8 Homeschool Lessons for Pride Month

The Stonewall Inn in New York City was the setting for a police raid that started what would become known as The Stonewall Riots in June 1969. The days-long riots were the catalyst for the gay rights movement for LGBTQ rights and ultimately the inspiration for Pride Month. Teach kids the meaning of Pride Month with these resources.

1. Children's literature is a great way to introduce new topics to children.
Parents looking for ideas on how to go about explaining Pride Month to children need to look no further than Pride: The Story of Harvey Milk and the Rainbow Flag.

2. Family read-alouds are another excellent addition to homeschool lesson plans.
Be Amazing: A History of Pride is a book by 14-year-old drag queen, Desmond is Amazing, an LGBTQ+ activist and business owner. Desmond encourages LGBT, queer, nonbinary, gender nonconforming, and gender creative kids, teens, and their parents and guardians to embrace their uniqueness and ignore the haters.

Celebrating Pride Month means not only showing up for the parades and online events, but also knowing the history and challenges members of the LGBTQ+ community have endured over the years. These resources provide background and work as a starting point for parents raising allies.

3. Learn about the LGBT activists who kickstarted the Stonewall Rebellion.
Marsha P. Johnson and Silvia Rivera dedicated their lives to fighting for LGBTQ+ equality. The book Syliva and Marsha Start a Revolution: The Trans Women of Color Who Made LGBTQ+ History, is the perfect introduction to Pride Month and gay pride history for young children.

4. Encourage independent reading with an LGBT activist biography
The National Council of Teachers of English indicates that the goal of independent reading is to build habitual readers. "Independent reading leads to an increased volume of reading. The more one reads the better one reads. The more one reads, the more knowledge of words and language one acquires," it said in a recently published statement on Independent Reading.

Assign your child the biography, Who Was Harvey Milk by Corinne A. Grinapol as an independent reading assignment.

5. Take inspiration from one of many free homeschool lesson plans on the internet.
The educational site, Share My Lesson, provides a wide variety of free lesson plans to use for Pride Month 2021. It includes ideas to help educators create gender equality lesson plans and covers topics ranging from the meaning of pride to gay pride history resources.

Picture books and hands-on activities can help your student understand and empathize with what they're learning about. The following resources are a great addition to homeschool lessons around Pride Month.

6. Couple these LGBT books for kids with at-home Pride activities you can do with your kids.

• And Tango Makes Three by Justin Richardson
• Heather Has Two Mommies by Leslea Newman
• I am Jazz by Jessica Herthel and Jazz Jennings
• Prince and Knight by Daniel Haack

7. Incorporate gender equality lesson plans and tackle LGBTQ+ discrimination issues.
The Anti-defamation League (ADL) website offers a variety of resources on gender equality for kids and provides tools and strategies to help educators bring LGBTQ Pride to their students and classrooms.

8. Create Pride flag art with your children.
Last year, Mom.com contributor Bryanne Salazar shared 20 Ways to Celebrate Pride Month. One way she suggests is with a rainbow flag. "Displaying a rainbow flag on your property or on a bumper sticker on your car is a quick and easy way to identify yourself as a member or ally of the LGBTQ community," she wrote. The Duxbury Free Library has pinned a variety of rainbow crafts for kids and parents to work on together to celebrate Pride.

In 2004, I was honored to be invited to what was likely one of the very first same-sex weddings in the country. As a mom of three children under the age of 6 at the time, I was sadly unable to find childcare to attend my co-worker's wedding, but I still look back at my home state with pride — Massachusetts was the first U.S. state to amend same-sex marriage laws.

So now, with Pride Month 2021 upon us, I share that story with my youngest as we delve into our homeschool lessons and Pride activities, and continue to do the work to help make his home state of South Carolina a bit more inclusive every day.

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