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Learning Actions

What is a Learning Action?

In workshops and classroom settings, the terms “activity” and “exercise” are often used to describe anti-racism work. We believe that these terms minimize the very serious realities of racism and the deep, on-going learning and reflection that is required in engaging with anti-racism. The words “activity” and “exercise” imply that racism and anti-racism are external to us, that anti-racism can be an activity that we simply do once, and that a handout will adequately unpack the material. This can be compared to diversity work and how oftentimes, a cultural component is merely added to an existing system. While this may appear to diversify a particular space or system, it does not engage in genuine systemic transformation. This problematic method/perspective is often critiqued as the “add-on,” the “one-off,” or the “add culture and stir” approach.

Because anti-racism is an active process that involves continuous learning and reflection, we have chosen the term “Learning Action” over “exercise” and “activity” when it comes to facilitating anti-racism learning with particular materials.


✱ For individuals intending to facilitate our Learning Actions, we recommend the following path through our resource:

➊ The Basics: Level 1 ⇢ ➋ The Basics: Level 2 ⇢ ➌ Glossary ⇢ ➍ Learning Actions ⇢ ➎ Recommended Resources


Components

  • a list of materials and handouts;

  • specific theoretical/critical framing and the facilitator's thorough understanding of the underlying concern the action is designed to address;

  • appropriate use/adaptation of the action to ensure the action is appropriate for your community of learners, and suggestions for adapting the action;

  • discussion of the ground rules for the action for ensuring safety and for the debriefing/discussion afterwards;

  • discussion of the differences between safety and discomfort (the latter is often required for embodied learning), and discussion of the ground rules regarding safety;

  • encouragement to participants to be attentive to their own thoughts, reactions, and responses (often multiple or contradictory) to the Learning Action which they can build on/share during the debriefing/discussion;

  • participation of the facilitator (though this may occur in different ways);

  • debriefing and discussion of how to take the learning/action forward and into multiple trajectories; this often and should take much longer than does the action/activity itself;

  • self-care of all participants, including the facilitator.


Framework

Based on the above principles, each Learning Action is developed on a template which addresses the following:

I.  Framing the Action (theoretical/critical approach) 

II.  Materiality of Set-Up and Possibilities for Adapting the Action 

- how the facilitator can participate 
- how participants contribute to the group's learning 

III.  Facilitating this Learning Action

- some possible responses as it happens 

IV.  Discussion/Debriefing   

- working through responses and trajectories


OUR LEARNING ACTIONS

This resource provides you with a list of anti-racism activities to be used with your specific community. In order to use this responsibly, please familiarize yourself with the other sections of this webspace before facilitating these Learning Actions.

We have adapted some of these Learning Actions from other sources and framed them with particular reference to facilitation and debriefing; others have not been framed, but are simply borrowed directly. If this is the case, the activity link will have the note "unadapted." 

↳ Intersectionality

  • Examining Class and Race (Unadapted)

  • Power/Non-Power Chart (Unadapted)

  • Power Shuffle (Unadapted)

↳ Inventories

↳ Knowledge Gaps

↳ Language and Representation

  • Examples of Racial Microaggressions - Reading/Handout (Unadapted)

  • The Exclusion Triangle

  • Racism in the English Language - Reading/Handout (Unadapted)

↳ Whiteness

  • What is White Culture? (Unadapted)

  • Adjective List: How I See Myself—My Whiteness (Unadapted)

  • White Privilege: Unpacking the Invisible Knapsack - Reading/Handout (Unadapted)