Teach preschool children about African-American inventors by showing pictures and videos. Discuss how important these inventions are in everyday life. Afterwards, the children can create a collage on the bulletin board from magazine and newspaper images of inventions designed by African-Americans. Some of the African-American inventions that will be interesting to children are James S. Adams' airplane propeller, C. B. Scott's street sweeper, Harry C. Hopkins' hearing aid, Benjamin Banneker's clock and J. L. Love's pencil sharpener.
Discrimination can be a hard concept for preschool children to comprehend. Use snack time to demonstrate the consequences of discrimination. Tell your students that only the children with the color green in their clothing will receive a snack. The other children without the color green in their clothing must sit on the floor during snack time. Listen to the students' comments regarding the new snack-time rules, such as "That is not fair!" Then explain that they have just experienced discrimination and that everyone will now receive a snack.
Trace a man's shoe on a white blank piece of paper. Make enough copies to hand out to the class. Have the preschoolers create a bare footprint of their individual foot on the copy of the man's shoe. Next, the children will color the picture. On each page write Martin Luther King Jr.'s quote, "Walk in His Footsteps and Change the World." Then ask the children to tell you how they would change the world. Finally, place all the children's pictures together to create a book.
Discuss the traffic light, an invention created by Garret Morgan. Show variations of the traffic light over the years. Then have the students play the game "Red Light. Green Light," in which one student stands up with his back toward the class holding red, yellow and green sheets of paper. When the child holds up the green paper, the class walks fast; the class walks slowly when the child holds up the yellow paper; and when the red paper is held up, the entire class stops walking. Display the colored pieces of paper in any order.