Humanizing Classrooms, Adding “Good Friction”
Humanizing History Visuals
Welcome to Humanizing History™! Every month, we feature a central theme. Each week, we dive into different areas of focus.
This month’s theme: Humanizing Classrooms, A Guide to Cultivating Inclusion and Belonging
This week’s focus: Identity Literacy, or helpful frameworks to expand how we approach identity
Today’s edition of Humanizing History™ is about 1200 words, an estimated 4½-minute read.
The Why for This Week’s Topic
This month, we’ve chosen the theme “Humanizing Classrooms, A Guide To Cultivating Inclusion and Belonging” to honor teachers and the essential work of education.
In a recent newsletter, “Humanizing Classrooms, Where the Work Begins,” we shared ideas for initiating inclusive practices. We discussed the importance of first examining our own lenses and identifying both strengths and areas for growth. We also highlighted the power of storytelling and the importance of recognizing our personal values, along with a prompt designed to inspire deep reflection.
Last week, in our newsletter, “Our What, Why, and How,” we explored a helpful framework to support the creation of humanizing classrooms, such as asking: What is inclusion? Why does it matter? How can we cultivate it?
Today, we’re expanding on the “How,” by examining the concept of adding “Good Friction.”
As a quick reminder, what we are suggesting are some ways to do this work, not the only way.
It's important that we step into action that feels authentic to us, so choose what works for you — your community, your context, your needs, your goals and values.
Introduction to Adding “Friction”
The idea of adding “friction” to a thought process or system to create change is a concept regularly posed by social psychologist Dr. Jennifer Eberhardt. For decades, Dr. Eberhardt has used neuroscientific tools like fMRI scans to produce groundbreaking research that demonstrates the connections between race, visual perception, and implicit bias.
For example, her 2005 paper “Imaging Race,” was a pioneering effort that bridged social psychology with neuroscience, revealing connections between social and biological processes.
In her 2019 book, Biased: Uncovering The Hidden Prejudices That Shape What We See, Think, and Do, Dr. Eberhardt proposes that “adding friction” — such as an informal prompt or a more formal tool that requires people to pause, reflect and (re)assess — is a way to mitigate implicit bias.
To illustrate this concept, Dr. Eberhardt discusses the app, Nextdoor, “an online social networking service that serves as a sort of giant chat room for individual neighborhoods,” with tens of millions of active weekly users.
According to Dr. Eberhart, Nextdoor was facing criticism for the racial profiling occurring in its “crime and safety” category: “There were too many posts with racist overtones, messages that labeled Black people and Latinos ‘suspicious’ for walking down a street, sitting in a car, talking on a cell phone, knocking on a door.”
Dr. Eberhardt noted the irony around adding “friction” to technology: “Speed is the holy grail of technology. Most tech products are created with the aim of reducing friction and guiding us through a process rapidly and intuitively. But the very thing that makes technology so convenient also makes it perilous where race and safety are concerned. The goal is to create an online experience for users that’s easy, quick, and fluid, allowing them to express themselves instantly. Yet these are exactly the kinds of conditions that lead us to rely on subconscious bias.”
This is where “Adding Friction” comes in. To curb racial profiling, Dr. Eberhardt suggested that the app aim to slow people down.
To address the issue of racial profiling, Dr. Eberhardt proposed adding “friction” by introducing a prompt that required users to describe specific actions that led them to believe a person was “suspicious,” rather than relying solely on appearance. Users were also asked to provide detailed descriptions, including clothing, to avoid vague phrases that could unfairly target innocent individuals. Additionally, a note was included stating that “racial profiling” was “expressly prohibited.”
After adding friction to the process, Nextdoor self-reported a 75 percent decrease in racial profiling incidents.
While such data should be analyzed with diligence, it suggests that adding intentional pauses — even in a tech space designed for speedy, intuitive use — encourages users to reflect, pause, and reassess. This, in turn, may help curb behaviors that, if left unchecked, could easily replicate and reinforce bias.
“Good Friction” in Education
What does this have to do with education? In short, possibly everything.
Educators make countless decisions every day — it's estimated that teachers make at least 1,500 decisions a day! Even if working with inherited standards or curricula, if left unchecked, some of these decisions may unintentionally reinforce limited narratives or even moments of harm. However, with intention, we can also create frameworks that better affirm our students and promote experiences rooted in our values.
Since 1500 decisions is a staggering number, let’s break it down. Most of these decisions likely fall within curriculum design or the creation of community. When we think about what we teach and how we cultivate a classroom environment, where can we add “Good Friction” to ensure that our choices foster inclusion and create humanizing, empowering spaces for all students?
Curricular Examples of “Good Friction”
Questions to Expand Our Social Studies & STEAM Curricular Content
Social Studies or the humanities is an obvious place to begin adding “Good Friction” to our curriculum.
By incorporating reflective questions like: Whose point of view is centered? Which perspectives are missing? Am I telling an expansive and nuanced story? — we can start to assess and reframe our content. This process can encourage us to explore untapped resources, reconsider historical timelines, and recognize gaps in our understanding, all of which may help build a more inclusive and comprehensive curriculum.
For instance, when we ask, “When does U.S. history begin?” we prompt students to consider multiple viewpoints. Does it start with the arrival of Europeans hundreds of years ago? Does it begin with the arrival of Indigenous Peoples thousands — likely tens of thousands — of years ago? By shifting the timeline, we encourage students to recognize that history is shaped by who is telling the story, and whose voices are included — or excluded.
When assessing curricular content, it’s also crucial to ask where our resources are coming from and whether they reflect diverse perspectives, histories, and voices — especially those that are often marginalized or overlooked. Are we exploring lesser-tapped resources, such as local community voices or non-traditional media? Additionally, we may consider if there’s something we might be missing or unaware of, making a conscious effort to engage in further learning — a quest to understand the things we know we don’t know, and perhaps, the things we don’t even know that we don’t know.
An Example of a Story, “Hidden in Plain Sight”
One example of “Good Friction” in history can be found in the story of the Statue of Liberty.
Nearly every student in a U.S. classroom will encounter an image of the Statue of Liberty at some point. Often, these images are accompanied by stories of Ellis Island, with the statue serving as a symbol of “freedom” for newly arrived immigrants and visitors. However, what’s not often taught is the origin of the Statue of Liberty. Sources like the National Park Service, declare that the Statue of Liberty was conceptualized by Edouard de Laboulaye (and designed by Frédéric Auguste Bartholdi) to honor the emancipation of slavery. Although the original design was altered, a compromise was made: the statue’s current form includes broken chains at Lady Liberty’s feet, which are not visible from ground level. Dr. Joy Degruy has spoken about this history on numerous occasions, referring to the Statue of Liberty as an example of history “hidden in plain sight.” This story highlights the power of reexamining widely known symbols and the importance of uncovering the deeper, often overlooked meanings behind them.
STEAM content is a part of the human story as well. For ideas on how to link human stories to fields like science and technology, view some of our Humanizing History STEAM content here.
Next week, we’ll explore more about the “How” in regard to cultivating community.
Theme: