When do you think you’ll buy your first minivan?.Give one word to describe mom-to-be’s mood during her pregnancy.What has been mom-to-be’s biggest food craving during the pregnancy?. ![]() What are you most looking forward to about being a dad?. ![]() The list of baby shower questions for daddy could vary, but could include questions like these: Before the shower, take a video of dad, being asked questions about mom-to-be. That's it.All you will need is a smartphone and a tv/ computer screen to show the video you will be taking. So, when Black History Month comes, "We want to focus on the joy, the stories, the culture, the celebration. "All year, we're already teaching Black history and incorporating it into our curriculum," she says. That is why a Black History Month grounded in activities and events does not feel like a missed opportunity. When it came to slavery, the Civil War, or even Reconstruction, she learned bullet points, not real stories about the real lives that Black Americans lived throughout history.īut Forbes has made space for exactly that in her own classroom. "I remember sitting in the classroom with so many questions because it felt like there were so many gaps in the curriculum," she says. She knows because this was the experience that she had in middle school. "It's really hard to teach a child when you push their identity off and don't allow them to just be and to speak and to share and to celebrate," she says. This goes for everything that she teaches, not just Black history. "Seeing so many different cultures being represented at a big parade and celebrating within the whole diaspora was really nice."Īs a teacher, Forbes says ensuring that students are enjoying their experience is the whole point. "Everyone was included," she says about a parade that Forbes organized to punctuate the first Friday of the month. The same goes for this February's Black History Month programming. "Not only are we learning about certain history, we're learning about exactly why these things happened and how they contribute to America as a whole," she continued.Īs the child of Sierra Leonean immigrants, Bangura also says it means a lot that Forbes highlights stories from the entire Black diaspora. The way Forbes teaches leads to a richer understanding of where the country is today. "It's like, wow, I really get to learn about this history and enjoy it." "She genuinely makes it fun," Bangura says of her teacher. She says that the class is a welcome departure from what it's usually like to learn Black history in school. Josephine Bangura is a senior at Freedom who is enrolled in the African-American studies elective that Forbes teaches upperclassmen. "You just have to be willing to see it and be willing to do it." "There's so many ways to bring joy out of the curriculum," she says. Edmunds' example that motivates Forbes today. The impulse to center jubilation comes from Felicia Edmunds, Forbes' elementary school gym teacher who devoted the month of February to extracurricular activities that went beyond traditional lesson plans: dancing, singing, reading poetry and more. Among them, a Black history bingo game, talent show, non-alcoholic paint n' sip, a spirit day dedicated to cultural dress, another to HBCUs, an assembly dedicated to go-go music, a Black history parade, and finally, a black-out, where the charge is simple: wear all black. That is why, this year at Freedom, they're turning it up a notch.įorbes has worked alongside other teachers to pack this February with an ambitious series of events that honor Blackness through revelry. "The most important thing for me and my colleagues is that the kids feel seen, celebrated, appreciated, and allowed to be unapologetically Black," she says. ![]() As such, February could lead way to a hurried, 28-day scramble to discuss all that's happened to Black folks in America, from the transatlantic slave trade, to the Jim Crow South, to the Civil Rights Movement and the untimely death of too many Black lives to count.įor Forbes, however, February is a time for celebration. Woodson's "Negro History Week"–could be seen as an opportunity to spotlight the solemn tale of Black American struggles. The tradition–a contemporary evolution of Carter G. ![]() "And not just to impart knowledge, but to nurture, to encourage, to support."Īccording to Forbes, that nature is essential to navigating this month as a Black educator.īlack History Month poses a challenge to some. "Ever since I was 5 I felt like there was something that was in me to teach," she says. Though today she's a social studies teacher at Freedom High, a predominantly Black and brown public school in Woodbridge, Virginia, Forbes has been educating for as long as she can remember. For De'Ana Forbes, it started with crayons, teddy bears, her baby sister and a baseboard-turned-chalkboard in Danville, Virginia.
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