Professional Hopes and Goals

As I work with children and families from diverse backgrounds I hope they always feel welcome in my classroom.  I hope they feel that we have good communication with each other and that working together we can do our best to help their children be successful.  One goal for myself and for the early childhood field would be to never let my own biases get in the way of being an effective, caring and responsible teacher.  I would also hope that all early childhood teachers would be aware and knowledgeable about diversity, equity and social justice.  Having this awareness and knowledge will make them better teachers. 

Thank you to all of my colleagues in this course.  This course has given us all the opportunity to share personal stories and I am thankful for your openness and willingness to share.  Reading stories and ideas containing examples of what we are learning about has helped me get a better understanding of the issues presented in this course.  Thanks for all of your help and good luck in the next course!

Welcoming Families From Around the World

My family’s country of origin is Romania.  I chose Romania because through World Vision my family actually sponsors a young boy from Romania.  Even though we sponsor this boy I actually do not know anything about Romania. 

The following are the five ways I would prepare to be culturally responsive towards this new family:

1.     Research – I would do research on Romania.  Where is it located, what language do they speak, what is the climate, favorite foods and information on the environment and economics.  I would start by using the website http://www.romania.org.

2.     Language – I would try and learn some common words in Romanian so I could help the child feel welcome.  There is actually a translator section on the Romania website where you can translate English words into Romanian.  http://www.romania.org/services/romanian-translations.php

3.     Food – I would learn about what kinds of snacks they like to have in Romania and hopefully bring some of those foods into the classroom.  I would hope this would make the child feel more at home and it would help the other children learn about the new student.  Familiar food always seems to be a comfort to me. 

4.     Include Materials – I would bring music and books into the classroom that relate to Romania.  This would help educate the other students about Romania and help the child feel at home and that his culture is represented in the classroom.

5.     Meet the Family – I would take a special time to meet the family prior to the child attending school and after the child has been in school for a week or two.  This would allow me the opportunity to learn about the family and see what their expectations are for their child’s school experience.  Meeting with them a couple weeks later would be a good chance to see how things are going and if they have any new questions or concerns. 

These steps would help me have a better understanding of Romania and the environment the child has been living in.  It would allow the other students in the class to feel like they have a better understanding of where the child is from and it would hopefully bring up similarities between the children.  I hope it would help the child feel welcome in the classroom and a part of our classroom team.  I hope the family would feel important to our program and feel comfortable enough to have open communication with us.  I hope these steps would create a good environment of acceptance, caring and belonging.    

The Personal Side of Bias, Prejudice and Oppression

Prejudice was really brought to light for me when I read the book “The Help” and then watched the movie.  It has been many years since I have watched the movie but it was heart wrenching to see how some white people treated African Americans.  I was not born during that time so actually reading about these experiences made it much more real.  In this book the prejudice and bias against African Americans diminished all equity.  The African Americans in this book were not treated fairly.

It was embarrassing and difficult to watch some of the ways African Americans were treated.  It was even more difficult to realize that these situations really happened in our country.  As I read the book and watched the movie it made me sad and angry to see woman being treated differently just because of the color of their skin.  The part that really got to me was at the end of the book when Aibileen had to leave her job and leave the child she had been taking care of everyday.  The little white girl was about three years old and she adored Aibileen.  She preferred Aibileen over her own mother and to watch Aibileen’s sadness when she had to say goodbye was depressing.  It was even more difficult to know that all of that sadness was caused because of another woman’s hatred. 

There are many things that would need to change in the environment to turn this situation into an opportunity for greater equity.  Thankfully there were a few people who were making good choices and helping to bring equity to the situation.  Throughout the book Skeeter was a white woman who started treating African American woman appropriately and in return created an opportunity for greater equity.  Celia was another white woman in the book that did not let society’s beliefs influence her own thinking of African American woman.  Celia showed equity to her maid and in return found a strong friendship.

It was great to see the bonds these two white woman made with African American in a time in history where these bonds were not suppose to be made.  They did not let the prejudice and bias of society influence their treatment of other people.  That is an attitude more people need to possess. 

Practicing Awareness of Microaggressions

This week I walked into a conversation concerning a husband and wife.  The husband is white and the wife is Asian.  As the other people were visiting about this couple one of the people said, “I wonder if she is a mail order bride.”  Even though the person they were talking about was not there to hear the comment it still made me feel very uncomfortable.  I just shook my head no and at that time exited the conversation.  I felt the comment was inappropriate and I did not want to continue to be a part of the conversation.   

Another example of a microaggression that I have observed before is when I have been out to dinner with a couple and the husband said to the wife “Are you really going to eat that?”  The wife was a little over weight and was going to eat a certain type of dessert.  The wife decided against eating the dessert when her husband made that comment.  It made me angry to hear him say this to his wife.  If I was his wife I would have then ate two desserts!

This week I realized that even if the person you are saying something about is not there to hear the remark it can still be offensive to the people who are there and hear the remark.  These experiences were a good reminder to remember to not judge other people and that your words greatly impact the people around you. 

Perspectives on Diversity and Culture

I chose to interview three people.  Two were family members and one was a coworker.

1.  58 year old woman

“Your culture is your lifestyle.”

“Diversity means different, change and different skills.”

2.  50 year old woman

“Your culture is your environment, the way you grew up.”

“Diversity means different.”

3.  36 year old male

“Culture is the attitudes, norms and customs of a segment of our society.”

“Diversity is a collection of varies cultures to make up a larger society.”

Derman-Sparks and Edwards (2010) said, “culture refers to how particular groups of people live” (p. 55).  The people I talked to agreed that culture was your lifestyle and the environment you lived in.  They also believed that culture related to a group of people.  When it came to diversity I found it interesting that the two women said diversity meant different.  When I was first asked about my concept of diversity the word different was the first thing to pop into my mind.

None of the people talked about social identities.  This isn’t necessarily surprising to me because prior to this class I would not have thought of social identities.  I now know the importance of social identities and see how social identities influence your individual diversity.  Also none of the people really dug into deep culture.  I believe you really have to put some thought into understanding your deep culture.  If culture is not something you really talk about or think about you are probably not going to reach understanding your deep culture.  

After thinking about the other people’s definitions it is important to me to have a deeper understanding of culture and diversity.  My own culture is not something I have really spent much time thinking about until now and I am still realizing new ideas.  I do believe that really understanding your own culture can help you be more open to the cultures of other people.  Recognizing your own social identities can help you better understand yourself and others.   

Reference

Derman-Sparks, L., & Edwards, J. O. (2010). Anti-bias education for young children and ourselves. Washington, DC: National Association for the Education of Young Children (NAEYC).

My Family Culture

There are not many items I would feel I would need to take with me.  As long as I had my family that would be all I needed.  If I had to choose three items the first one I would choose is my wedding ring.  I would take my wedding ring because it is an item that is with me everyday and represents the bond between my husband and I.  It represents our love and dedication to each other.  I would also take my beautiful cross necklace my husband bought me before we were married.  It is special because my husband gave it to me and it represents my faith in my savior.  The third item I would take with me is a small photo album that contains pictures of my children.  Pictures are items I truly do cherish and many times are not replaceable.     

In the end if I could only keep one item I would keep my wedding ring.  It is the only item out of the three that is with me everyday and was given to me on such a special day in my life.  After really thinking about this assignment, I feel that material items are really not that important to me.  Spending time with my family and creating memories is what is most important to me.  Having these strong relationships creates memories and you can always take memories with you no matter where you go.  If you don’t have relationships what do you really have in this world?

When I Think of Research . . .

I have gained many insights from taking this course.  “Research is about uncovering and enabling the emergence of new understandings, insights and knowledge” (Mac Naughton, Rolfe, & Siraj-Blatchford, 2010, p. 3).  Questions can be answered and new questions can arise from quality research.  I have learned that quality research is research that is reliable and valid.  I learned that when you conduct research it is important to look at the risk/benefit equation.  This refers to the greater the benefit to be gained from a piece of research; the more risks are acceptable (Mac Naughton et al., 2010).  I have also learned that consent to be a research participant is essential.  It was also interesting to me to look at the guidelines for quality online research.  The importance of the guidelines and checking my online resources will be something I will remember in the future. 

In regards to planning, designing and conducting research data triangulation was a new concept for me.  It was also a concept that I found beneficial to research.  “Data triangulation involves using different sources of information in order to increase the validity of a study” (Guion, Diehl, & McDonald, 2011, p. 1).  I also learned important information regarding interviewing children in a research study.  Spending time in their classroom and having informal conversations with children are important before you try and do any formal interviews.  “It is important to take advantage of informal opportunities to elicit responses from children in unplanned conversations as well as formal interviews” (Mac Naughton et al., 2010, p. 246).  The researcher also needs to give children multiple opportunities to express their thinking through formal and informal conversations.  “The researcher who wants to interview children effectively will structure those interviews to provide multiple opportunities for children to say what they know and what they think” (Mac Naughton et al., 2010, p. 246).

One of the challenges in this course was the terminology.  I felt like the understanding research charts were helpful to really focus on different terminology and start to understand the meaning of the different words.  This course was challenging to me because there was so much new information and information that was hard for me to really wrap my mind around and fully understand.  I have a lot more respect for researchers after this course.  In my opinion there is an unlimited amount of research that can be done in the early childhood field.  It must be acknowledged that history has shown that research benefits children (Mac Naughton et al., 2010). 

References

Guion, L., Diehl, D., & McDonald, D. (2011). Triangulation:  Establishing the validity of qualitative studies.  Retrieved from http://edis.ifas.ufl.edu/pdffiles/FY/FY39400.pdf.

                                  

Mac Naughton, G., Rolfe, S.A., & Siraj-Blatchford, I. (2010). Doing early childhood research: International perspectives on theory and practice (2nd ed.). New York, NY: McGraw-Hill.