home. Tatum (1992) describes how racial identity is developed in
Black children at a very young age, whether the child is one of the only
Black members of a community or in highly diverse or predominantly
Black environments where the topic might include variation in skin
tone, for example. An antiracist perspective on early childhood,
however, situates race within a context where racism moves beyond
one individual, racist act, or belief. Rather, racism is underscored by
systemic power, as Oluo (2019) notes “you don’t have to be racist to be
a part of a racist system” (p. 28).
Oluo (2019) describes White supremacy as “insidious by design” and
“woven into every area of our lives” (p. 218). In children’s literature, this
includes and is not limited to, the racist history of books for children
(Stevenson, 2011), the publishing industry that selects which authors
are published or rejected (Corrie, 2018), and the narrow representation

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Tamara Spencer 15

of young children or childhood in books. Data on books by and about

BIPOC published for children and teens compiled by the Cooperative
Children’s Book Center highlight gradual, but slow progress, in the
publishing industry as White main characters, or even animals,
continue to dominate the main character roles. With close to 90 percent
of children’s books featuring a White protagonist, a child’s exposure
to books comes in tandem with the visual message that Whiteness is
the norm. As Welch (2016) aptly argues, one can go out of their way to
purchase books that feature BIPOC, however, it is the scarcity of these
titles and the publishing mechanisms that maintain this inequity that
continues to perpetuate the long-term harm.
Educators and families must grapple with the formidable ways in
which White privilege also plays out, both in the content of children’s
literature and the curricular modalities that are used to teach these
texts. That is, educators and White families must consider how
White children bear witness to tangible and societal inequity and
develop in-group bias, or favoritism towards the groups in which they
are members (Patterson & Bigler, 2006). Children’s books provide
whimsical and imaginative spaces, stories of families, hope, and wonder
(Thomas, 2016). Thus, when White children see themselves reflected
in these stories as the protagonist, the astronomer, or the princess,
these cultural artifacts reinforce their understandings of self within
a societal system of power. Additionally, when BIPOC characters are
portrayed as secondary, reinforcing anti-Black ideologies, or absent
in the text altogether, children’s texts reinforce detrimental patterns
that reproduce systemic inequalities. Taken together, educators and
families require a deeper awareness of antiracist text selection in early
childhood classrooms, moving beyond simply a celebration of diversity
to one that better captures children’s lived experience with race.

Research Methodology
This study enacted an action research case study methodology
(Dyson & Genishi, 2005). The study took place over the course of an
academic school year (2020-2021) and asked the following research
question: What is the relationship between the use of diverse children’s
literature and a teacher’s development as a social justice educator?
This article draws upon the findings presented during a focus group
comprised of preliminary and clear-credentialed California teachers.
This phase of the research involved a Critical Children’s Literature
Group (CCLG) that met regularly to discuss select antiracist early
childhood texts and served as a broader network for socially just

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16 Using Children’s Literature to Advance Antiracist Teaching

literacy education. The decision to characterize the group as an inquiry

group built on the tradition of Nieto (2003) and Cochran-Smith and
Lytle (2015) that puts inquiry and research at the center of teacher’s
work. During that year, the group of eight teachers met approximately
once a month for a 1.5-hour CCLG session. The CCLG meetings were
designed to be an informal, semi-structured space to support enhanced
pedagogical knowledge. Before each meeting, participants received a
comprehensive collection of inclusive children’s literature books (i.e.,
Appendix 1). In between meetings, all participants were asked to
maintain a written or audio memo to record their reactions to the text.
Based on the work of Escamilla and Nathenson-Mejía (2003) they were
asked the following questions every meeting: (1) What has this book
led you to think about? (2) What questions does this book raise? and (3)
How do you think your students would respond to this book?
All of the teachers worked in California schools (6 public and 2
parochial), self-identified as educators committed to social justice
and equity, and were graduates from the same teacher preparation
program. Except for one BIPOC male-identifying participant, all others
were female-identifying women. Of the six women, one identified as
multiracial (both White and Asian American). The five other women
self-identified as White. Six of the eight teachers taught in early
childhood grades (K-3), however, all texts selected were picture books
appropriate for the early childhood spectrum (birth-age 8). It is critical
to note that the teachers volunteered to participate in the group and
brought knowledge, deep conviction, and interest in critical pedagogies
in education. To analyze these data, I subscribed to methods akin
to those put forth by Dyson and Genishi (2005), and Marshall and
Rossman (2015) to inductively analyze these data. Building on these
foundational qualitative methods, I used Phillips and Carr’s (2014)
three-part cycle for ongoing data analysis. In this model, “each data
collection period builds on the one before, incorporates changes and
adjustments as you analyze and interpret your ongoing work” (p. 122).

The Critical Children’s Literature Group Procedures

Scheduled to begin in the Spring of 2020, the CCLG, like so
many other aspects of society, was shifted to a virtual format due to
the COVID-19 global pandemic. In addition, the double pandemic—
COVID-19 and systemic violence and inequities for BIPOC in the U.S.—
deeply impacted the lived experiences of the teachers and thus served
as the backdrop for all conversations in the CCLG. For example, current
events such as Floyd’s murder and the subsequent protests or local hate

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Tamara Spencer 17

crimes that targeted Asian American Pacific Island (AAPI) individuals

would come up frequently in our conversations about literature.
Each meeting began with a short period of time for participants
to greet each other and update their profile name to include the grade
they teach. Before the meeting, the teachers were sent a bundle of 5-6
children’s books for inclusion in their classroom’s library collection.
The books and each session were loosely organized around Howlett
and Young’s (2019) categories of multicultural literature:
• Books that provide a diversity of perspectives
• Books that develop cultural competence
• Books that increase intercultural competence
• Books that combat racism, prejudice, and discrimination
• Books that develop the awareness of the state of a community,
country, globe, or planet
• Books that develop social action skills

Appendix 1 presents sample children’s books for each of these six

categories. While not described in this article, texts were identified
within preservice classes and in consultation with a graduate student
researcher. We surveyed a broad range of sources to identify current
titles in children’s literature. Howlett and Young’s categories of
multicultural literature provided a tool to choose texts in a manner
that moved beyond a visual diversity (i.e., a character happened to
be BIPOC) to instead one that intentionally offered a lens or method
to engage in explicit conversations about diversity, equity, inclusion,
and belonging. We selected texts by consulting with a local children’s
bookstore and referencing websites like We Need Diverse Books
(2022), Bank Street College of Education’s (2022) annual list of best
books, author and trade book events through the National Council of
Teachers of English (NCTE), and traditional award category nominees
(i.e., Coretta Scott King Award, Ezra Jack Keats Award). Given the
state of the world at that time, we also noticed a flurry of discussions
on diverse children’s literature on social media and monitored them
as well for additional titles. On some occasions, the CCLG members
brought new titles to the group as well. Ultimately, it was not within
the scope of this project to create an exhaustive list of books, but
instead, its value and purpose was with the intentionality used to
select texts and bring them to the CCLG for use and discussion. In
sum, over 150 children’s books were read and considered over the
course of this research and the breadth of titles accounted for rich
and complex conversations that ultimately led to the select list of
antiracist children’s literature presented here.

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18 Using Children’s Literature to Advance Antiracist Teaching

Each session began with an open-ended short discussion question

to orient the conversation. Once the meeting was underway, the
conversations were organized around three intentionally broad and
open-ended questions: (1) What CCLG books did you read this month?
(2) What questions or thoughts did these texts raise? and (3) How did
the children respond to these texts? Rarely did the meetings end on
time as the teachers were eager to talk to the group about the books,
how they generated discussions in their classrooms, or their identity as
social justice educators.

Findings
In this section, the findings of this action research study are
presented, specifically themes that emerged to answer the following
research question: What is the relationship between the use of diverse
children’s literature and a teacher’s development as a social justice
educator? These themes highlighted aspects of the work of social
justice educators, such as the need to have ongoing and difficult
conversations about race and identity, explore and identify antiracist
texts collectively, and the opportunity to consider how their students
grappled with these texts.

“We Need to Practice this Skill Intentionally and Frequently”

The teachers’ participation in the CCLG was voluntary and most
described the opportunity to deepen their understanding of what
it means to be an antiracist teacher. For example, one teacher later
reflected:
Racial literacy and social comprehension skills are a core foundation
for me as a teacher. Every book that is read to children or read in a
classroom creates an opportunity to have a conversation with students
about race, social justice, and the numerous pieces a part of it. To
create a more equitable and just society, individuals need to be made
aware of, given tools and skills and be put in opportunities to practice
identifying, discussing, and questioning race and the numerous layers
that go along with it like systems, power, privilege, microaggressions,
and bias.

Several teachers commented on the importance of talking about

issues of race and equity with children and felt that an audience of
young children was easier to talk to than that of adults. As one teacher
noted, first graders can be more open than their family members.
Another commented on the difference between a discussion with
children and that with adults:

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Tamara Spencer 19

With adults, I’m still working on that part. I feel more comfortable
talking about it with kids. And, if they’re not, then that’s what I’m
here for. But most of the time, it’s a lot of pushback in groups like—
this shouldn’t be talked about at school. Then where should it be talked
about when they spend about six, seven hours a day with me?...Race is
100% a part of everyone’s life, whether you’re White or whether you’re
not. If you’re White, it’s 100% a part of your life, because, look at all
that privilege you’ve got; for sure, it’s part of your life.
In addition, some of the teachers avoided conversations about race
with other adults as they feared “saying the wrong thing” or being
misunderstood. One first-grade teacher noted her worries about
reading books that explicitly discussed race, in front of her classroom
aid (a Black woman). However, most agreed that children were the
safest of audiences to develop these skills and that their anxieties could
not drive their choices if they wanted to embody an antiracist approach
to teaching and learning. Thus, talking to children intentionally and
explicitly about race supported the teachers in their ability to have
these conversations more frequently and more often. As one second-
grade teacher stated:
Just like how it is a priority that my students learn how to add and
subtract multi-digit numbers this year. If I’m dedicating two class
meetings a week to that math skill, I need to dedicate just as much (if
not more) time to talk with my kids about race and equity. The more
that we get our students talking, the more comfortable they will feel
in discussing these important topics and they will be more equipped to
express their feelings and thoughts about race and identity. We need
to practice that skill intentionally and frequently, like any other skill.
Early in the CCLG, we took note of “predictable conversations” that
might occur when teachers are reading antiracist children’s books. We
challenged ourselves to move beyond “this student said” or “this parent
feels” rhetoric, to one where we highlighted patterns when teachers
engage in this type of work. For example, one teacher shared how his
reading of The Color of Us (Katz, 2002) (see Figure 1) resulted in a
White child saying she felt “left out of the pictures.” As a BIPOC, the
teacher (Cameron) felt caught off-guard by the statement.
Several of the CCLG White teachers used this moment to pivot
from the actual interaction and instead reframed the challenge to
one that situated the event within an antiracist framework. While we
always talked through our experiences, we also pivoted to the broader
themes and challenges that present when one is engaging in this type
of teaching. One teacher, affirming the BIPOC teacher’s feelings of
uncertainty in reading the text offered an alternative argument and

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20 Using Children’s Literature to Advance Antiracist Teaching

Figure 1

stated, “I’m White, I see so much White stuff all around me…all around
heteronormative White stuff all over the place.” From there, she raised
the reoccurring theme of the importance of text representation in
classroom libraries, curriculum, and school programming. In addition,
she encouraged Cameron to engage this child and the class of students
in an analysis of the classroom texts that present this pattern.

Lingering Over a Page

Each month, the teachers were provided with a bundle of books
to be included in their classroom library. In all cases, the teachers
took the opportunity to read the books independently and read all or
some of them with their students. While many of the children’s books
explicitly highlighted issues of race or class, some stood out to the
teachers in the way that they just offered the “everyday” diversity of
the world around us.
The teachers were drawn to the opportunities presented by the
book Lovely (Hong, 2017) (see Figure 2). In her first book as a children’s
author, through vivid and unexpected imagery, Hong showcases
that “Big, small, curly, straight, loud, quiet, smooth, wrinkly. Lovely
explores a world of differences that all add up to the same thing: we are
all lovely!.” (Creston Books, n.p.).
Sally, a first-grade teacher described her experience bringing

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Tamara Spencer 21

Figure 2

Lovely into her first-grade classroom. With her CCLG book set, Sally
would first put the books out on display. She observed how her first
graders engaged in collective meaning-making activities born from
their curiosities, questions, and interests when previewing the texts
with each other.
I have not read Lovely to my entire class, but I had it out on my display
bookshelf in my room. And because there are not a lot of words, and
a lot of illustrations, two girls got to pick a book, and they chose that
one. They didn’t read any of the words because they can’t read yet.
That’s okay. They were looking at the pictures. And they stopped at
a page and they started talking about it...and they had this entire
conversation by themselves about a page in a book without even
knowing what the book was about. Never having a teacher read it to
them. But just being able to have a conversation about similarities
and differences, just from a picture in a book it was really cool to see
them do that.

Another teacher described how powerful it was for her students

to see a tattooed image in a picture book. While tattoos and body art
are common amongst the adults in her school community, rarely do
they see tattooed people on the pages of children’s books. The teacher
noted that one student commented, “that looks like my dad’s arm!” As
a result, the teacher embraced the opportunity to linger on the page
and discuss the illustrations with her students. One teacher noted:
I really appreciate Lovely. We often see diversity in terms of culture,
skin color, traditions, but I really like how Lovely included body
positivity and people with disabilities because sometimes we forget
to include that in what we decide is diverse. Things like that, and
allowing the kids to ask questions like, why does that person look like
that? Why does their skin look like that? Or why are they using that

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22 Using Children’s Literature to Advance Antiracist Teaching

device, or even just like, I’m someone who’s struggled with my weight,
so to see, like, lovely as being a little bit bigger, and that’s okay, too.
I love that that is being spoken and read to the kids, for them to start
having that mindset of that is okay, that is lovely.

Sally’s students who “discovered” Lovely highlighted a valuable early

reading behavior that we coined lingering over a page. When discussing
the texts, the teachers commented on pages that students “lingered
over” and were eager to discuss and process in the community. In turn,
the teachers modeled this practice in the CCLG. In the text, All Are
Welcome Here (Penfold, 2018), the author unapologetically affirms
diversity through a colorful and engaging portrayal of a diverse and
inclusive school setting. The center spread (see Figure 3), a family event
in the school’s gym, was one of those pages that frequently reoccurred,
both in our conversations in the CCLG and the teachers’ classrooms.
One teacher, Ava, describes how her classroom often lingered on
this page. She stated:
It is a space for kids to be okay to just be curious about some of the
things that they notice about individuals on the page. For example,
‘I see someone wearing something wrapped around their head,’ that
type of thing. Then it kind of opens [the conversation] up, that way it
is not negative but more an inquiry…Then we can go back to it, [and
say] ‘well, ok, you perceive this person was this way because you saw
them wearing this...’ So, it is a good book to come back to later on.

The World is On Fire around Us

Over the year with the CCLG, despite our inability to meet in
person, we collectively grieved and supported each other through the
painful events that occurred in the world around us, just as we sat on
our computer screens. The CCLG commenced just after the violent and
Figure 3

Issues in Teacher Education

Tamara Spencer 23

public murder of George Floyd and the teachers returned to classrooms

in communities that were often draped with Black Lives Matter
posters, murals, and protests. In addition, over the year, several visible
and deeply harmful images and videos were shared publicly of hate
crimes against the AAPI community. And so, the CCGI shifted into a
critical space for the teachers to process how they were engaging with
children, in these conversations, in real-time.
Several teachers commented on how Black History Month 2021
brought out several conversations about George Floyd. Ashley, a second-
grade teacher, described a conversation that occurred that month on
her classroom rug. The students had recently attended an assembly
and the conversation turned to George Floyd. Ashley chose to read the
CCLG text, The Breaking News (Reul, 2018). In this text, children feel
the aftermath of a community that is distracted and troubled by recent
news and it offers the perspective of children, who are bystanders in
these moments in time. Ashley noted:
After George Floyd, my students really connected with [The Breaking
News]…they were able to share, that they went to our schools’ Black
Lives Matters march, after that or made signs. They shared some
tangible things that they had done to take action or to express their
experiences after George Floyd’s murder.

The CCLG group had spent significant time that year discussing
unexpected turns conversations with children could take and Ashley’s
class soon entered one of those moments. She described how some of the
children began to talk about how George Floyd was in the news again
because the police officer’s trial for murder had begun. Ashley recalled:
…one of my students said, ‘Well, why did that police officer kill him?
Like, what did he do?’ And another student of mine raised his hand
and he said, ‘Oh, well, he didn’t have a reason except for that he’s
racist.’ And then another kid was like, ‘You’re not supposed to say
that. And I was like, ‘Why? Why are you not supposed to say that?
Are you feeling worried that you’re not supposed to call people racist?
Ashley commented on how empowered she felt, at this moment, to have
this conversation because she had also received the CCLG book A Kid’s
Book About Racism (Memory, 2019). Ashley described how she shared
this text with her students, a text with no pictures, just words set
against a crisp white backdrop that invites children to speak plainly
and matter-of-fact manner about racism (see Figure 4).
She stated:
And so, this is a perfect moment to read A Kid’s Book About Racism. I

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24 Using Children’s Literature to Advance Antiracist Teaching

Figure 4

told them [the second graders], we don’t usually do back to back read
alouds but I think we are really ready for this book right now. So we
kind of shared what they understood for it to be…In The Breaking
News, you really pay attention to the images of the people and the
colors; it is all gray and the little pockets of light. With this book,
it’s all focusing on the words. They were just so—in trance—listening
and absorbing what it was saying. …it was just really such a unique
reading, with them being able to go from one book to another… we
spent, at least an hour, the first hour of school day, just talking
about all of it and reading those two books. And it was really, it was
a wonderful experience. And I think they all took something from it
feeling like, more confident and recognizing racism when it happens…
And so it was just a valuable experience. And I felt lucky to have those
two books on hand and feel prepared to deliver them both.

Ashley worked in a progressive school district that supported the

faculty in their efforts to engage in antiracist pedagogy. In that sense,
the work was not new to the community, though Ashley’s commitment
and dedication indeed positioned her as a leader in their community.
Through the CCLG the teachers also supported each other in school
environments that were less open to the work of social justice educators.

“The World Does Not Look Like Our School”

Melanie, a resource teacher in a suburban public school was a
valued member of the CCLG. In her fifth year of teaching, Melanie
often expressed her appreciation of her school’s new principal, who

Issues in Teacher Education

Tamara Spencer 25

was working to transform their school from one where a “color-blind”

ideology was pervasive among some teachers and parents, to one that
embraced diversity, equity, inclusion, and belonging. In one of her first
professional development events, Melanie recounted her new principal
telling the faculty that, “the world does not look like our school” and
therefore, it is the responsibility of the teachers, to bring that world
into their classrooms.
With the support of her new principal, Melanie embraced the
opportunity to understand how a social justice framework applied to her
work as a special education resource teacher. Melanie described how
her work, particularly in early literacy, is often reduced to a discrete
set of skills, academic learning goals, or responsibilities separate from
young children. Her students can also be characterized, by some,
through a deficit lens or incapable of more complex conversations. And
so, when Melanie’s third-grade students discussed the picture book,
Hidden Figures (Shetterly, 2018) it was impactful, not just on the
students, but also for the general classroom teacher who witnessed the
event and subsequent conversation.
With the new principal Hidden Figures had been a school-wide read
aloud. It had been read in a third-grade classroom where I co-taught
during some of the readers and writers workshop times [with the
resource room students]. I had a couple of students in that classroom
and one of the students has autism, and it can appear like he is not
paying attention. But then we’ll have these moments where it’s very
clear, he is paying attention, it just doesn’t look like listening looks for
most kids. So as we were reading the book, the student raises his hand
in the middle of the book and was like, isn’t that segregation? For me,
it was a special moment, for many reasons. But one was, it came from
a student who, if you walked in the room and set eyes on him, people
wouldn’t be able to tell he was listening. But he really was listening,
was super intrigued by the book…and, he sparked this conversation
in the class…and so, that book has held a special place in my heart
in the way it sparked conversation for the class and that unique way.

Melanie’s reading highlighted the concern that the teachers raised

that some parents or community members felt that conversations
about race and equity were not appropriate for young children. As
the teachers felt more comfortable reading the books, discussing the
books, lingering over pages, and rehearsing the difficult conversations
that might arise, they felt validation and pride to include these books
in their libraries and curriculum. Ava noted how she now works to
replace the “traditional” texts in her reading and writing workshops
with ones that account for the diversity of the world around them. One

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26 Using Children’s Literature to Advance Antiracist Teaching

teacher did caution that she felt comfortable reading the books but felt
uncertain how to continue the conversations with some members of
her school community. At this point, one participant reminded her that
the work we do functions on a continuum and so this was just another
indication of that and her journey as a social justice educator.

Discussion
The findings of this action research study highlight how teachers
of young children can actively engage in antiracist pedagogy. Whether
their students were sitting in the presence of books that affirmed
their identities or engaging in critical conversations about racism or
Black joy, the CCLG teachers understood that their work as educators
required persistent and embedded work that disrupted systemic
inequities present in the lives of children. Through participation in the
CCLG and the opportunity to analyze children’s books, teachers were
provided a space to examine their identities as educators committed to
social justice. This study, therefore, adds to the scholarship on teacher
development and the value and importance of teacher professional
development that supports antiracist pedagogy in early childhood
classrooms.
The findings of this study also demonstrate the need for professional
spaces where teachers can speak candidly about race and racism to
disrupt patterns of systemic oppression in schools. White and Wanless
(2019) write that “because Black people have historically been assigned
the lowest status in the American racial hierarchy, U.S. racism causes
undue harm to Black children in particular” (p. 73). Early childhood
educators require spaces to talk through societal harm caused by
racism and identify tangible resources that can support facilitating
productive and meaningful, developmentally attuned, conversations
with young children.
As was mentioned, this study occurred at a time when the United
States faced the COVID-19 global pandemic and systemic violence
and inequities for BIPOC. Indeed, the findings demonstrate how these
topics were prevalent in both the CCLG meetings and the classroom
experiences for the teachers and children. Husband (2018) highlights
the necessity of antiracist early education as “teachers should teach
children about race and racial justice [to] develop a sensitivity to racial
injustices in their everyday lives and within the broader society” (p.
1067). Thus, the presence of antiracist literature became a critical tool
for early educators to use to assist in their discussions of the everyday
world with young children.

Issues in Teacher Education

Tamara Spencer 27

Implications of this study also examine how young White children

and families are impacted by the misrepresentation and omission
of BIPOC in children’s literature. Setting Whiteness as the default
in children’s literature underscores what some qualify as “White
supremacy” in education, that is “Whiteness is supreme over others.
We see that present in our values as a nation, in our culture, in our
ways of being, and, therefore, embedded in all our systems” (Brown,
2021, p. 29). Here, the findings from the CCLG highlight teachers
from a broad range of classroom settings—urban/suburban public
and parochial—who saw that value in using an inclusive and nuanced
classroom book selection that centered diversity, equity, justice, and
belonging. As Appendix 1 demonstrates, using a critical lens, teachers
can be intentional in the selection of literature and consider race and
equity in the selection of texts for the classroom. Thus, the findings from
this work underscore Escayg’s (2019) synthesis supports antiracist
teaching as it has the capacity for teachers to gain “additional insights
on how children draw on cultural messages, representations, and ideas
about race to construct their own racial understandings” (2019, p. 2).
Text selection alone does not mitigate or curb the impact of
systemic racism in early childhood classrooms. Gaias et al. (2021), for
example, considered the intentional focus on race, culture, and across
domains of practice to include: Visual/Esthetic Environment, Toys and
Materials, Activities, Interactions, and Organizational Climate. While
this research only considered one aspect—classroom literature—it
does shed light on how teachers can be actively engaged in a teaching
practice that serves to disrupt White supremacy culture and bring
meaningful and relevant content into the lives of all the children in
their classrooms. In that sense, these practices reflect the ethos of a
culturally sustaining pedagogy in early childhood that Paris (2012)
defines as one that can “perpetuate and foster—to sustain—linguistic,
literate, and cultural pluralism as part of the democratic project of
schooling” (p. 93).

Acknowledgements
This work was funded through the Provost Faculty Research Grant
Program at Saint Mary’s College of California. A special thank you to the
graduate student researcher on this project, Marissa Loudon. In addition,
much appreciation and respect for the social justice educators in the CCLG.

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Appendix 1
Select Children’s Books based on Howlett and Young’s (2019) Categories
of Multicultural Literature
Category CCLG Select Children’s Books
Books that Provide All Are Welcome Here (Penfold, 2018)
a Diversity of Perspectives Lovely (Hong, 2017)
Colors of Us ( Katz, 2002)
Books that Develop Night Job (Hesse, 2018)
Cultural Consciousness Dreamers (Morales, 2018)
Bedtime Bonnet (Redd, 2022)
Books that Increase Saturday (Mora, 2019)
Intercultural Competence Drawn Together by (Lê, 2018)
The Proudest Blue (Muhammad, 2019)
Books that combat Racism, A Kid’s Book About Racism (Memory, 2019)
Prejudice, and Discrimination Breaking News (Reul, 2018)
Don’t Touch My Hair (Miller, 2019)
Books that Develop Hidden Figures (Shetterly & Freeman, 2018)
the Awareness of the State Separate Is Never Equal: Sylvia Mendez
of a Community, Country, and Her Family’s Fight
Globe, or Planet for Desegregation (Tonatiuh, 2014)
We Are Water Protectors (Lindstrom, 2020)
Books that Develop Social Let the Children March (Clark-Robinson, 2018)
Action Skills (through history Just Ask (Sotomayor, 2019)
or present day events) Shaking Things Up: 14 Young Women
who Changed the World (Hood, 2022)

Volume 31, Number 2, Summer 2022

Reproduced with permission of copyright owner. Further reproduction
prohibited without permission.