Children are creatures of wonder. The inexperience of their youth is a stimulant, rather than an inhibition, permitting them great capacity for curiosity and formation. Everything is new to a child. It is with joy that children discover themselves and navigate their unbridled potential. Yet, Black and Brown youth are often denied the grace and innocence of childhood. They are seen as older and guiltier than other children, subject to suspicion and punitive discipline.¹ Research has found that Black children are often treated as adults as early as age 13, being perceived as less innocent and more threatening.² 

Joy, which emotionally and physiologically drives capacity for growth and authenticity, is discouraged and diminished amidst this premature adultification. Nurturing Black and Brown children means centering pillars of childhood, like joy. Creating space for joy in classrooms is an entryway to honoring the humanity and well-being of students, while stimulating the brain development that allows learning to flourish. 

The human brain is a wonderful and complex creation, constantly evolving as its surroundings shift. It develops milestone by milestone to assume responsibility for many things, including a sense of direction, what information to retain, and which relationships to form. The brain is wired around the human desire to survive and thrive in a world with rich sociocultural considerations. In other words, our capacity for cognition rests with the development of the brain.

All human decisions, behaviors, thoughts, and creations, are rooted in our emotions.³ Emotions provide feedback to decision making, helping us make rational decisions. They are integral to neural networks responsible for learning, and the quality of our experiences cannot be divorced from them. When children, like all of us, experience joy, their brains increase dopamine levels. Dopamine sends positive reinforcement to regions of the brain that affect development, behavior, and movement, deeply influencing a child’s developing brain.⁴ Those regions include the hippocampus and prefrontal cortex, and are responsible for increased memory, attention, mental shifting, creativity, and motivation. This helps us understand how to help children thrive. As children grow into adults, their understanding of the world is formed by the qualities of their experiences and the emotions they’ve associated with them. Joy drives thriving. 

Classrooms are sites of inquiry and learning. Children spend much of their time in a school building – upwards of seven hours a day. If we want children to be children, we must push classrooms towards joy. This becomes vital when educating Black and Brown children, who are more likely to be subject to adultification and live in a world that repeatedly dehumanizes them.

There is no single definition of joy, although we know the great benefits it has on childhood. There are, though, evidence-based strategies to organically induce joy in classrooms. Educators and researchers alike have found independent discovery, honoring identity, movement, and play to be significant contributors to a joyful classroom.⁵ The things we want for children, a quality education, curiosity, and joy can and should happen simultaneously. 

Children are sponges, rapidly developing the necessary structures and mechanisms so their brains can help them understand the world. Their capacity for brain development is expansive and governed by the quality of their emotional experiences. Childhood and adolescence, and the range of emotions and experiences that accompany them, are seasons of formation. Every child deserves the unburdened opportunity to explore the world and themselves before they make their assertions.

1. Center for Policing Equity: https://policingequity.org/resources/blog/the-adultification-of-black-children ↩︎
2. https://www.apa.org/pubs/journals/releases/psp-a0035663.pdf
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3. Emotions are the Rudder that Steers Thinking: https://ascd.org/el/articles/emotions-are-the-rudder-that-steers-thinking
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4. Neuroscience and Learning Through Play: https://cde-lego-cms-prod.azureedge.net/media/zbcd21td/neuroscience-review_web.pdf
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5. 5 strategies for incorporating joy in the classroom: https://www.the74million.org/article/educators-view-5-strategies-for-incorporating-joy-in-the-classroom/ ↩︎