"I Am Brown" Image for teaching Community

Click image to enlarge.

Image from ​I am Brown
Written by Ashok Banker
Illustrated by Sandhya Prabhat
​Lantana Publishing, 2020

This playful book explores the varied experiences of people of color and upsets stereotypes that suggest that all brown-skinned people have a single, shared experience.

The procedure below is a general outline of how you might use this image to teach about community. This seems most helpful during the initial community-building days of back-to-school. These steps are rudimentary; you will have ideas about how to expand on this process.

How you might use this image to teach community:

1. Give students time to study the image.
2. Ask them what they notice and engage them in general conversation about the image.
3. Ask them to describe what the people in the image are doing. Ask students why the people are doing those things.
4. Ask them to think about how the people feel, and how they know how the people feel. They might say serious, focused, busy, etc. 
5. Ask them how the people feel about each other, and how they know.
6. Throughout the conversation, children will make observations that include characteristics of a community. You might write these on a piece of chart paper. For example, students might mention that the people are close together, they play with each other, they talk to each other, etc.
7. After listing the characteristics of a community on a chart, write the word community at the top of the chart. 
8. Read through the chart and let students think about how each of the items on the chart relate to the classroom community.
9. Hang the chart in the classroom for reference later. When a student demonstrates something on the list, refer to it when you name and celebrate the way the student is taking care of the classroom community.
10. Invite students to write about the image and the community it depicts. They can write about how the whole community works together, or they can zoom in on some aspects of the community.