Gracie Staynes leads a Supernow class.
Supernow
With Pride Month underway, children’s media has been finding ways to celebrate all month long. From the Blues Clues Pride Parade to Sesame’s Street’s rainbow muppet message of solidarity, kid-focused brands have been infusing pride into their programming. Even Lego got in on the Pride Month celebration with their Everyone is Awesome rainbow-themed set.
For Supernow, relatively-newcomers to the children’s media scene, celebrating pride month has presented an opportunity to double-down on their mission of inclusivity. Supernow hosts live, interactive classes for kids ages 4-10, and have been focused on putting out special pride-themed content in June. Their pride classes, hosted by magical characters including the queen of rainbows and joy, Queen Dee, and drag queen Gracie Staynes, explore radical expression, inclusivity, and diversity.
In one of the pride classes, Staynes focused on helping students build self-esteem and embrace what makes us each unique. In another class, Queen Dee led a joyful celebration of students’ differences, focusing on color. Kids explored differences of color, embraced all shades of skin, and gained greater appreciation for the rainbow. The last pride-focused show will be on June 22 at 1 PM ET and is called “Color Wars.”
For Supernow’s co-founders, Rachel Breitenwischer and Lyndsey Wheeler, it’s always been important to create a place where all kids feel like they belong. Supernow classes aim to be an environment where all kids and families can feel not only welcomed, but celebrated. When kids join Supernow shows, Breitenwischer and Wheeler want them to come away with a sense of joy, compassion, and acceptance.
“The DNA of this company has been built on inclusivity, radical, self-acceptance, and self expression,” said Wheeler. “We talk about letting your authentic flag fly all the time. Many of our teachers are LGBTQ+ and feel very passionately about accepting their authentic selves, and we want to create an environment for that, for teachers and students.”
While Pride Month provided motivation for thinking deeply about how to celebrate the LGBTQ+ community, Breitenwischer and Wheeler stress that the focus on pride won’t stop after June. Supernow’s teachers are primarily performers, from Broadway actors to musicians, all of whom are invited to develop their own creative approaches to teaching inclusion. With a focus on teaching young kids, much of Supernow’s pride-themed shows aim to teach kids about acceptance and expression. Even in shows that are not explicitly focused on pride, students are encouraged to embrace who they are and to celebrate what makes themselves— and others— unique.
“One of the things that we embrace with our characters is that they’re all very quirky. We want our characters to sort of have unique attributes or personality traits, that might even be considered traditionally odd or weird, because we want to make it clear to the kids that it’s okay to not be the norm,” said Wheeler.
Classes at Supernow are offered on a wide variety of topics, from Hamilton sing-alongs and theater games to science explorations. No matter the content of the class, the focus is on helping students learn social and emotional skills while connecting with other kids around the world to form a community based on acceptance.
“We’re creating a community of kids around the world,” shared Breitenwischer. “We had one class with a teacher from Prague and kids in Venezuela, India, London, New York and Texas. These kids normally would not have exposure to that sort of global community, but they’re going to be growing up in a very global world. We allow kids to have a social learning experience with kids from beyond their backyards.”
