Empowering Kids with Social Justice Education with Dr. Shelby Kretz, Ph.D.
00:00:00 Alyssa
You're listening to Voices of Your Village, and today we get to dive in with Dr. Shelby Kretz to chat about empowering kids with social justice education. Dr. Shelby Kretz is the creator of Little Justice Leaders, an organization that provides social justice education resources for educators and families. Little Justice Leaders offers a monthly subscription for parents and teachers that provides resources each month to learn about social justice. Little Justice Leaders has sent over 17,000 learning kits to parents and teachers around the world, and Shelby earned her Ph.D. in education from UCLA, and her dissertation explored social justice education at the elementary school level. Over the past decade, Shelby's worked with thousands of parents, teachers, and school leaders to bring social justice education to these children. It was such a rich discussion to get to hang with her, and I especially loved diving into of the breakdown with Rach at the end of what this looks like with our kids' IRL as parents and how it shows up. If this podcast is serving you, if you are finding value in it and it's helpful for you, please take a minute to rate and review the podcast. I love reading the reviews and when you rate it, it helps other folks find this podcast, which gives them free information and support on this journey of raising emotionally intelligent kids. Alright folks, let's dive in.
00:01:33 Alyssa
Hey there, I'm Alyssa Blask Campbell. I'm a mom with a master's degree in early childhood education and co -creator of the Collaborative Emotion Processing Method. I'm here to walk alongside you through the messy, vulnerable parts of being humans raising other humans with deep thoughts and actionable tips. Let's dive in together.
00:01:54 Alyssa
How are you doing today, Shelby?
00:01:56 Shelby
I am good. How are you, Alyssa?
00:01:58 Alyssa
I'm doing all right. We were just having some T -Swift chats in the office.
00:02:02 Shelby
Oh nice. What are the T -Swift chats?
00:02:05 Alyssa
Got all fired up trying to figure out a way to go to a show.
00:02:08 Shelby
Oh my gosh, it's impossible.
00:02:10 Alyssa
Yeah. Well, she... Where do you live?
00:02:13 Shelby
I live in Ohio.
00:02:14 Alyssa
Okay. So she's going to be in Toronto. I live in Burlington, Vermont, but I'm from Western New York. Like I'm from near Buffalo and yeah, she's going to be in Toronto. So we're just chatting about the ins and outs. Yeah.
00:02:27 Shelby
Have you been to the Eras tour yet?
00:02:29 Alyssa
No
00:02:30 Shelby
OK, so, you need to get those tickets.
00:02:33 Alyssa
Have you been?
00:02:34 Shelby
I have. I went to Detroit.
00:02:35 Alyssa
OK. Everything its chalked up to be?
00:02:37 Shelby
It was. It's an amazing show. Like she she really puts on a show and
00:02:41 Alyssa
So you're saying we should do it.
00:02:43 Shelby
You should do it if you can. Yeah. But I know it's really hard to get the tickets. So.
00:02:47 Alyssa
I know.
00:02:49 Shelby
Yeah.
00:02:49 Alyssa
Just trying to really make this happen.
00:02:51 Shelby
Yeah. Are they like on sale again now or?
00:02:55 Alyssa
Yeah, you could. They're just I have to justify. I don't know if I can justify this expense.
00:03:00 Shelby
Yeah. Oh, because then you'll have to go to Toronto like for the weekend.
00:03:03 Alyssa
The whole shebang. It's a lot.
00:03:04 Shelby
Its a really good show.
00:03:06 Alyssa
I know. Feels worth it, right?
00:03:08 Shelby
Yeah. I mean, it's like a vacation.
00:03:10 Alyssa
Sure. Without my kids and husband.
00:03:12 Shelby
It's a trip. It's a girl's trip.
00:03:13 Alyssa
It's a true vacation.
00:03:15 Shelby
Yeah, exactly.
00:03:16 Alyssa
Where in Ohio are you?
00:03:17 Shelby
I'm in Toledo in Northwest Ohio, just outside of Detroit, kind of.
00:03:22 Alyssa
Okay, so that was convenient for you then.
00:03:24 Shelby
Yeah, yeah, yeah. Detroit is really close to us.
00:03:27 Alyssa
Yeah, sweet. I've never been in Northwest Ohio. I, because I grew up in the Buffalo area, actually, like on the Pennsylvania border south of Buffalo. So I would have like soccer tournaments growing up in Akron, Ohio. Like,
00:03:38 Shelby
Oh, okay, nice. So been to Ohio.
00:03:40 Alyssa
Yeah. Yeah. But Northwest, I've never been that far.
00:03:44 Shelby
Yeah. There's not too much going on up there.
00:03:47 Alyssa
Sure. Is that where you're from?
00:03:48 Shelby
It is. It is. All my family's here.
00:03:51 Alyssa
Nice.
00:03:51 Shelby
Yeah.
00:03:52 Alyssa
Did you leave and come back or? Yeah. Because you went to UCLA.
00:03:54 Shelby
I did. Yeah. Yeah. I left Northwest Ohio. Right when I graduated high school, I went to college in Columbus, spent six years there. And then I moved out to LA. I was out there for five years and came back like you're right before the pandemic.
00:04:08 Alyssa
Gnarly. Did you come back like wanting to put down roots? Are you like, oh, we'll see what happened and then stayed with pandemic life?
00:04:15 Shelby
Well, I had started traveling quite a bit right before then. And so I kind of came back to have a home base here and then go travel most of the time. And then of course the pandemic happened. So I ended up staying in Toledo for just over a year, I think, which was kind of nice. Like I was home really for the first time in a decade, and got to be around nieces and nephews and family. And then I started traveling again. So now my partner and I, we spend about half of our time here in Ohio and about half of our time out traveling.
00:04:43 Alyssa
That's rad.
00:04:44 Shelby
It is, it is. It's a very, we're lucky. It's a nice lifestyle. We both work remotely, so it works out for us.
00:04:50 Alyssa
Yeah, that's sweet. Do you run Little Justice Leaders full -time?
00:04:55 Shelby
I do now. I stopped, I finished school, I finished teaching. I was teaching at UCLA. And so since January of 2024, I've been full time with Little Justice Leaders.
00:05:05 Alyssa
Cheers. That's awesome. So, help me understand. It's like a monthly book subscription. Yeah.
00:05:10 Shelby
It's a monthly box. So we have activities. It comes with a book and then also like lots of information.
00:05:16 Alyssa
Cool. What's the target age range?
00:05:18 Shelby
So elementary school. So K through fifth or sixth.
00:05:22 Alyssa
Cool. Break this down for me. How did you, how and why? Like what brought you into this space?
00:05:28 Shelby
Definitely. It was around the time of the 2016 election when I really started to hear from a lot of of parents and teachers that they were struggling with how to talk to their kids about what they were seeing in the news and the media. And I worked in education. I had actually just started my PhD in education at UCLA around that time. And so many folks were confused about how to address what their kids were seeing on the news. And there was a lot of xenophobia, misogyny around that time, I'm sure you remember. And it was like, how do I talk to a kindergartner about this? I know they saw it. They heard it. They, you know, um, it's, it's all around us. And, um, that's when I really started to think about this as a problem and being an educator, thinking about what could I do about that and took a couple of years. But in 2018, I finally got the idea and was like, you know what, I need to do something about this. This problem, unfortunately, is not going away. Uh, kids are being exposed to more and more, um, political content, social content than they ever have before. And this world is in need of more empathy, more understanding and more awareness of what's going on. And so I started to put out content on Instagram just to see if we could, if there was any interest and there was, and it kind of grew from there.
00:06:42 Alyssa
What does it mean to you when you talk about social justice?
00:06:46 Shelby
That is a great question. It's something I explored in my dissertation, actually, where I was looking at how teachers are approaching the topic of social justice. And there isn't really one good definition, but when I think about it, especially when we're talking about with kids, for me, it's about teaching young people and really ourselves too, adults, to value diversity, to care deeply about other human experiences, and to seek equity and fairness in our society. And so thinking about how do we create this kind of world that I think so many of us want to see. And that's really what I think about when I think about social justice and what it means to me.
00:07:25 Alyssa
Sure. I dig that. I think one of the, so we do work with educators primarily, that's what we do. And we've been having so many discussions about fairness versus equity. And I want to dive into that a little bit, but you mentioned both. And what we hear from teachers a lot is like, is this focus on fairness? If this kid has access to this tool, but this kid doesn't, does that look like, you know, when we're talking about neurodivergence or really looking at this like equal access idea. And I would love to explore this with you and kind of what that looks like and how you're talking to families about it.
00:08:04 Shelby
Definitely, so it's a hard concept because when we think about equity versus equality versus fairness and what is fair, I think historically it kind of, as a society we have thought fair is equal. So fair is the same, what's fair is the same. But I think anyone who's a parent with more than one kid knows that this isn't the case.
00:08:24 Alyssa
So just to break that down, like if one kid gets to have a special break for a sensory support in the classroom, everybody gets to have that break or access to that tool or whatever. So that's just to give an example there.
00:08:36 Shelby
Yeah, exactly. A perfect example. So that would be equal, right? Everyone gets the same thing. Or let's say in your class, you give every child a cookie and that is equal, right? That would be equal and it might be considered fair, but it's really not fair if one of the kids has a gluten allergy and so they can't eat that cookie, right? So it's not fair to that child who then doesn't get a snack. Or for instance, like if you have two kids and let's say one of them needs braces and the other one doesn't, what would be equal would be to either get them both braces, including the one who doesn't need it or get neither of them braces, every parent has to contend with the reality that kids don't need the same things. So you want to be fair. And to me, I really equate and have started to equate fairness with equity. So that is rather than giving everyone the same thing and making sure every child has the exact same, it's giving every child what they need and that's what's fair. So what do you need to be successful? What do you need for your snack? If you can't have the cookie, then we need to get you something else so that you still have a snack. And that's what's fair. And that's also what's equitable, but it's not always equal.
00:09:40 Alyssa
Yeah. I like that example of braces or I think of like glasses, right? If one kid needed glasses to help them see, we wouldn't offer glasses to everyone in the class. The person who needed glasses to help them see would have the glasses. And I think what can get confusing for some folks is the ability to see outside of your own lens. That if you have, if every morning you wake up and you're not thinking about, do I have enough food to eat for today? Or am I going to come home to a house that has heat, if it's cold, etc. And if those are things you don't have to think about at all, then I could see how you might be like, yeah, I don't think we should be providing breakfast at school for kids. Or looking at these what I would consider basic safety needs that not everyone has access to. But it does require empathy to be able to acknowledge what equity looks like. Empathy, I think has been confused as like stepping inside someone else's shoes and it's not what it is because you don't know what it's like to stand in those shoes. If you don't know what it's like to wake up and not know if you're having breakfast, what the next time you're going to eat is, et cetera. You can't just stand in those shoes and be like, Oh, I know what that feels like.
00:10:59 Shelby
Right. Right. Yeah. Cause because you don't, you know, if you haven't experienced that, I think what we can do as adults and I think what we really can push our kids to do as well as think, okay, well, I can imagine if I didn't have breakfast, I would feel hungry. And so let me extend some basic human compassion to say, um, you know, giving kids breakfast is a worthwhile investment. Now, if you really want to get, uh, technical, you can look at the research and it shows very clearly that providing meals at school impacts student achievement. So if that's what you're concerned about, there's research to back that up too. And that's often the case when it comes to these issues of justice is that there's often research, and sometimes there's not because there's still so much more that needs to be done, but there often is research backing it up too. So you can look at it kind of from that analytical lens, but I think there's also just this human lens of, I don't know what it's like to be hungry and have to go to school and learn all day, but I can imagine that that wouldn't be something that I would want to experience. And I don't want other kids to have to experience that. And our kids can think that, you know, we can talk to them about these things.
00:12:05 Alyssa
Exactly, and I think it really requires us to believe somebody else's experience. To believe them that this is what it feels like in your body to try and navigate the school day not knowing when you're going to eat. Or to believe them that they are working with all the tools that they have and that our systems haven't set everyone up for success.
00:12:30 Shelby
Yeah, so you're hitting on exactly one of the reasons why I am always advocating for having these conversations at younger ages, because the challenge is when you've experienced your whole life one way and never really been exposed to or learned about anything different, it becomes very difficult to imagine that there's something, there's another experience that you know nothing about. So by the time you're 30 years old, or even 20, even 15, you really have developed more and more over the years, a set way of understanding the world. And to then be able to back up and say, well, everything I've experienced is part of this narrow perspective. That's very different than what other people have experienced. It's hard to believe it. And it becomes more and more difficult to believe. But when, you know, you're five, then your mind is so much more open to learning, oh, you know, this is different from something else, because young kids are just learning all the time. And they're open to that. And as we get older, we close to that. So if we want folks to believe other experiences and really value diversity, I think that's a key reason why we need to start young.
00:13:43 Alyssa
Agreed. And I, our tiny humans are ripe for curiosity. And I think so often we shut it down with answers when we could stand to be curious with them. You know, thinking of like, if we walk by somebody who's homeless on the street and a kid asks questions, what are they doing? Why are they living in that tent? Why are they laying there? I actually had this experience where I had, I was walking by parent and child. Like we were kind of walking in tandem, walking past a homeless person. And the parent said, well, that person didn't make great choices. And now this is where they live. I was like, oh, I so badly want to step in here because I think what's key here is that the kids being curious and then the adult is shutting down that curiosity. And I think it's one of those opportunities where if we pause as the adult and said, you know, I am not sure what happened in their life. I feel curious about it too. Even like, even if you pause there and you come back you revisit later but to just start by matching their curiosity with curiosity I think can be really helpful.
00:14:54 Shelby
Yeah absolutely and I think one thing I talk about a lot and it was actually one of the big findings in my dissertation research was about kind of that responding in the moment and I kind of see like connections between your work and talking about responding to kids big emotions in the moment right there's so many ways that we might want to respond as adult. When it comes to big emotions, it might be frustration, anger, sadness, whatever that might be for us. When it comes to uncomfortable questions or comments about a justice -related topic, it's often shutting it down, changing the subject, not responding at all, or clearly getting uncomfortable and telling your kid not to say that in public or something. And that's such a natural response because these topics are uncomfortable and most of us were not raised talking about them and so--
00:15:41 Alyssa
It's also just hard to be in discomfort
00:15:43 Shelby
Yes
00:15:44 Alyssa
It's hard to be in even if you have been exposed to it it's hard to experience discomfort.
00:15:49 Shelby
Especially when it happens in public because you're worried about who's listening and offending someone of course but I always encourage parents if that happened to you if you did shut it down and it happens to all of us, I talk about these things every day and it still happens to me, circle back like you said, circle back and have that conversation later, even if you feel like you completely messed up your response at first and come back to it and say, Hey, you know, you made that comment about the person we saw on the street yesterday, let's, let's talk about that. Um, or did you have any more questions about it? Or, you know, what were you curious about? Whatever, opening the door. Um, no, ideally we get to a point where we can respond in the moment and are able to respond with empathy and compassion and thoughtfulness, but we're going to mess it up sometimes. So coming back to it is okay too.
00:16:37 Alyssa
And I think there's a lot that we as adults don't understand or know or are just putting together. And the reality is, you don't know why that person's living on the street, right? Like, we don't know their story. We could wager some guesses, you know? We know that our systems are not set up to support folks who have high ACES. We know that that can lead to a lot of traumatic experiences and then responses to trauma, right? Like we can make some guesses here, but I think we're too quick as adults to feel like we're supposed to have that answer. And then when we do try to have the answer feeling like we got to talk about this entire problem, right? Like I'm going to explain all of these systems to you and you're four and this is overwhelming when I do it in that way. And so I think like having for me, we were recently at Barnes and Noble and we were waiting, the escalator was down, just my three -year -old's favorite part of Barnes and Noble. And we were taking the elevator up to the kids' floor and we're standing in like a group of people. And while we're waiting for the elevator, somebody keeps like going.. and like sniffing. And my three -year -old was like, I was like, why is somebody doing that with their nose? Just like full loud, it's all quiet, right? And I'm like, oh God, I wanna die. And I was like, because also we're about to get in an elevator, right? Like this hang isn't done, we're not walking fast. And I was like, I don't know, buddy, I heard that too. Just like pause. And then we get in the elevator and he was like, it's happening again, mom. Why is somebody doing that with their nose? And I was like, yeah, I don't know, bud. I hear it too. Just like same thing. And later in the car, I was like, hey, I heard that sound too. And I'm not sure what was happening. You can always ask me questions. Sometimes I know the answer and sometimes I don't and we can be curious together. And I was like, sometimes I might be curious with you later or I might be curious with you in a conversation, just me and you, if it might hurt somebody else's feelings when we're curious. And he was like, what hurts somebody's feelings? So that we gave some examples and talked through it. But I really like, it's those practices for me too of like just not having the answer, right? Like I can wager a guess. I was like, what do you think's going on? And he was like, maybe he has an allergy. I was like, yeah, maybe. You know, we got to do some brainstorming, but I think we all too often want to have the answer. And what we know is that we, as adults, are all building our skill sets, too, and unlearning a lot from our childhood, relearning, and all that jazz. What does it look like to introduce social justice to kids in a way that is age appropriate for different ages?
00:19:40 Shelby
Yeah, absolutely. So to your point, I mean, when it's something in the moment like that. I think asking as many questions as possible first, before we come in with our complicated explanations. So what have you heard about this before? You brought up this word, what do you think that means? Where did you hear that from? And getting a sense of what they know first is gonna really help you bring it to their level. Because they might know a lot more than you expect. They also might know a lot less than you thought based on what they said. They might just be confused or repeating something that they heard. And they really have no idea what it means. So I think getting a sense of where they're at is so important before you start any of these conversations. Now, if you're starting from scratch, it didn't come up. You just want to introduce a topic to them. I would always say, start with picture books. Kids books are such a great kind of window, um, for kids to explore a topic and experience that's different than theirs in a way that's going to be age appropriate for them. If you're starting with really young kids, so preschool and under, we can still start this work, but we might not, like you said, want to get into the very complicated explanations. So in that case, a lot of times it's just starting with diversifying your representation in the media that they're taking in. You can start this from birth in the people around them, in the books that they're reading, the TV shows they're watching, making sure that there is positive representation of all different types of folks. So we're thinking about race, gender, disability, LGBTQ+ identities, immigration and language and refugee experiences, religion, age. So thinking about kind of having positive representation so that when they get older and learn more about, for example, racism, they already have a positive basis of race and understanding of people of different races so that what we want is for them to be like, oh, that makes no sense with my worldview because we want them to think it no sense. Hopefully we all also think it shouldn't be this way. But they won't have that initial discomfort, confusion when learning about racism if they haven't had a positive understanding of race and people of different races. So I always encourage starting with that positive understanding so that as they get older and start to learn about the topics more, you can go deeper into them. But they originally had this thought of like, that doesn't make sense to me with what I know.
00:21:58 Alyssa
Yeah. Okay. I dig this. There's a new playground that was just constructed right near us. It's like walking distance and it's an accessible playground. And my three -year -old, Sage, we went there the first time and he was like, this slide is different. And this way to go up, he was observing things that were different in it than the playground that they had taken down space that had been there before, put up a new one. And I was like, yeah, what do you notice about it? And he was like, oh, this is bigger than that. And then we tied in a Daniel Tiger episode where they had to reconstruct part of a playground for Chrissy to be able to access it. And he was like, Chrissy could go on this, Chrissy could go on this. And then he was identifying the different parts of the playground. And I was like, yeah. And on the old playground, when we had the playground before, what could Chrissy go on? And he paused and he was thinking But he was like, well, she could go. And he named a couple different of the structures. And I was like, yep. And I was like, what couldn't Chrissy go on? And he named a lot of the playground. And I was like, yeah. And I noticed that before the ground had wood chips. And so if somebody came in and they had a wheelchair, what would they do? And we got to talk through these. I just consider them what ifs. But it was so helpful to have that media example. He loves Daniel Tiger, you could connect it to Chrissy first. And then we could go from there with what else was accessible and available. And I asked him like, how would it feel for you if you came in and you were in a wheelchair and you couldn't go on those wood chips and people were playing in the playground? And he was like, I would feel sad, I would feel left out. Yeah, we could like explore that more. But having I like that suggestion of like starting with media starting with like, what books do you have? What shows are they watching? What are they exposed to? Because it does give a basis for this conversation. He doesn't have a friend or a peer in his life who's disabled. So for him, finding representation of that felt really important so that we could build on these conversations. Whereas we live in Burlington, I have almost all of our friends that he's exposed to are queer. And so like, we don't have to really focus on media representation. This is his norm, right? So for us, it's looking at like, what is he already exposed to in everyday life? And what isn't he? And where do we find those gaps?
00:24:34 Shelby
Exactly, yeah, exactly. Like the media should supplement what, essentially what they're not getting in real life. And really, I mean, it can be everything because, you know, really good child media kind of represents all different types of things. But yeah, I think thinking about, you know, what are they not getting? What can they not get here in my community and my, you know, the people around me right now? And how do I make sure that they're seeing positive representation? I love that example of having, you know, that character to refer to as a starting point for developing the empathy and awareness that's going to, in many ways, probably shape the way he thinks about play and disabilities for a long time, just from that one very simple conversation.
00:25:17 Alyssa
Yeah. And I think what's huge is the awareness that for so many of us as adults, we're still building these skills and that there's going to be discomfort for us, right? And like, how to talk about it, where to talk about it. Do you have suggestions for folks who are just starting there where like, they're like, Oh, I don't know these answers. Or I have other, like maybe they're not to a place of compassion and equity yet across the board. And so like where to start with getting curious ourselves?
00:25:55 Shelby
Yeah, absolutely. So one thing I always recommend to folks, it's just find five or 10 social media accounts of people who are different from you, who maybe are involved in activism and education work, who are talking on issues that you're not super familiar with. Just follow them and their content will start to show up in your feed if you do use social media and it's a really easy way to just add a little bit of learning into our life, right? Not everyone's ready to go buy a bunch of books or even listen to a bunch of podcasts, although that's a really good place to start if you're a podcast person as well, but just having it like a little bit starting to like infiltrate your day -to -day via social media. If you are ready to like, you're like, you know what, I want to talk to my kids about this, but I'm so not an expert. First, I will say that's everyone because, you know, first of all, there's always so much to keep up on. Even if you did this full time, you wouldn't be able to. I surely can't. But most people who really do care about social justice are involved with like one, two, maybe three issues. But there's others that they don't know a lot about. Like maybe they fight really hard for racial justice, but they're not as familiar with disability justice or climate justice. And so there's always going to be areas where you don't have the answers. I think a lot of that is fumbling your way through it with your kids saying, like you said, I don't know the answer to that. Let's look it up together and learn. And kids have questions all the time and it's so easy to just try to have the answers, but really we can just say, I don't know, I'm not sure. Let's look it up together. Let's let's find a video about that. Let's let's find a book that can teach us more about that and getting comfortable with that because that's what it's going to be when it comes to social justice work with kids and familiarize yourself a bit. We do a lot to educate adults before talking to kids because I think, you know, you need to have some baseline knowledge before you bring a topic to a kid, but the truth is your kid might bring you a topic before you're ready for it. They often do. And especially now, if your kids have access to media or if they go to school with other kids who have access to media, then they're probably hearing about things and getting ideas that, that you might not know about. So that might come to you. In fact, you might hope it comes to you because if it doesn't, that means that they're developing ideas and potentially biases that you have no idea about, which is worse than them coming to you with a question that you don't know the answer to, so you can then respond.
00:28:21 Alyssa
Well, I think you, you bring up a really good point of when they aren't coming to us, they are still probably being exposed to conversations and then they're creating their own narratives and their own beliefs based off of what they're hearing. When they do come to us, or if we open up the door for them to come to us, our reaction or response will shape whether or not they continue to come to us. And if they come to us and we're like, we shut it down, we're not open to talking about it, we just make that conversation stop as fast as possible because of our discomfort, what they learn is, oh, this is too hard for my adult to handle. It's really uncomfortable for my adult if I go and talk to them about this. And so what's key I think is really for ourselves noticing that discomfort inside and even naming it like, yeah, I learned something different when I was a kid and it doesn't feel right for me now. And when you're talking about this, like I'm noticing I feel a little uncomfortable in my chest. I want to learn more about this together. Because what's huge here is if we don't communicate our feelings, they feel them anyway. Right. So our mirror neurons are going to fire. They're going to notice our discomfort. They're going to notice a shift in our energy. And we can name that. We can say I am feeling uncomfortable. This is a topic that when I was little, people didn't talk about and now I'm learning how to talk about this or I'm noticing some feelings for me, I want to learn more about this with you. But really acknowledging the us feelings part and then taking ownership over our own regulation and not putting it on them to not come to us or to regulate us. But instead just naming that I think could be really helpful for kids because they feel it, whether we name it or
not.
00:30:22 Shelby
Absolutely. 100%. We actually have, um, uh, a checklist for talking to kids about current events or kind of responding to, uh, events that happened in the media or something your kid might say. The second point on there is model vulnerability, and it's about being honest about your own feelings about whether you're uncomfortable about this topic or you don't know what to say, or it makes you really sad. Whatever that might be. Um, yeah, I think being honest about how we feel can really open the door. But the most important thing, like you said, is making sure that we're not shutting them down. Because if they don't come to us next time, then they might be going to their friends at school, all their cousins or siblings, neighborhood kids, essentially other kids who likely aren't going to have the full picture either. And so we really, really want to make sure that it's us that they're coming to and that they feel comfortable coming to us.
00:31:14 Alyssa
Yeah, that's huge. That's huge. Chat with me a little bit more about what's in the monthly subscription box, if people are interested in that and kind of what they can expect, how that works.
00:31:25 Shelby
Yeah, so in our boxes, every box is going to have a different theme of social justice, and it's going to have a children's book, of course, to guide that conversation. It's going to have art or craft activity for the kid to do that's going to be connected to the topic while they're learning about it while you're talking about it. You're also going to have a piece of activist art. So that might be a sticker, a magnet, a poster, something cute and fun to remember the topic. And then most important for the adults usually is a set of information cards for the adults. So that's going to be everything you need to feel confident before you bring this topic to your kid. Like what we talked about, you know, getting yourself knowledgeable. It's going to include tips, how to talk about this, do's and don'ts, conversation starters, whole bunch of good content to make sure you can feel ready to start the conversation. It's also going to have a link to lesson plans for teachers. So if you're a teacher or homeschool family, it's going to offer all that as well. Now that being said, we are making some kind of changes in the product. So we might be moving away from the subscription box model and more into a kind of content digital type model. So more to come on that, that's going to be over the next few months. So keep an eye for it. But yeah, for now, we're always going to have all the content, all the activities, all the book recommendations for different topics to get the conversation started. We're just trying to find a way to make it even more accessible so that you can get exactly what you need when you need it. So yeah.
00:32:56 Alyssa
I love that. Yeah. That's awesome for accessibility. And that exact point, like I had done a subscription box in the past and what I found was like, Oh, I was craving this, like one topic that I wanted to be able to talk about, but I didn't have any control over what book would come or anything, which was great because it also exposed me to new books and new topics and ways to talk about things. But I did want like a, oh, I need to download this kit today because this topic's coming up a lot or whatever.
00:33:27 Shelby
Exactly.
00:33:27 Alyssa
I love that. Rad, sweet. What do you hope the impact of your work will be?
00:33:34 Shelby
Yeah, so what I hope the impact of my work, I'm an educator, so I'm always thinking about education and systems of education. My big dream is that we rethink what we're educating kids for. And I really want,
00:33:49 Alyssa
What do you mean by that?
00:33:49 Shelby
Yeah, I want us as a society to start asking the question, like, what do we want our kids to learn in school? Why do we want them to go to school? What do we hope they take away? And what kind of humans do we hope come out of this school system that we put so much into? And we haven't seen huge major shifts in the way schooling works in centuries, really. And in decades, we haven't seen really significant change. And I want us to start thinking about like what do we hope kids learn? What do we hope they become from what they learn in school? And I want people to think much more deeply about what kind of kids we want to educate, how we want them to be in the world and see the world and experience. And so that's kind of what, you know, I hope in the long run, I would love to be able to influence school curriculum and be able to impact what we teach and why we teach it and how we encourage kids to grapple with topics that matter.
00:34:52 Alyssa
Love it. I love it so much. I, you know, we're looking ahead to ages three, we're looking ahead to kindergarten.
00:35:00 Shelby
Yes.
00:35:01 Alyssa
It's so huge, because of what you just named. That right now our school systems, our public school systems, there are definitely some things that are in alignment that we have shared values. And there are some things for me that aren't and figuring out like what is the school systems goal of this thing of kids being able to do certain things or memorize certain things or behave in certain ways or conform in certain ways. And it's something that I personally have been sitting with so much and I'm currently writing the next version of Tiny Humans, Big Emotions, but for kindergarten to fifth grade.
00:35:44 Shelby
Nice
00:35:44 Alyssa
Yeah. So we're looking at the K -5 range and that emotional development piece and we shift. In these first five years, it's so focused on the individual and building your own skills and we're so egocentric to start as humans and then we shift into a social world where inclusion and belonging become the forefront for kids and you start to see it show up in so many different ways. And those peer relationships start to matter in a different way about one's own identity. And so I think that's such a rad goal for impact because I think right now what we're doing for lack of a better word is like teaching to the test and yeah, that's not in a values alignment for me. And I would so much rather that you chuck that curriculum out the window some days and say like, oh wow, everything feels bonkers in the classroom today. We are coming out of vacation or we've had a long couple of days or there's some heavy stuff going on. And we're just going to focus on being connected and in community and feeling safe and regulated. And if we don't talk about the letter of the week today, great, that's not what matters most today. And that some days that might really matter. And we might have the capacity to focus on things like that. And some days we won't. And allowing that ebb and flow and for us to be human first.
00:37:15 Shelby
Yeah, exactly. I think, and I think, you know, the school system wasn't built for that. It really wasn't. And so we need to think about, you know, is it doing what it was built for? It kind of is, but--
00:37:27 Alyssa
Is that what we want?
00:37:29 Shelby
Is that still what we want? I mean, especially with how much the world has changed and how much the, I mean, school system was built to prepare students for jobs that don't even exist anymore. And to prepare them for a world that doesn't exist anymore. So, you know, how has our world changed? How has our worldview changed? And, you know, what do we need to change about our school system to align those things?
00:37:53 Alyssa
Yeah, I think one of the questions I really have been sitting with lately is like, what content really matters to me? Like, do I care if they know about the War of 1812? Right? Like, what content really matters to me? I don't care if they know the life cycle of a butterfly. And what would it look like to to have school systems that had the ability to explore different content areas without certain content areas being mandatory, if that makes sense.
00:38:28 Shelby
Yeah, 100%.
00:38:29 Alyssa
Yeah, oh, Shelby, I feel like we could dream here.
00:38:33 Shelby
I know, I know, there's so much, like I wish that we could wave a magic wand and change so much right now, but I do think, and there's a lot of amazing folks the education system who are doing this, who are pushing forward this work. So I think hopefully we are on this path, but we need widespread change because I think so many people feel what we're feeling and what we're thinking and dreaming. So hopefully it's coming.
00:38:59 Alyssa
I sure hope so. I sure hope so. Thanks for doing the important work you're doing. Where can folks find you, connect with you, learn more about your work?
00:39:07 Shelby
Yeah, so our website is littlejusticeleaders.com, so you can find our boxes there and all of our future offerings will also be there. If you are looking for lots of education and maybe you're not even ready to jump into it with your kids yet, check us out on Instagram @littlejusticeleaders. We give away lots of information for parents and teachers who are interested, whether you're doing this work or thinking about doing this work, it's a really good place to start. And then on our email list as well, same thing, we give out tons of free resources. Right now we have a guide for talking to kids. I was talking about this, the guide for talking to kids about current events. This goes for something they might overhear in the media or they might scroll through on YouTube or an uncomfortable question they might come home with, which I know is happening in so many places across the country right now. So you can get that. It's completely free at ljl.education/voices. We made that specifically for this podcast. So ljl.education/voices. You'll get that free guide. It's gonna give you a step -by -step way to respond to those uncomfortable questions or those uncomfortable moments when your kid might see or hear something that maybe you wish they hadn't or you're not sure that they're ready for.
00:40:19 Alyssa
Awesome. Thank you so much for this work and for sharing those resources.
00:40:22 Shelby
Thank you, Alyssa.
[Music]
00:40:26 Alyssa
Hello, hello.
00:40:30 Rachel
Hi.
00:40:35 Alyssa
There's a lot in that 'hi'.
00:40:37 Rachel
Oh, man.
00:40:40 Alyssa
Yeah.
00:40:40 Rachel
I'm just, yeah, I mean, you know how it goes. Back from vacation.
00:40:45 Alyssa
Nuts.
00:40:46 Rachel
I had to take Nora back to the doctor. So we were, Alyssa and I were just on vacation together. My older child ended up getting like a cellulitis situation with like red streaking from a puncture wound from a shell.
00:41:00 Alyssa
On her foot
00:41:00 Rachel
And then like - Yeah. And so like, then I didn't know if there was like a fragment left in there. The antibiotics worked, but like there's still redness and inflammation. So I had to take her to the doctor today to make sure that like, everything's good, which it seems to be, you know, the old watch and wait, which is so awesome.
00:41:23 Alyssa
No one's stressed.
00:41:25 Rachel
Honestly, I feel like, I mean, after cancer, infection became like a huge OCD trigger for me.
00:41:35 Alyssa
Sure
00:41:35 Rachel
So I actually feel like I've like handled this like really well, but I hate it. And I don't like watch and wait. I like like a cut and dry, like, yep, you're good to go. So anyway, she is fine. She's not like sick, but I have to still kind of monitor that. Then we did back -to -school shopping because my kids start school at the end of August. So we did that and thoroughly overstimulating.
00:42:05 Alyssa
Yeah, that's busy. Do they send like just like a list home?
00:42:09 Rachel
So it's tricky, right? Because every teacher does it differently. So like Nora has a list but Abel doesn't because his teacher's gonna take care of it, which is my preference. But then it's like we're shopping and of course I'm like having to let him pick out a couple things, otherwise it's just like torture.
00:42:24 Alyssa
Totally.
00:42:25 Rachel
Yeah. Yeah I think I'm just like not quite like back in my groove post -vacay.
00:42:32 Alyssa
Getting back in the groove post -vacay is so hard. Yeah we came home and we were like all right we're gonna dive into some sleep work with Mila and get her back on track. We were sharing a room for two weeks and basically TLDR she nursed every 90 minutes for for most of those days. And at one point Zach drove her at 3 a .m. in the car because he didn't want her to wake up the rest of the household and I needed any stretch of sleep. So that's a little snapshot into our sleep vacation. And so we came home, we're like, we're gonna do this. And then she, that was on Saturday night, we got home. Sunday, she had like a random little fever. No other things, but we were like, huh, all right, well, don't do it tonight then. We'll see how she feels tomorrow. Monday, start to add symptoms to it. It gets real bad Monday night. She has a terrible night, Monday to Tuesday, like just sobbing on and off all night. And then test positive for COVID on Tuesday. So she was like, guys, I'd rather get COVID than learn how to sleep on my own if this is what I have to do to delay this process.
00:43:43 Rachel
Oh man.
00:43:45 Alyssa
And now I'm just hoping for the sleep we had before. Where it was every hour and a half. We didn't know how good we had it.
00:43:52 Rachel
Isn't it funny how it's all perspective, right? Because when you have a newborn, sometimes an hour, not that Mila's a newborn.
00:44:01 Alyssa
Yeah, her newborn sleep was great.
00:44:04 Rachel
Right, but when you have a baby who's not sleeping, sometimes an hour and a half feels like a total victory. Sometimes three hours feels like a full night.
00:44:14 Alyssa
Literally, I was just last night, we split the night. And so we each did four hour chunks. She was down for a little bit. And then when she woke up to nurse for the first time, that kickstarted my first four hours of being on. And then Zach came in and I was gonna have four hours after that. So, and then when Zach came in an hour after that, Sagey woke up and I was on him because obviously, so. But I got a three hour stretch from 3:30 to 6:30. And this morning I was talking to your sister and she was like, how was it? Did you get any sleep? I was like, yeah, actually, I got great sleep. And I was like, finally. And she was like, Oh, good. Like, and I was like, yeah, I got to sleep from 3:30 to 6:30. And she was like, so that three hour stretch was great sleep.
00:45:02 Rachel
Yeah, it's wild.
00:45:04 Alyssa
That bar is low.
00:45:06 Rachel
It's so low. Oh, man. Yeah, you're in the thick of it.
00:45:14 Alyssa
We were just reflecting back, Zach and I, to like, we didn't know how good we had it in the newborn days. I mean, we knew she was a really great sleeper at that point, but also Sagey, we didn't see any sleep changes for him at the beginning, which is super common, right? That you don't see sleep changes for months to come. But then yeah, all hit the fan at once. We used to put her down as a newborn and then come, go hang out. We would watch a show, whatever, go to bed. She slept a seven to nine hour first stretch of sleep in her newborn days. And Sagey was sleeping through the night as per ush. And then it shifted and it has never gone back. And now we're like, we didn't soak that time up enough.
00:45:58 Rachel
I know, it sucks. I wish I had comforting words, but it is what it is.
00:46:06 Alyssa
It's all downhill from here, is that what you're saying?
00:46:08 Rachel
No, I mean, it totally, it does get better, But when you're in the thick of it and you're like, okay, it's probably going to be totally different in six months. Six months feels like a frigging eternity. It's not that comforting because you're like, one night feels like six months because I'm not sleeping. The night is lasting forever.
00:46:26 Alyssa
100%. And just like 24 -7 parenting. Right?
00:46:30 Rachel
Never a break.
00:46:31 Alyssa
Never a break.
00:46:33 Rachel
I used to get this feeling of dread slash impending doom when the sun would go down. Because I would feel like, okay, I know I'm going to be alone with this kid for the next like 10 hours and not much of it is going to be spent asleep and I'm so tired.
00:46:50 Alyssa
Yeah, no one's coming to save us. No. It's so real. Who are we chatting about?
00:46:54 Rachel
I want to say Dr. Shelby. My computer, I haven't shut it off or closed any tabs in a really long time. So my computer is...
00:47:02 Alyssa
Same actually. And I told Beki the other day, I clearly have to, and then I just didn't, and it's bad. It's bad over here.
00:47:10 Rachel
I need to. There's some, you know what? I know we're trying to dive in here, but I think part of why I'm feeling so tired right now is like the mental, August is like a big transition month for many families, but like, it's always kind of a sad month for me. Cause it's like, we come back from family vacation, getting ready for back to school, and Cody's going into his busiest personal and professional time of year. So I know that I'm getting close to a season of like tons of solo parenting. And I feel like I'm having like anticipatory depression kind of, because I just feel so tired. Anyway, the thought of knowing what I need to do to my computer just also triggered like, there's so many things that I need to do. I don't want to do them.
00:47:55 Rachel
Relatable. So relatable.
00:47:56 Rachel
We are chatting about Dr. Shelby Kretz,
00:48:02 Alyssa
Rad, oh yeah Little Justice Leaders.
00:48:04 Rachel
So there are lots of little gems in here, but one that stuck out for me because it is applying to my real life is that fair doesn't mean equal. And helping kids understand this concept, and I'm deep in it right now because everything in our world is unfair, as far as Nora's concerned, because I hold Abel to the standards of a five -year -old and I hold her to the standards of a nine -year -old and explaining to her that if I treated them equally, it actually wouldn't be fair for one of them. Ughh.
00:48:43 Alyssa
It's, okay, when we were on vacation, this is big in this age group, right? That elementary age group, it skyrockets. And Sage is just starting to wade a little bit into it today. He was like, I never get anything in this family. Nothing's ever for me. And I was like, oh my God, it's so huge, right? In those elementary years. And when we were on vacation at one point, I took a walk with the like two bigs, the oldest kids, nine and 10 year olds, and took a walk with them, chatted, took them on a special date. We got ice cream and hung out. And when we were doing that, one of them asked about his sister. He was like, so is she gonna get to do this too? And I was like, oh, I'm wondering why you're asking, before I answered. And he was like, well, like, is it just for us and it's special for us, or is she gonna get to have it too? And he was like, is it gonna be fair? And I said oh, well no, I wasn't planning on taking somebody else for a walk and to get ice cream but maybe it'll come up maybe it'll happen I'm not sure it wasn't my plan. What are you going to do with that information and he like sat there and like kind of had a little smirk. And I was like did you want to tell her that you got to do this and that she didn't, so that you could feel really powerful and included and she would feel left out. And he like kind of sat with it for a sec. He's 10. And so like those are words he understands. And he was like, well, like, I think she would feel sad. Like I just want to make sure she doesn't feel sad about it. And he like pivoted to like, I just I'm just looking out for her. And I was like, Oh, you think she would feel sad if she found out you got to do this and she didn't. And he was like, Yeah, you know, I just think it should be fair for her. And I was like, Oh, that's thoughtful of you to want to have her feel included. She doesn't feel excluded if she doesn't know that it's happening. Right? Like, she'll only know that it's happening if we tell her that it happened. And it's okay for her, people to feel left out sometimes. And then that led into me asking them both, what's the hardest feeling for you to have, to let yourself have? And one of them answered, said that it's two, it's feeling left out and feeling embarrassed. And I said, feeling left out's one of my hardest ones too. And we got to chat about that, that feeling left out isn't something to be avoided.
00:51:32 Rachel
You can't.
00:51:33 Alyssa
You can't. But I do think that's like in the fairness messaging from kids when they're like, it's not fair. I think often what they're saying is, I feel left out.
00:51:45 Rachel
Yeah. And there's a part of me that wants to parrot what I heard in childhood every time I said it's not fair.
00:51:53 Alyssa
Life's not fair.
00:51:53 Rachel
That's right. So that comes up for me after so many it's not fairs.
00:52:00 Alyssa
Same
00:52:00 Rachel
And I'm just like, which is true, like life isn't fair. You're going to navigate spaces where things aren't fair and you're going to have to know what to do with those feelings. So like, yep, this isn't fair and it's not gonna change. And also sometimes it is fair, it's just not equal. Like, that is the concept that I think is hard to teach children. And I said to Nora, I'm like, hey, if you want me to treat you the same way I treat Abel, that means like you don't get to watch certain shows, you don't get to own your computer anymore, you don't get to have sleepovers with your friends anymore, you don't get to have a later bedtime, all of these things. I'm like, so if you want me to treat you the way that I treat Abel, a lot of your privileges that you get to have because you're older are gonna go away.
00:52:49 Alyssa
Yeah, how's fair feel now, right? That's what I wanna say.
00:52:54 Rachel
Right, and like, I don't wanna be a dick, like that's not my goal, but there's part of me that's like, yeah, if you wanna have the privileges of being nine, which are being able to access these things that are not developmentally appropriate for your five -year -old brother, Also, I hold you to a higher standard.
00:53:10 Alyssa
Yeah, there are also responsibilities you have for being nine.
00:53:14 Rachel
Your brain is more developed, your impulse control is more developed. My expectations will be different. And man, that is a tough pill for kids to swallow.
00:53:25 Alyssa
I think for all of us to swallow, like there are definitely times where I'm like, oh, I want to have the level of privilege without the level of responsibility. In fact, I remember telling Maddie her first year out of college, I was like, here's the thing, college years and that first year out of college, it's the best in that you have such little responsibility. You have no money, so like the money to responsibility ratio, hard, but you have no responsibility for the most part. Unless you've like gone back to college or you had kids young or whatever, like when she was graduating, she had no kids, she had no partner, she had no like life insurance to pay for. There was just like so little that she had to like do from a responsibility standpoint. I was like you get to right now just have fun. In a way that shifts as you get older and there's more responsibilities coming at you. And I still feel that way as an adult where I'm like sometimes I would like to have less responsibility but maintain all the privileges.
00:54:33 Rachel
Totally. I was thinking about this the other day, when I was feeling exhausted driving us back from Lobster Night, and I was just thinking like, as a parent, it feels like, and often the reality is that like, it really doesn't matter how I feel or how tired I am or what else I have going on. I still have to show up for these kids.
00:54:57 Alyssa
Yeah, that's the correct- that exhale is so real. I feel that so much in my life right now. So much. I feel it as a parent. I feel it as a business owner. I feel it as a partner like but yeah most predominantly as a parent where it's like, yeah, it doesn't matter that I slept none last night,
00:55:16 Rachel
Right? Like you still have to get up
00:55:18 Alyssa
They still need me.
00:55:18 Rachel
Right and it's not just your baby, it's also your three -year -old like it's just... Cody and I were talking. We had a little bit of a heated conversation on the way to date night last night, lol.
00:55:29 Alyssa
Fun
00:55:29 Rachel
We never want to talk alone. So of course like when we're alone, this is coming up. So every year he goes on a bear hunt. And the timing of like the bear hunting season is that it's always like the first or second week of school for the kids. Sucks so much. So he was like, I really don't think it's fair. Cause I was like testy, as we were talking about like the timeline of the hunt. He's like, this is like the one time that I leave you that's not work related for the entire year. And it's two nights, and I don't think it's fair that you're treating me like this because outside of this, I never ask for time away. And I was like, you're right. It's not fair that I'm treating you like this. And I feel like I have to be thinking about prepping for back to school and knowing that I'm going to be the emotional container for all of the kids' you know what. And then also thinking about you not being here, you know? And it's just like -
00:56:30 Alyssa
100%.
00:56:31 Rachel
It's that kind of stuff. It's just like, oh, there's so much emotional responsibility that I carry. Sometimes I'm just like, I don't want to do it. I don't want to be the point person every time somebody's scared or tired or, you know?
00:56:49 Alyssa
Yeah. Yeah, I know. And I, I actually just very recently for myself, I don't want to be the point person and I do, right? Like, I don't want to be the point person. But then when something happens, I want them to come to me. I want them to need me in a certain way. Right? Isn't it so true? And so I very recently was like, alright, Alyssa, you have to pick with this one, like little baby step instances, right? So Sagey's upcoming dentist appointment, which was today, I was like, Zach, it would be really helpful for me if you took him and I didn't go. He hates the dentist. It has not gone well in the past. His teeth are fine. He just, the experience for him that is 0 % enjoyable. It's been an emotional ride in the past. And I was like, you know what? I need you to do this. And Zach was like, sure. And like took it on. And I today had these feelings of like, should I go? Should I go so that I can be there for him and with him? And had to literally be like, Alyssa, he's got this. Like, step back, he's got this. And he did, he walked me through what happened. And he actually, so it was like a week ago that I saw it was on the calendar and asked him to do it. And he said yes. And then a few days ago, I was like, oh, we should start talking to Sagey about the fact that his dentist appointment's coming up. He was like, oh, I've been chatting with him about it at bedtime. We've been practicing some things, talking about it. Oh my God, you not only said yes to this, but you took the task on in completion, like fully, and that is something that feels rare. And it was so relieving. It was like a full weight lifted.
00:58:32 Rachel
Yeah,
00:58:33 Alyssa
So rad. Why don't you ask Cody if you could trade and you could come for two days to Vermont to the Vermont AEYC conference with us and stay Saturday, Sunday, maybe even Monday, and we can hang out as part of the SEED team gets together for this.
00:58:49 Rachel
So he would be so fine with that. The problem is that Joel has a conference that same week. So Erika and I are trying to figure out like how this could shake out. But that was one thing he said. He's like, I don't object to you. Like if you wanna go somewhere or, which is true, it's really my own, like not wanting to leave the kids. I don't like being away from them. I am a control freak sometimes, although I did hand off, years ago, I handed off the dentist stuff. Like, I don't remember the last time I took the kids to the dentist. I've never taken Abel.
00:59:21 Alyssa
That's so nice.
00:59:21 Rachel
I've never taken Abel to the dentist. Good for you. And for everybody listening, yes, my kids get checkups every six months. I just don't do it.
00:59:30 Alyssa
Right, right, right. It's not that he hasn't gone. It's that you haven't taken him. That's awesome. Yeah. Yeah. I like that, though, with the fairness. I think it's really breaking down with kids. And so from the adult side, we'll hear this sometimes when we present things like there should be a sit and spin in this classroom and this kid could benefit from this pair of headphones or go on a walk with the teacher to have a break from the classroom or things like that. And sometimes teachers will say like, well, that's not going to be fair to the other kids in the room. And we really have to break down the equity piece of the fact that really what we're looking at here is meeting everybody's needs. And that's what equity is. And what do you need to thrive? Maybe the other kid in the classroom doesn't need to go for a walk or their body doesn't need a sit and spin to be regulated and this kid's does. In the same way that if one kid needed hearing aids and the other kids didn't, I wouldn't give everyone hearing aids just so that everybody had them. We're looking at what does your body need to thrive? And I think that that can often get muddled in the like, well, it’s not fair conversation with teachers and just pulling back and saying like, Yeah, really what's fair is everybody having what they need,
01:00:42 Rachel
Correct
01:00:43 Alyssa
Not having access to all the same things.
01:00:46 Rachel
Yeah, and I think like this is an important concept for kids to understand as we move into conversations about social justice, because there's like a false narrative that if everybody has equal access to things or whatever, that like, okay, that's fair. And when we're talking about social justice issues, that's not the whole picture.
01:01:08 Alyssa
Correct. Correct. I actually, on the beach with the 10 -year -old, asked if anyone had ever talked to them about race, and does he know what that means. And he said, like racing? And I was like, no, like different skin colors for people. And he was like, oh, yeah, like if somebody has black skin. And I was like, correct. And he said, yeah. And he said, did you know that it used to not be fair for black people in our country and then now it is fair?" And I was like, oh, tell me what you mean. And he like couldn't really provide more beyond that. And I was like, okay. And I was like, you know what's interesting is that you're right. There were a lot of things in our country that were not fair for black people and for white people, and there's still a lot of them that are still not fair today. And I said, do you want to know something wild. Did you know that if you are a boy who's black, that it's more likely that you'll have to go to the principal's office or that you'll get in trouble in school, even if you're doing the same thing as a boy who's white? And he was like, why? And we got to chat about that, but really diving into like, yeah, it's not fair right now and we don't all need the same things because we don't all have access to the same things.
01:02:36 Rachel
Yeah, this reminds me of a conversation that I had with Nora at the end of the school year. So part of dress code is that like, you're not supposed to have like extreme colors in your hair or whatever. And so like,
01:02:50 Alyssa
Sure,
01:02:51 Rachel
That's a different conversation. But anyway, so my kids go to a pre -K through 12 school. It's small, everybody knows everybody. So there's this high school girl that my kids have interacted with at several different capacities. Like she's helped with childcare at stuff, whatever. Anyway, she wears a wig. And Nora told me that like some of her classmates had been like talking about it in like a not kind way. And I was trying to explain to Nora how like, there's a really long history of black people being treated unfairly or poorly around their hair and how if she had questions about the wig, I was happy to answer them, but that it wasn't okay for her classmates to be talking about the wig in that way. And this all came up because this girl's wig, it was like a shade of red, like a deep shade of red. And so Nora was trying to figure out like, is this okay in terms of like dress code? Why are wigs okay? Why would she wear a wig? Like all these questions that I'm trying to answer while also giving her the bigger picture of like, it's really not okay to comment on a black girl's hair, and here's why. And it turned into this like a whole conversation. And it just made me like that one conversation made me think like, there's so many opportunities that I think arise really naturally with kids. And it's important to use those opportunities intentionally, because part of me was like, I just want to be like, don't ever talk about her wig. Like that's inappropriate. Right? But then I was like, she's not going to understand why, unless I break this down for her.
01:04:36 Alyssa
Yeah. And it doesn't have to be like, it's that, how do I make it developmentally appropriate where I don't overload too much information in one conversation and still give her context.
01:04:48 Rachel
Right. And help her, because I said, like, if you hear your friends talking about her wig again, I want you to let them know that it's not okay to do that.
01:04:56 Alyssa
Yeah.
01:04:58 Rachel
But also like you have to know the reasoning if you're going to tell your friends that, right?
01:05:03 Alyssa
Right. Because then they're like, why?
01:05:04 Rachel
Right.
01:05:05 Alyssa
Well I don't know. My mom said so.
01:05:07 Rachel
Right.
01:05:08 Alyssa
Yeah.
01:05:10 Rachel
Yeah. And again, that's a situation where like equal and fair are not the same thing.
01:05:17 Alyssa
Right. Right. Yeah. So good. So many good things to unpack here with Shelby and that really do just like apply to everyday life. I hope that as folks tune into this, they can start to notice and build awareness around those little moments that do often pop up with kids where we do have those opportunities that often for us just feel uncomfortable and we want to shut them down and make them go away as fast as possible. And noticing where we as adults might find ourselves saying things like, well, that's not fair if that happens, or the desire to make things fair. I had a friend who was like, a kid's birthday was coming up and she was like, this is our first time where it was a first birthday and they have an older kid. First time where there's this kid's birthday, like, should I get something for the big kid? Like they're going to feel left out, it's going to be all, and I was like, let's break that down. Lets talk about it. And we got to dive into like, yeah, they're allowed to feel left out or disappointed that it's not their birthday. It's not our job to make those hard feelings go away. And starting to look at those things where for us as adults, the idea of what is or isn't fair is coming up.
01:06:31 Rachel
Yes, it's that like everybody gets a trophy kind of like mentality, which like doesn't help kids.
01:06:39 Alyssa
Doesn't help them build resilience. They need to practice feeling hard things in order to know how to move through hard things.
01:06:46 Rachel
1000%, I've never gone into one of my kids' birthday parties and been like, I can't wait to support my other kids emotions when it's not about them. Like, I don't want to, it's inconvenient, it sucks. And I'm doing it in front of an audience because you know, it's like friends and family are there, whatever. And on the flip side of that, I don't want them to go to every birthday party expecting that they're going to get a gift. That's not a cultural norm for us. Like you have to learn how to navigate someone else's birthday and not get a present.
01:07:11 Alyssa
Yeah. As my dad would say, the world doesn't always revolve around you, Alyssa.
01:07:16 Rachel
Well, that's kind of what comes up for me, too, like, you know, in my..
01:07:20 Alyssa
But really what he meant was, it's okay to feel disappointed.
01:07:24 Rachel
Correct. It's okay for this not to be about you. And it's okay, if that doesn't feel great.
01:07:31 Alyssa
Nothing's ever about me in this family. That's probably what I would have said. I wonder where Sage gets it. That apple doesn't fall far from the tree.
01:07:37 Rachel
Well, I mean, kids are just so egocentric. It was like, okay, we went back to the beach the other day to spend time with Lauren and fam. I was carrying two coolers, a boogie board, and two bags, and Abel was walking behind me, empty -handed, obvi, crying about why he had to walk so far in the heat. Like, Abel, read the room, okay? I am legit a Sherpa right now. But they just think about their own experience and that's developmentally normal. And it's such a pain in the butt sometimes.
01:08:15 Alyssa
For sure, yeah. And it's always looking at those things on the outside and being like, oh, yeah, he's bummed that he has to walk. Honestly, I'm bummed that I have to walk. If somebody would please come carry this stuff and carry me back to the car, that would be delightful. He's allowed to feel that, right? It doesn't mean we put all our stuff down and carry him.
01:08:36 Rachel
That's right.
01:08:37 Alyssa
And that, I think, is the piece that it's not our job to save our kids from hard feelings. So I hope that we as the adults can, as people have tuned into this episode, also start to reflect on where that comes up for us, our desire to rescue people, especially our kids from their hard feelings of like fairness.
01:09:25 Alyssa
Thanks for tuning in to Voices of Your Village. Check out the transcript at voicesofyourvillage.com. Did you know that we have a special community over on Instagram hanging out every day with more free content? Come join us at @seed.and.sew S -E -W. Take a screenshot of you tuning in, share it on the gram and tag @seed.and.sew to let me know your key takeaway. If you're digging this podcast, make sure to subscribe so you don't miss an episode. We love collaborating with you to raise emotionally intelligent humans.
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