Importance Of Introducing Diversity To Your Kid's Toys

by Diversity in Toys Diversity in Toys

The toys your kids play with can help you shape their view of the world. After all, play is how children process their lives and the world around them. It is how they develop emotional and social awareness and learn more about critical social values like self-esteem, leadership, and compassion. Play can help you, as a parent, direct the foundation for who they will be in society. You can shape this foundation intentionally if you think hard about what toys your children are playing with.

Toys are generally the foundation for most faulty ideas surrounding diversity and race. They may unintentionally deliver the wrong message to our kids when you have doctor dolls who are only white or firefighters who are only men. Kids tend to internalize what they see as the truth if that message is not countered correctly.

To raise your children to be antiracists, you must ensure you weigh the scale towards inclusion and diversity to help them become better critical thinkers. Our society often weights it in the other direction by not talking about it or with homogenous images. You, as parents, must intentionally do some things differently. We don't expect you to control every message your kids get, but you can control what medical messages and toys they have at home.

Kids Need To See Themselves Represented In Games, Toys, And Crafts!

When children of color don't see themselves represented in toys and media, they will not feel valued or like something is wrong with them. They might think they must assimilate into white society and try to change themselves to belong. Similarly, white kids get the message that children of color do not belong in their world. Therefore, you need to introduce ethnic dolls at an early age.

There was an old study repeated in several iterations, where kids were shown a black and white doll and asked to explain the positive and negative qualities they saw. Even black kids chose the white doll to have more positive traits. It can be difficult to see young black kids identifying a black doll as a not-pretty or bad doll. No one told them that, but when everything around them delivers that impression, they don't want to be that.

Your children will be much more engaged and interested when they see someone who looks like them reflected in their toys, media, and books. It will be inspiring for them to see someone who looks like them doing things that everyone agrees are positive.

White Parents Should Also Be Conscious Of Their Children Having Diversity In Dolls.

It is also important for white parents to introduce ethnic dolls to their kids at an early age as a way of normalizing differences. We must think hard about representing the real world, not the bubble in our towns or homes, but from a global perspective.

It would help if you always taught your kids to think critically about the world around them. You can say things like, "we have several friends of color. Why do you think there are not many people of color on this show?" or "did you notice our neighborhood? There are several people besides white people!" Speaking freely about these things can help you create opportunities for a healthy conversation and help them think critically about the media they consume.