For this Los Angeles educator, teaching Asian American history is personal

Five-year-olds have a very literal way of understanding the world, says Kimmy Waite, who spent her early career in the kindergarten classroom.

“One of my students had an amazing mind for science and engineering,” said the Los Angeles-based teacher, noting that he was eager to experience everything he had learned.

“One day at recess I found him outside the classroom door with his cheek pressed against the wall. I asked him what he was doing and he said, “Today our vocabulary word was texture! I try to experience the texture of the wall.’

She enjoys the students’ radical openness to these new textures, new ideas and new people. That’s one reason Waite, who now works as an elementary school STEM curriculum specialist while pursuing a Ph.D. in sustainability education, is passionate about teaching underrepresented communities.

“I believe that young learners are ideally equipped to think about issues of injustice and also about scientific inquiry because of their unique way of looking at the world,” Waite said. “They are very passionate about what is fair and what is not fair.”

Growing up Asian-American in Seattle, Waite says she rarely saw herself reflected in her school curriculum. “If I did, it was always like a very suppressed narrative,” she said.

Teaching, Waite said, was “a calling to counteract the experience I had and make it better [other] children.”

But improving the experience for all students requires better training for educators, she said. “Our teacher education programs need to put more emphasis on anti-racism and social justice,” she said. “I think it’s fundamental that teachers are trained.”

This interview has been lightly edited for length and clarity.

How and when did you decide to become a teacher?

I wanted to learn about different places and educational systems around the world that were different from North America. I first started teaching as a fifth and sixth grade ESL teacher in a public school in Seoul, South Korea. I have also taught professional development to early childhood educators in Guyana. One of the reasons I love Los Angeles is the local and global connections that always emerge in the classroom.

But the main reason I became a teacher was because I wanted to make a difference. I believe that education and teaching have a greater purpose and a greater purpose to advance social justice and environmental justice.

Tell us about your own experience with school and how it affects your work today.

As an Asian American, I have never seen myself reflected or represented in my K-12 curriculum. On the rare occasions that Asian Americans were in textbooks or mentioned in a lesson, the image was of an oppressed people who silently accepted their fate. However, history tells us that this stereotypical image is not true. Throughout history, Asian Americans have participated in resistance and coalition building against injustices. But this is not usually taught in schools.

Much of the work I did to prepare to be a teacher, in undergrad and in my teacher education and master’s program, was about exploring the white narratives that were presented to me during my own K- 12.

My own K-12 education also showed me the importance of having teachers of color. From kindergarten through my doctoral program, I’ve only had five educators who looked like me. In elementary school, I never felt like I connected with any of my teachers or that I was seen.

What is your favorite—or in your opinion, most important—lesson from Asian American history to teach and why?

Asian Americans have a long history of resistance, and that resistance has shaped our civil rights today. The key moments of each court case may not appear in early elementary school, but the concept they reflect about Asian Americans fighting for equality may. Here’s a few examples:

• United States v. Wong Kim Ark: This 1898 case affirmed that American-born people of Asian descent were US citizens and set a legal precedent for the citizenship rights of historically marginalized US-born people. A great book to use to learn this is I Am American: The Ark Story by Wong Kim.
• Korematsu vs. United States: After the attack on Pearl Harbor, Japanese Americans were ordered to report to assembly centers. Fred Korematsu defied these orders and was arrested. Legal challenges were filed, but his sentence was deemed constitutional. Scholars now consider this to be wrongly motivated, along with cases such as Dred Scott v. Sanford and Plessy v. Ferguson.
• Fred Korematsu Civil Liberties and Constitution Day is celebrated annually in California and 12 other states on January 30 to honor Korematsu’s legacy. Some great books on this are: Fred Korematsu Speaks Up and They Called Us Enemy.
• Related to the incarceration of Japanese Americans during World War II, the POV documentary Manzanar, Diverted: When Water Becomes Dust tells a story of historical dispossession: the dispossession of indigenous lands; the forced removal and incarceration of Japanese Americans; and the extraction of natural resources. Three communities unite in the fight for environmental justice. The lesson plans I wrote for the film are available on PBS Learning Media.

California also has one of the largest Sikh populations in the country; However, despite their rich contributions to California’s culture, economy, and industries, there is a lack of awareness about Sikhs, which can lead to harassment. Before the pandemic, a volunteer from the Sikh Coalition came to my kindergarten class and my students learned about Sikhs in California as part of a state history lesson. They used coloring pages of Sikh children as superheroes. It celebrates a group of people who create awareness and understanding, but also show that they have joy, which I think is really important.

What is the best advice you ever received and how did you put it into practice?

This isn’t direct advice, but the best example I’ve been given in my career was actually from 5- and 6-year-old kindergarten students. I love their inquisitive minds, their unfiltered honesty, and the pure joy they get from things we might find mundane.

Young learners are ideally equipped to think about issues of injustice and also for scientific inquiry because of their unique way of looking at the world. I also admire their courage and authenticity. We should all be like that, but as adults we are socialized into it.

What is one thing you have read that has made you a better educator?

“The Next American Revolution: Sustainable Activism for the Twenty-First Century” by eternal activist, foremother Grace Lee Boggs.

One of Boggs’ most famous questions is, “What time is it on world clocks?” She encourages us to think globally and see how interconnected we are. Even when I was in kindergarten, I always kept this question in mind when planning lessons or when preparing for learning projects.

You have a busy job and this is a stressful time. How do you take care of yourself?

Knowing when to say no is a skill I’ve had to learn (and continue to learn) over the years. And no compromise with no, because no is a final and complete answer. As educators, we are in a helping profession and we want to help. However, you must take care of yourself first and protect your own time and energy for your own mental, physical and emotional health.