If you are looking for ways to celebrate Black History Month in your home, look no further than Disney+ (if you have it) for some great ways to spark conversations with your family about times past and present. On Martin Luther King Jr Day, we watched Remember the Titans with the girls, but we also listened to some excerpts from his speeches via a Fishers IN spotify channel. But with an entire month to continue conversations surrounding uncomfortable times, here are 6 movies to watch on Disney+ for Black History Month.
GLORY ROAD
In 1965, Don Haskins was invited to Texas Western Miners to be their coach. Even though they don’t have much of a budget, he sees a chance for change and moves his family to the dorms. Once there, he recruis seven talented but rejected black players to play with five white players. From there, the rest is history and they became the team to win the 1966 National Championship against Kentucky.
RUBY BRIDGES
The year Ruby Bridges was born, the US Supreme Court charted a new course for the country with a ruling on Brown v. Board of Education. They ruled that segregation of black students in public schools was inherently unequal. So in 1960, when Ruby Bridges was to go to school, she ended up helping to integrate the all white school in New Orleans. Because she was the only black girl to attend the school, the white mothers all pulled their kids out of class leaving her as the only one there. Everyday she faced a crowd of angry white citizens but she emerged unscathed. Encouraged by her teacher, Barbara Henry, and her mother, she broke barriers.
KIDS BOOKS ABOUT STRONG WOMEN
REMEMBER THE TITANS
Based on the actual events in 1971 where one black and one white high school are closed and forced to attend T.C. Williams High School to integrate. The black man hired to coach at the black school is made head coach taking over for the successful white coach. The team becomes a unifying symbol for the community while the boys, adults, and community learn to depend and trust each other, no matter the color of the skin. This is a really fun movie to watch for Black History Month that also tackles real issues in a way kids can handle.
HIDDEN FIGURES
Set during the race to space, when the US was trying to beat Russia to put a man in space, NASA found talent in group of African-American female mathematicians who ended up serving as the brains behind one of the greatest operations in U.S. History. Based on the true-life stories of three women, known as “human computers,” they quickly rose in the ranks alongside history’s greatest minds to launch and safely return John Glenn into space. Watch this beautifully done movie about Dorothy Vaughan, Mary Jackson, and Katherine Gobels Johnson who crossed gender and race lines and became a part of U.S. History.
RED TAILS
During the Second World War, the US Army Air Corps began to integrate African American pilots into the Fighter Pilot Program. Known as the Tuskegee Airmen, these men were forced to endure harassment, prejudice, and racial injustice until they were able to prove themselves in Italy in 1944. When the war was taking its toll on the allied forces in Europe, these black pilots prove themselves in battle and rose above (literally) to soar into history.
THE COLOR OF FRIENDSHIP
When Mahree Bok from South Africa (white) is chosen to spend a semester in Washington DC at Piper Dellums’ house (black family), neither have any idea of the color of each other’s skin. Assumptions about each other are questioned and the two girls from two different backgrounds discover true friendship has no specific color, which makes this one of the perfect movies to watch for Black History Month.
Have you seen all of these?! We haven’t but now we have a list to work off of! I’m excited to spark conversations about these topics with my girls!
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