DD4 said a girl at nursery is brown.. what to say ?

[vangh]

I always ask my DD about her friends. I say stuff like ' who's your best friend ? ' ' who shall we invite to your birthday ? ' she is 4 in a few weeks.

I asked her about a girl in her class and she said ' yeah she's brown '..

Her nursery is pretty diverse and we've spoken about lots of other children before that aren't white, but she's never said anything like that.

I didn't really know what to say. I know that sounds really stupid probably. I think I said something like, everyone is a different colour.. not sure if that was the right thing to say.

I understand she'll notice that there are different skin colours but I'm a bit surprised she said that and I don't want to say the wrong thing.

For context, we don't ever talk about skin colour at home, so maybe we should. Maybe there are child friendly books that explain this ?

Has your child said something like this and what did you do ?

I think it’s really difficult not to put our own adult interpretation, and internalised racial attitudes and awareness onto this topic when it comes up unexpectedly. I too have stumbled over describing people to my own children when trying to work out who we are talking about.

As an observation, skin colour is just descriptive, but when I was growing up it might very likely have been a descriptor that was used negatively. In order to develop an understanding of racism and other discriminatory attitudes as they grow up, children first need to be comfortable observing difference.

i am hopeful that as this generation grows there will be much less issue with diversity as a predictor of success, but it doesn’t hurt my white-presenting mixed-race kids to understand that life might be a little bit easier for them than their brown cousins. At the same time, growing up in a household of privilege and high educational attainment also opens doors for them that are harder for their white cousins who live in a deprived part of the country and a totally different socio economic setup.

True equity is about recognising that we don’t all start from the same position, and some people have to work harder than others against systemic prejudice.

I was so unbelievably proud of my 7yo DS the other day when watching the latest Attenborough programme and he announced that he had already seen 3 women on it. The catalyst for this was that he remembered me complaining about a lack of sex diversity when we watched a different episode.

I'd have just said yes, she has brown skin, and left it at that.

I would definitely correct a child describing someone as 'chocolate' or another food item though, I don't think that's appropriate.

Pretending children are colourblind or making it a taboo to discuss skin colour is the worst thing you can do, as it gives children the sense that dark skin is shameful.

Agree with this poster.

My 4 year old would never shout to another person anything about their appearance, in particular colour. But, where i live there are all kinds of skin colours so a black man wouldn't be something that would be newsworthy!

I really wouldn't worry about it at this stage. My DD became friends at playgroup with the only girl who wasn't white at nursery, they're both still friends at 22.

I would ask what she means…
a friend’s daughter once said that she didn’t want to hold X’s hand ( a black girl)in nursery because she was “brown and dirty”. This shocked everyone, especially the parents. However, when they queried her more the girl had been playing with mud/dirt and had hands that were dirty with something brown, and friend’s daughter didn’t want dirty hands.
Adults immediately jump to skin colour… kids don’t.

DS has started doing this too, very diverse class with a lot of different ethnicities. He is simply stating a fact - this person is brown. I just left it at “yes they are, and you’re white and uncle Z is Asian. You get lots of different skin colours”. But he did eventually come and ask me why some people are brown so I told him the truth, that darker skin helps to protect from the sun more. His curiosity seemed to be satisfied after that as he’s not mentioned it since and instead just says “Name played with me today, it was fun” or whatever other observation about the day and who he played with, without bringing race into it. Kids are curious, answer them honestly and they’ll move on.

And hair, and sometimes clothes, and sometimes smell from different homes environments like spicey cooking smells. And sometimes their mummies and daddies look different too.

Have a look in your library and see if they have a wide selection of children's books picturing children from different ethnicities ( and if they haven’t ask why not and direct them to Letterbox Library!) when you look at books together you can say things like “ That little boy has his hair the same as X in your nursery” , “ That little girls mummy has bangles like Ys mummy”

It is perfectly normal for children to notice and comment on things they observe about other people. It is fine to respond to this and help your child to recognise that we are all different in some ways , but that in many ways we are also the same!

Well done for saying what you did btw, I think that's a good answer.

Kids aren't born racist so she is just stating what she sees. Black people are not black, they're brown but they chose the descriptor so we all use it. Your DD needs to understand the term used is black because its not just about the colour you see. And in any case, underneath we're all the same.

My DD coloured herself light brown as a tot because she saw her skin colour was different to her friends pinkish colour. My dd was brown because she was tanned, lol!

@Bellaboo01

I have several children, she was the only one who commented on everything/person she found interesting/different.

I had years of it, disabled people, blue hair, exceptionally tall people etc etc.

She's grown to be a lovely older teen, who has a very mixed friendship group. She never commented on colour after that.

She was just incredibly observant, and interested in everything, she couldn't just sit and be quiet...it was draining.

My 4yo's best friend is black. She's white. She mentioned it when we were chatting about her friends, just very matter of fact '... is black'. I replied, yes, and you're white and you have brown eyes and (other friend) has blue eyes and we're all different on the outside and that's great. She agreed and the conversation moved onto something else.

She is about the right age to start noticing skin colour. It is true what a PP has said, kids just dont have preconceptions about what it should mean. There are loads of good tips on the internet to talk to kids about colour and lots of books. When my mixed race nephews were small I came back from a year living in a very hot place, just at the time they have decided black and white were silly and people should be classified as pink and brown. They were quite fascinated by the fact that I was both on account of a very deep tan.

You're overthinking it.

Black and brown are now the accepted terms. No need to do anything.

I wouldn’t say anything. IMO you’re massively overthinking this. A 4 year old is just making an observation.

The only time a child’s race-related remark has really made me cringe was when I heard a girl of no more than 8, say of another, ‘Oh, she’s Eurasian.’ She’d evidently heard it from her parents, who were Australian.
It was said in a slightly disdainful tone, which was why it really made me cringe.

I think where you are going wrong is wanting her not to acknowledge that people are from different races. It's almost like saying 'shhhh don't mention it!'. Would you tell her not to mention it if she said her friend had golden hair? It's just as factual.

"Oohh that's nice" or "does she have brown skin, that's nice" is fine.. My children's dad is brown and my kids have said "he's brown like daddy" , "he has curly hair like daddy" in the same way he will say "mummy's skin is really pale" 🙄 it's not a bad thing it's noticing differences. I think as long as your responding in a positive/ neutral way and teaching your daughter everyone is different then it's fine. Just don't make a big thing out of it, like don't make her be friends with somebody because theyre brown or treat them differently because she is brown, it's just normal.

It’s okay! Honestly it is. We are a “brown” family and all kids from around that age do start to notice things like this, whatever their background. It’s not done with malice and is just the natural curiosity of children. Please don’t make a big deal of it and make your child wonder what she’s done wrong. Your response was fine - as long as she is taught that the colour of someone’s skin is not important, that all people are beautiful regardless of colour and that character is what counts, then you’re doing a grand job.

Most people in the world are black or brown, no?

I'd personally by some books that explains differences of skin hair ect and start reading so your child has a better understanding as they grow. All children notice different things skin,hair ect it's all apart of developing.

Most four-year-olds’ worlds are pretty small, and it’s fine to give an age-appropriate answer with ‘some’. They don’t need the full picture of global majority language just yet.

Nope. Not at all understanding why your preferred response is more age appropriate, @DrMarshaFieldstone.

(Speaking as a member of said global majority I’d object to anyone giving their four year old the impression that I am some strange anomaly. Thanks.)

@StrangeNew Not looking for a row. Small children make sense of the world from the micro and build towards the macro. If a child has only known a predominantly WBRI context it’s age-appropriate to use this as their initial frame of reference and ‘some’ ≠ anomaly.

Quite apart from the fact that many billions of people in the global majority wouldn’t describe themselves as either Black or brown.

I think it's actually odd that she mentioned this. If it's a diverse school, then seeing kids of all races would be the norm and nothing that would stand out to her. Also if there are other kids of colour, why did she mention this particular child? I would try to get to the reason, as if she is pointing this out about one particular child it might cause some offence.

Sometimes someone's skin colour is the thing that makes them stand out in a particular group, and the most useful way of explaining who you mean. I honestly don't see this as racist or think it needs a big discussion. "Brown" is not the word an adult would use, but it's not an unusual choice for people of that age and unless the intention is obviously malicious, which it doesn't sound like here, I wouldn't do anything.

I agree. There are at least 4 other black kids in her class. She's never said they were brown or even mentioned it.

She says they're boys or girls or happy or sad usually. But nothing about skin colour.