LGBTQ-positive books by Pamela Malins,
These 8 LGBTQ-positive books impart lessons about diversity and acceptance. What kind of storybooks should be read to children? This question has been contentious — so much so that when I was teaching in a public elementary school in Ontario 10 years ago, certain books were kept in a separate room in the library apart from regular circulation. These were books featuring stories about same-sex families or gender diversity. In 2010, I left full-time teaching to pursue graduate studies and explore the ways young children make sense of diverse gender and sexual identities. These identities are intertwined as the ways we express our gender is often perceived as aligning with our sexuality. My research was also tied to debates surrounding the health curriculum and what was considered appropriate for young children. I also learned that other teachers also had challenges in using children’s literature that showed gender and sexual diversity. What age children should learn about sexual activities may be up for debate but learning about and discussing a diversity of sexual identities should not be questioned. In Canada, we have the right to love who we choose, and in Ontario June is the month of LGBTQ Pride celebrations. Children of same-sex families in school In 2005, Canada became the fourth country to legalize same-sex marriage. Between 2006 and 2011, according to Statistics Canada, “the number of same- sex married couples nearly tripled.” According to the 2016 Census, there were 72,880 same sex couples in Canada in 2016, representing 0.9 per cent of all couples and “at the time of the 2016 census, 10,020 children aged 0 to 14 were living in a family with same sex parents.” These children are now or will soon be attending schools across Canada. As early as kindergarten, children begin to perpetuate learned gender identities. They make decisions about what is for boys or for girls, and how boys and girls should behave. Children re-enact what they have learned from the media and adults in their lives and learn very quickly what performances get awarded with attention and praise. Gender studies scholars Harriet Bjerrum Nielsen (retired Professor of Gender Studies at the University of Oslo) and Bronwyn Davies (University of Melbourne) explored how gender identify unfolds in the schooling environment. By age two children “develop an emotional commitment to their gender” and many already behave and speak in conformity with conventional gender images by the time they arrive at preschool. Children are not only aware of sexual identities, but they also know the power that is associated with heterosexual identities in society and how it provides them access to various rights as citizens. In summary, children are very familiar with gender and sexual identities. The question has become: what gender and sexual identities? Equitable classrooms How society values some identities over others produces hierarchies of identity and power relations that influence how children make meaning about diverse identities. Children need the skills to navigate ongoing messages about gender and sexual identities found in popular culture marketing through everything from TV to toys to fast-food packaging, all of which have implications for children’s identities, particularly their gendered identities. Education researchers Wayne Martino and Wendy Cumming-Potvin conducted research in Australia and Canada with people studying to become teachers. They found that when these students were presented the possibility of using former Instructor, Western University and Assistant Professor, University of New Brunswick Reprinted with permission from World Economic Forum and the Author.
PRIDE Villager
Page 8 Issue 4 • Spring 2020
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