Thing for English 111.

With so many minorities in the world and so many cultures surrounding us we should all take notice. Not only as adults, but by starting off as young children. The article of "Children Speak about Interethnic and Interracial Friendships in the Classroom: Lessons for Teachers" by Cinzia Pica-Smith speaks exactly what and how teachers should handle introducing different colored children to each other.

This article tries to fend off racism from affecting the current children of the new generations to come. For many years minorities were forced to be in lower educations systems, segregated from other colors, and treated like dirt. By the segregation laws being forbidden in the U.S., this gives many children a chance in life to develop long lasting friendships with children of other backgrounds. By children being able to interact with other races, it increases understanding and racism decreases. Children also develop better social and behavior traits when they are in an interracial friendship. Which allows them to be diverse in their activities.

To study children and interracial friendships they had to gather research. Apparently having extracurricular activities really helped the children bond and develop friendships. In the article the researcher felt that the best way to get a child's understanding of the topic is to best ask the children themselves to have them explain friendships and interracial friendships and how teachers help interracial relationships to grow. The interviewer decides to find out what keeps the formations of these relationships to form and increase by using the children as subjects of the research and have the children speak out their thoughts and opinions. The children interviewed recieved these questions: 1) how would you describe a friend? (2) I hear a lot of children talking about their best friends, what is the difference between a friend and a best friend? (3) Would you tell me a little about your friends? (4) Are any of your close friends from a different ethnicity/race and cultural background than your own? Tell me about your friendships with them. (5) How could children's friendships with children of different ethnicities/races and cultural backgrounds be encouraged? The children mostly answered that intergroup friendships are not as abundant, but so wonderful when found..

Most of the children interviewed that had interracial relationships described them as rewarding, but a lot of hard work. The children with the interracial friends also said they enjoyed being able to learn about new cultures and explore new opportunities with their friends. Especially new hobbies that they might of not even heard of before.

As much as the children liked interracial friendships, there is also some unlikeable qualities. Sometimes they would rather just hang out with friends that like the same things as they do. A child of color, Letrell, explains it in his own way, "I noticed that my friends who are the same cultural background like me, like kind of the same stuff as I do ... my friends who aren't the same cultural background as me like different things than we like. So the good things about having different friends is that you can do different things and learn something new. But the bad things is that you have to try to make yourself like the same things that they do, and try to do it right ... try to do it as good as they do. Like if you are not used to it, and you make yourself like it." Some of the children have trouble with the parents having the other children coming over who are not the same color as their child. It seems that one child's parents are okay with it, while the other set of parents are iffy on the friendships. (Not known, but possible.). Some of the children feel like the same race understand them better and are even easier to talk to about things.

Even though the interracial friendships are fun, they face obstacles. Such as teasing. Children are often made fun of for the way they look and where they come from. It is hard for the children of color to feel good enough to hang out with white children or any other races. Also children's parents can be hesitant about these types of relationships, and may prevent the development of them.

Finally, they support intergroup friendships when they model and share stories of their own friendships. Children explain that teachers may act as barriers to intergroup friendships in several ways: when they do not respond to interrupt critical incidents involving racial prejudice, when they do not provide or facilitate opportunities for children to interact in interethnic/interracial group situations, and when they do not demonstrate their interest and investment in interethnic/interracial friendship. Teachers are another big impact on the prevention of these friendships. If a teacher does not stop or prevent racial discrimination it can cause children to catch on to their behavior. Another obstacle is children who do not live nearby or in close neighborhoods are not likely to develop friendships outside of school because of quality time that could not be spent together.

To develop better interracial friendships, teachers need to take a stand and prevent racial slurs. Also, by allowing group projects and quality time in the classroom, new friendships can form in the least likely pairing possible! Allowing children to interact with each other more will prevent racism in the classroom and eventually to the playground!