Get Out is a film known for being about race, the topic is unavoidable.

When I'm teaching or working with students, my job is to help students unpack the conversations around uncomfortable topics, such as race, and to also help them learn how to productively have these conversations - not to tell them what to think.

This means students need a safe space to reflect on their identities, and they need a vocabulary and discussion norms to help them engage in uncomfortable but real conversations.

This means, if you were to show this film (Get Out) or any of its parts in a classroom -- first, you should do some pre-viewing (as in before viewing) questions and activities.

Resources for Laying the Groundwork for Creating Safe Spaces and Community in the Classroom for Critical Conversations:

• Courageous Conversations is where my journey began with how to facilitate conversations in the classroom. There's a book, and they offer training and more, too!
• Learning for Justice has many articles about discussing racism on their website too. They even offer a free guide called "Let's Talk! Facilitating Critical Conversations with Students".
  • They also have a 24 page guide for discussing race and other hard topics with students
    • Page 7 gives students very concrete things to do during discussion in order to reflect, maintain composure, and participate respectfully
    • Page 19 gives a good overview of strategies you can offer to students in the moment when they feel certain, specific emotions (pain/suffering/anger, blame, guilt, shame, confusion, or denial)
• All of the resources above will help you understand how to lay a foundation for creating a safe community and conversation space for critical conversations, but at a high level you'll essentially be introducing conversation and discussion norms. This sheet of “Ground Rules” (aka discussion norms) is from a church in NY, but it’s consistent with what has not only been taught to me, but also what I’ve taught and used with students, too.

Why it's important to consider your own identity and self reflect:

Perhaps even more importantly, though, you should reflect on your own identity and comfort level too. The Learning for Justice guide offers detailed recommendations on how to do this, but in my experience, as a mixed race educator that's white passing, and that's taught in predominantly white school settings - I think it's important to be mindful of your role as the leader in the room, and each of your class section's personalities and demographics.

In a predominantly white classroom, sometimes it feels like being voyeurs into trauma whether we're watching Get Out or Moonlight, or reading Homegoing.

When I was collaborating with colleagues to teach a text by a Japanese American author, When the Emperor Was Divine by Julie Otsuka -- as the only Asian American teacher in the group, I was sometimes hurt and offended by my well intentioned colleagues that just didn't know the microaggressions that could come so easily when it came to teaching and discussing a book that couldn't avoid the nature of one's racial identity. And in turn, when I taught the text with students, the connections and opportunities created for my Asian American students to explore their own identities was quite meaningful. But in classes with a smaller minority of Asian American students, sometimes it could feel like I was in a museum display and so was the text, and students were talking about parts of the Asian American experience as if studying people under a microscope. It could be quite alienating if I wasn't thoughtful about the lessons and discussions.

When watching or reading with others that are practiced in courageous conversations and that are eager and empathic viewers and readers, the experience can be quite fulfilling.

If the majority of the classroom doesn't closely identify with the experience of a film's protagonist - it's an opportunity to experience great empathy. But it can also be an opportunity to introduce such extreme discomfort that creates a greater distance between lived experiences.

I love Get Out not just for the thematic discussions it can offer, but I also love the opportunities it creates to discuss horror, suspense, genre blending, …the start of an obsession with Jordan Peele's work…, and more!

Film and teaching with movies can also be a more approachable or accessible way in to certain topics and skills. Sometimes we can talk about or focus on the more stylistic or technical aspects of a work, and then we find ourselves in conversation about race, or relationships, or other deep themes.

Anyways, those are just some key points to consider before teaching or showing parts of a film like Get Out in a classroom. But if that feels like too big of a lift… I've got other movies you can teach with! Jordan Peele's, Us, is more about social class ;)