SCMCAA Head Start celebrates Black History Month

For Kelly Johnson, parent and family community engagement manager, there is no better time to start teaching tolerance and acceptance than with those under 6 years old.

“At Head Start, we have an opportunity to teach children to love themselves and others,” she said. “With diversity activities such as our Black History Month celebration, children learn to respect and celebrate the differences in all people.”

In preparation for the celebration, the staff from all three Poplar Bluff Early Head Start and Head Start centers chose 20 African Americans who impacted the nation and the world.

Mayor Robert Smith attended the SCMCAA Head Start event celebrating Black History Month. Photo provided

For an event, held at the end of February, classrooms were decorated with a theme surrounding different historical figures.

“Classrooms were decorated as space to recognize the work of Katherine Johnson, the Underground Railroad for Harriet Tubman, and a highway to celebrate Garrett Morgan’s invention of the traffic light,” Johnson said. “Other classrooms had activities surrounding Martin Luther King Jr.’s ‘I Have a Dream’ speech, George Washington Carver’s invention of peanut butter, and a never ending game of basketball for Michael Jordan.”

Along with Head Start parents and students, community members were invited out for the event. Catherine Willoughby, Carolyn Cooper, Deloris Hood and Loretta Henson sang “soulful tunes.” Willoughby worked for the South Central Missouri Community Action Agency Head Start for 42 years before retiring last year.

Photos provided

Poplar Bluff Mayor Robert Smith, along with local volunteer educator Kathern Harris and the Poplar Bluff Fire Department, also visited for the event.

“As an added benefit, all of the staff involved learned pieces of history,” Johnson said. “Not just pieces of ‘black history,’ but pieces of history that have changed all of our lives. The pieces of history on which Head Start was founded.”