Memorable Scenes
The most memorable scene for me was in the opening scene (min 6:29), where the children candidly know what brotherhood week is all about and still go ahead to acknowledge that blacks and Indians by design receive unfair and unequal treatment that they themselves would not like to receive. During the exercise, it was alarming how quickly the blue-eyed children picked up the discrimination behavior and even had ideas on some bad ways to treat brown-eyed students (min 12.19). This shows how extremely easy it is for young children to learn and exercise discriminatory behavior.
Body language
From the video, the brown-eyed children put on frowns while others had an expression of utter disbelief. Some had bent heads out of shame while others got into a fight due to name-calling. This showed that discrimination had a profoundly negative impact on the brown-eyes in psychological and social respects.
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Self-fulfilling prophecies
The positive label in this context was that blue-eyed people are better and the negative label was that brown-eyed people are inferior. Once this was embedded in the minds of the children, the sociopsychological phenomenon of self-fulfilling prophecy was realized. The teacher reported that the personalities of the ‘superior’ children changed more rapidly than those considered inferior. The card picking exercise demonstrated this efficiently where both groups used more time when they were inferior compared to when they were superior.
Sioux prayer
The blue/brown exercise showed the blue-eyed children that were previously considered superior that treating the brown-eyed children meanly was erroneous. They did not realize this until it was their turn to receive the discrimination they had perpetrated before. This is much like the Sioux prayer where one is not supposed to judge another as inferior if they have not felt inferior.
Promoting equality
Ms. Eliot made sure that both groups of students, that is, the blue and brown-eyed students each had their turn to be inferior and a turn to be superior. By experiencing both these sides, the students knew how bad it feels to be discriminated against and hence were more bound to treat others equally lest they themselves face the same kind of treatment. It was generally a scare then save strategy.
Collaboration and teamwork
I feel that the teacher primarily used two main techniques to build this collaboration. First, she builds their esteem by labeling them as superior. This is why both groups performed better in the card exercise than those who felt inferior. The other technique was having circle time, where all students had an equal opportunity to express their ideas freely. This encourages respect for others' opinions.
Relevance
The United States continues to battle the unending scourge that is racism. A significant account of this is the Floyd murder. Similar to what is depicted in the video, children should be taught from a tender age about the evils of racism and other forms of discrimination. If they grow up with these values, future generations will likely live free of discrimination, particularly racial-based discrimination.
