Tag Archives: MLK

MLK Day Craft: Hand and Heart Sign

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It’s Martin Luther King Jr. Day and we created a Hand and Heart Sign to celebrate this great man.

This MLK Day craft also gave Mila and me the time to sit and talk about the importance of MLK’s mission. We’re always in the lookout to talk about diversity, antiracism, and love.

With my parenting, I make it a point to talk about big issues with Mila. Civil rights for everyone no matter their race, gender, or socioeconomic standing is something I believe Mila should grow up understanding. Making sure I keep the conversation age appropriate is just as important too.

To begin our conversation this year about MLK, I had her watch MLK’s ‘I have a dream’ speech. She loved watching him talk and it gave her a sense of knowing him.

Then she did a MLK coloring page from The Letter Vee. She had a picture of him up while she colored it in.

Also pictured is our MLK artwork from last year. It’s one of my favorite canvases she’s done.

Then, we talked about what word describes MLK’s message and overall feeling. Mila said, “LOVE!” I’m so glad she picked up on that while listening and talking about him.

“If you are seeking the highest good, I think you can find it through love.”

MLK

This year, I wanted to combine aspects from last years artwork and the word love. Here’s what we used to create this adorable piece.

  • Heart sign (from the dollar store!)
  • Skin toned paints
  • Yarn
  • Hot glue

With Mila’s help, I painted her hand with the skin toned paint and had her put her hand wherever she wanted to on the sign. We let the paint dry in between colors so it didn’t get muddled.

After it was all dry, I wrote ‘love’ in the middle. Next, I used my hot glue gun to trace the word and around the heart. Carefully, I tapped the yarn on the glue so it’d stick.

For the bow on top, I took different colored yarn and tied it on the top.

I actually love how it turned out. To me it says, we need everyone to work together and create love for humans to move forward.

It’s also one of those crafts that can stay in your house way beyond MLK Day too.

Again, I forgot to take pictures during the making of this piece, but I did video. I promise I’ll start doing better with this! The videos are cute, but I feel like pictures work better on here.

I hope you enjoyed Mila’s creation for MLK Day. I’d totally recommend showing your child some speeches by him or even talking about MLK. There’s so many beautiful quotes that are so meaningful too.

Here’s some other ways Mila and I have talked about MLK and antiracism.

How do you talk to your kids about MLK? Do you do any fun crafts or read specific books? Let me know in the comments.

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Toddler Activity – M&M’s and Diversity.

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Today is Martin Luther King Jr. Day.

To honor that, I wanted to have another diversity talk with Mila. I figured to keep her full attention, I’d use her biggest motivation: m&ms. The girl loves them and always sneaks them. I guess I can’t blame her for that.

Anyways, m&m’s are a perfect way to showcase different skin colors, but we’re all human on the inside.

I lined her m&m’s up and asked her what colors they were. She told me all of the colors and I mentioned how all of them were all different. I talked about how people all have different skin colors too.

Then, I asked her if she would be sad if I told her she couldn’t have certain colors of m&ms. Of course she was. She told me she liked them all.

With that, I told her in the past, boys and girls who were black weren’t allowed to play with boys and girls with white skin. She seemed upset by this. Yet, i explained that some people judge others by their skin color.

Without giving her much more thought, I cut an m&m in half.

She seemed a little shocked, but I asked her if she thought the other m&ms looked the same on the inside. With a quick nod of her head, she pointed to another one and I sliced it in half too. It may be aggressive, but she liked it.

I told her that even thought people look different on the outside, we’re all humans on the inside. We have differences, but we still have the same emotions too.

Of course, as she gets older, these conversations will get more complex.

I’ll never claim to know what racism is like to experience. The only thinks i can do is teach my daughter to see people’s differences, but love them for their character.

Kids will change the world, but it starts with teaching them about diversity, even with m&ms.

Here’s some videos about Martin Luther King Jr. that Mila enjoyed this morning:

Toddler Activity – MLK Day Artwork

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With Martin Luther King Jr day quickly approaching, I knew I wanted to do an activity with Mila.

Plus, I thought it’d be fun to share beforehand in case you have your child home from school and want to do a productive activity with them.

Mila and I talk about race a lot. It’s important to me that she grows up anti-racist, especially in the world we live in now. It’s never too early to start those conversations. She has black barbies and dolls, books with diverse characters, and watches shows with people of all races.

Still, talking about MLK with her was a must. During this activity, I mentioned his name and talked about how people have different skin color. We also talked about how she would play with anyone, no matter what they looked like. She seemed shocked when I told her some people don’t like others because of the color of their skin.

Back to the project though!

This is an easy art project that actually took less than five minutes. The conversation we had before, during, and after spanned beyond that though.

Things you’ll need:

I started off by asking Mila what she thought her skin tone was between the three colors. She chose the middle color which was called “Territorial Beige.” It was interesting to see her perception of her skin tone.

This shade went in the middle because I wanted an ombre affect. Of course, you can do whatever color sequence you want.

I took a paint brush and painted her hand. Then we pressed it on the canvas. When pressing their hands down, make sure to get all of their fingers too. If not, it’ll be really faint. Finally, I cleaned her hand off and did the process two more times.

That part really is that easy.

After her handprints, or she calls them paw prints, dried, it’s time for the words. I ended up painting the phrase, “small hands change the world.’

You can use any quote or phrase here. There are a ton of MLK quotes that would work perfectly.

I have some more ideas to do for Black History Month that I want to share. They’ll be posted in the second half of the month. I have a few special activities for Valentine’s Day that I know you’ll love just as much!

If you like this activity or try it, let me know in the comments!