"I'm Chocolate, You're Vanilla"

Four our homestudy, we are required to read a certain amount of books, webinars, etc. We can choose which books we read, but our agency gives us a list of suggested books.

Since we are open to a child of any race, we picked this as one of our books on transracial adoption. I have been reading it ALL DAY!!! It is written by a black female psychologist who works with families and children. This book is helpful for anyone, regardless of you or your childrens' race or color.

I cant help but be reminded of the continual references to "faith like a child" throughout scripture. Pre-schoolers break down the barriers of race because they see things simply as they are, without the racial connotations and prejudices that many adults view the world through.

For example, the author interviewed a group of 3-year-olds as part of research for this book. She showed them pictures of children of various races and asked them to pick the person that looked the most like them. An excerpt from the book is as follows:

 "The answers of three-year-olds will leave you amazed at how irrelevent skin color and race are to their self-concepts. When I tried the photo task with Tasha, for example, she said the girl in the photo she picked looked like her, 'Cause I'd like to play with her," and Belinda explained her choice with the words, 'Cause she's nice.' Few three-year-olds wil give an appropriate skin-color label for the photo of the child they looks most like themselves."

"Moreover, childen who do hve an awareness of their skin color describe it with their own distinctive words, such as chocolate, vanilla, or peach, which relate to their experience with food rather then racial categories."

The author goes on to discover when children are very aware of race, they are usually influenced by someone close to them. She states that preschoolers are disinterested in categorizing people by racial groups, but rather whether they are  "nice" or "mean" or "fun to play with." Wow! If only we could erase the influences we have had throughout our lives to view the world and each other through the eyes of a pre-schooler.

"For God sees not as man sees; for man looks at the outward appearance, but the Lord looks at the heart." 1 Samuel 16:7

No matter who you are reading this blog, I would recommend reading this book. It is inexpensive, I downloaded it onto my Kindle for $7. It is very informative and educational about the racism and predjuices in our country and what WE can to to change it as we raise our children.