New Guides to Countering Antisemitism Added to Nickelodeon Anti-Hate Series

Tue, 12/21/2021 - 9:14am

USC Shoah Foundation and partners Nickelodeon and The Conscious Kid today launch a pair of Talk and Take Action: Guides to Countering Antisemitism that provide teachers and parents with content and tools to talk with children about the discrimination and hate directed at the Jewish community in the United States.

Co-written by USC Shoah Foundation, Nickelodeon and The Conscious Kid, an education, research and policy organization dedicated to reducing bias and promoting positive identity development in youth, the new guides provide critical, age-sensitive resources at a time when antisemitic incidents are on the rise in the United States and around the world.

The guides include chapters such as Stopping the Stereotype Cycle, Standing in Solidarity with Others, and Signs of Hope to Counter Hate, as well as a section on Addressing Antisemitism and Its Root Cause.

“These guides provide learning opportunities and education materials that educators and parents can use to help children counter antisemitism in their daily lives,” said Lesly Culp, Head of Programs in Education at USC Shoah Foundation.

The Conscious Kid was founded in 2016 by Katie Ishizuka and Ramon Stephens, both parents of color who found a distinct lack of diverse representation in children’s literature as they sought reading material for their young sons.

To fix that, the pair, both academics at the University of California, San Diego, started their own lending library, an endeavor that has since grown into an organization that has distributed over 140,000 books to more than 4,500 educators in 50 US states and developed a network of 2.1 million followers on social media.

Nickelodeon is committed to helping kids navigate their world by giving them age-appropriate and accessible tools and information. The guides further previous work done through Nick News and other similar resources, created in partnership with The Conscious Kid, which are located on NickHELPS.com, including How to be an Ally (for Kids) and the Talk and Take Action titles Dismantling Anti-Blackness and Stopping AAPI Hate. Through this ongoing partnership, The Conscious Kid connected USC Shoah Foundation with Nickelodeon, which resulted in the new Talk and Take Action: Guides to Countering Antisemitism.

Stephens, executive director of The Conscious Kid, talked about the focus on antisemitism alongside other forms of racism and hate crime.

“It's important that we include and engage in education about antisemitism when doing anti-racism work and do everything that we can to support solidarity across communities to create a more equitable future,” Stephens said. “We are grateful for the USC Shoah Foundation's expertise in developing the antisemitism toolkits so that young children, families and educators are equipped with the knowledge and resources to understand and take action against it.”

The new antisemitism guide for parents can be found here. There is also a guide for educators.

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