Something is wrong. We can look for it in our history, we can create it with our colleagues, and we can demonstrate it in our classrooms. The Africans who were brought here as slaves were not just passive victims. They found ways to resist their victimization. All whites were not bad, and some black resisters found white allies.
Concrete examples are critical.
For young children, examples can be found in picture books. This story is told from the point of view of a young black girl who travels back in time and experiences both the chilling realities of slavery and the power of her own resistance and eventual escape. This dual representation is important for all children, regardless of color. A white friend of mine often told her young son the story of how Rosa Parks refused to sit in the back of the bus in 1955 and sparked her whole community to take a stand against racist whites during the Montgomery, Alabama, bus boycott. The story was one of the child's favorites when he was just four years old.