--- title: How To Talk to Your Kids About the Contributions of African American Women description: No need to wait for Harriet Tubman to appear of the $20 bill canonical: https://time.com/3882511/how-to-talk-to-your-kids-about-the-contributions-of-african-american-women/ author: Carey Wallace article:opinion: false article:content_tier: free article:published_time: 2015-05-18T14:47:59.000Z article:modified_time: 2026-04-13T08:57:02.205Z og:title: How To Talk to Your Kids About the Contributions of African American Women og:description: No need to wait for Harriet Tubman to appear of the $20 bill og:url: https://time.com/3882511/how-to-talk-to-your-kids-about-the-contributions-of-african-american-women/ og:site_name: TIME og:image: https://static.time.com/v3/assets/bltea6093859af6183b/blted2efbbe7c1d8a83/6987ef9706f2c15b8c338334/harriet-tubman-2.jpg?branch=production&width=3840&quality=75&auto=webp&crop=16:9 og:image:width: 1200 og:image:height: 675 og:image:alt: American abolitionist Harriet Tubman (1820 - 1913) escaped slavery and went on to lead the Underground Railroad. og:type: article twitter:card: summary_large_image twitter:title: How To Talk to Your Kids About the Contributions of African American Women twitter:description: No need to wait for Harriet Tubman to appear of the $20 bill twitter:image: https://static.time.com/v3/assets/bltea6093859af6183b/blted2efbbe7c1d8a83/6987ef9706f2c15b8c338334/harriet-tubman-2.jpg?branch=production&width=3840&quality=75&auto=webp&crop=16:9 ---  # How To Talk to Your Kids About the Contributions of African American Women  by [Carey Wallace](https://time.com/author/carey-wallace/)  ## Carey Wallace May 18, 2015 2:47 PM UTC  Harriet Tubman, the "Moses of her people." Hand-colored halftone reproduction of a 19th-century photograph. (North Wind Picture Archives via AP Images) Harriet Tubman, the "Moses of her people." Hand-colored halftone reproduction of a 19th-century photograph. (North Wind Picture Archives via AP Images)North Wind Picture Archives/AP  by [Carey Wallace](https://time.com/author/carey-wallace/)  ## Carey Wallace May 18, 2015 2:47 PM UTC Harriet Tubman recently [won a poll to get a woman](http://time.com/3856138/harriet-tubman-20-bill/) on the $20 bill. While the poll was unofficial, it has led to a lot of arguing over whether the idea has merit, not all of it predictable: some [conservatives have supported](http://spectator.org/articles/62746/put-harriet-tubman-20-bill) the plan and some [African American feminists](http://www.washingtonpost.com/posteverything/wp/2015/05/14/keep-harriet-tubman-and-all-women-off-the-20-bill/) have opposed it. The chances of Andrew Jackson being displaced are still unknown, but you don’t have to wait until a woman’s face crops up on your money to talk about her with your kids. Parents often tend to focus on the accomplishments of famous men, like Martin Luther King and Malcolm X, says Tiya Miles, professor of African American History at University of Michigan, and a MacArthur genius. And when we do get around to women, Miles says, we often miss just how much their skills, creativity, and thoughts affect history. So how can we help kids see the whole picture? _Elementary age kids_ often hear stories of figures like Harriet Tubman, who led enslaved people to freedom on the Underground Railroad, or Rosa Parks, whose refusal to give up her seat sparked the Montgomery bus boycott. Miles encourages her own elementary age kids to get curious about the brainpower those women must have had, with questions like, What kinds of skills must Harriet Tubman have had to help all those people escape? What skills did Rosa Parks use to fight for civil rights? _Middle school kids_ can start to think about the importance of vision. To work for freedom or rights, African American women had to “envision a completely different kind of future,” Miles says. That’s creative work, so poets like Jacqueline Woodson and Maya Angelou can show kids new visions, and help them form their own. Parents can encourage kids with questions like, What is a visionary? What change would you like to see? _High school students_ can do a deep dive into the history, to learn that Rosa Parks, for instance, didn’t just make one snap decision that swept her onto the national stage. She was a respected community leader who made a difficult choice to serve as a figurehead in the civil rights movement, and spent years of her life to build it. Then students can begin to apply those lessons in their own lives, says Miles, wrestling with questions like, “How have people tried to change the world for the better in the past? What does it take for change to happen? How can we turn a vision into something real?” [Subscribe here to TIME’s weekly parenting newsletter. It’s free!](http://time.com/t4parents) ```json [{"@context":"https://schema.org","@type":"NewsArticle","@id":"https://time.com/3882511/how-to-talk-to-your-kids-about-the-contributions-of-african-american-women/","mainEntityOfPage":{"@type":"WebPage","@id":"https://time.com/3882511/how-to-talk-to-your-kids-about-the-contributions-of-african-american-women/"},"headline":"How To Talk to Your Kids About the Contributions of African American Women","datePublished":"2015-05-18T14:47:59.000Z","dateModified":"2026-04-13T08:57:02.205Z","description":"No need to wait for Harriet Tubman to appear of the $20 bill","url":"https://time.com/3882511/how-to-talk-to-your-kids-about-the-contributions-of-african-american-women/","keywords":["Living","Parenting"],"thumbnailUrl":"https://static.time.com/v3/assets/bltea6093859af6183b/blted2efbbe7c1d8a83/6987ef9706f2c15b8c338334/harriet-tubman-2.jpg?branch=production&width=1200&quality=75&auto=webp&crop=1200:675&height=675","author":[{"@type":"Person","name":"Carey Wallace","jobTitle":null,"url":"https://time.com/author/carey-wallace/"}],"articleSection":"","image":[{"@type":"ImageObject","url":"https://static.time.com/v3/assets/bltea6093859af6183b/blted2efbbe7c1d8a83/6987ef9706f2c15b8c338334/harriet-tubman-2.jpg?branch=production&width=1200&quality=75&auto=webp&crop=1200:675&height=675","width":1200,"height":675,"headline":"American abolitionist Harriet Tubman (1820 - 1913) escaped slavery and went on to lead the Underground Railroad.","caption":"American abolitionist Harriet Tubman (1820 - 1913) escaped slavery and went on to lead the Underground Railroad.","creditText":"North Wind Picture Archives/AP","representativeOfPage":true}],"publisher":{"@type":"Organization","name":"Time","url":"https://time.com/","logo":{"@type":"ImageObject","url":"https://time.com/images/logo.png","width":528,"height":156},"foundingDate":"March 3, 1923","sameAs":["https://www.facebook.com/time","https://www.instagram.com/time/?hl=en","https://twitter.com/time","https://www.pinterest.com/timemagazine"]}},{"@context":"https://schema.org","@type":"BreadcrumbList","itemListElement":[{"@type":"ListItem","position":1,"item":{"@id":"/tag/time-section-living/","name":"Living"}},{"@type":"ListItem","position":2,"item":{"@id":"https://time.com/3882511/how-to-talk-to-your-kids-about-the-contributions-of-african-american-women/","name":"How To Talk to Your Kids About the Contributions of African American Women"}}]}] ```