What an amazing 8 weeks it has been! I feel that I have learned so much from this course, and feel like I will be able to take the information to better myself in my career.
My hope for working with children and families of diverse backgrounds is that I am able to welcome them and make them feel very comfortable in my center. I want ALL families to feel that I am here for them and understand them, but many international families or families with diverse backgrounds come with extra needs, and I want to be able to have them integrate into my center with little issue. I also hope to grow from working with families (ALL families). Every family has something that I can learn from, and I want to be open to learning from each of them.
For the early childhood field in general, I would like to see more national support for understanding diversity and multi culturalism education for teachers. It would be so amazing if there was a course, like required CPR or First Aid that teachers would be required to go through to work with families.
Finally, I cannot say thank you enough to all of my colleagues this time around in EDUC 6164, each of you have made me think with your comments and support. I appreciate the Walden community and structure. It really makes us interact with our personal and professional takes on so many topics.
I'd also like to thank Dr. Parrish for her support and knowledge. Her style of teaching has been the best I have experienced so far, and I appreciate the hard work she put in to making us each feel like we had a voice and opinion on everything.
Here's to the next 8 weeks!
Saturday, October 25, 2014
Saturday, October 18, 2014
Welcoming Families From Around the World
In this week's scenario I have been tasked with writing about how I would handle a family from a foreign country arriving at my child care center and I am responsible for welcoming them.
Because of an interest in Indian culture, I have chosen to imagine my family coming from India. With my history of working at a very multicultural center, I can tell you my first stop is always Google. While, as scholars, we all have to be wary of internet resources, there are still many legit sites that can help any person begin to navigate cultural responsiveness. Next, I would contact my local university and see if there is an Indian studies department, or any sort of program at the University that could help me. Third, I would seek out any families in my current program who are from India and see what kind of information they could give me. Fourth, I would speak directly with the family's new classroom teachers, and prepare them with the knowledge and information I have gathered.
I think the most important step in preparing myself to be culturally responsive would be to speak directly with the family. While speaking with scholars, googling, talking with other families is helpful, without getting to know this specific family I am potentially setting myself up to be even more culturally unprepared.
All five of these ways will help prepare me and my child care center to welcome a new family in to our family. By gathering bits of information, and preparing teachers we are able to welcome a child that is possibly right off of a plane, in a new country, where a new language is spoken. By speaking to the parents and gathering information from them, it will help to make that transition go as smoothly as possible.
Because of an interest in Indian culture, I have chosen to imagine my family coming from India. With my history of working at a very multicultural center, I can tell you my first stop is always Google. While, as scholars, we all have to be wary of internet resources, there are still many legit sites that can help any person begin to navigate cultural responsiveness. Next, I would contact my local university and see if there is an Indian studies department, or any sort of program at the University that could help me. Third, I would seek out any families in my current program who are from India and see what kind of information they could give me. Fourth, I would speak directly with the family's new classroom teachers, and prepare them with the knowledge and information I have gathered.
I think the most important step in preparing myself to be culturally responsive would be to speak directly with the family. While speaking with scholars, googling, talking with other families is helpful, without getting to know this specific family I am potentially setting myself up to be even more culturally unprepared.
All five of these ways will help prepare me and my child care center to welcome a new family in to our family. By gathering bits of information, and preparing teachers we are able to welcome a child that is possibly right off of a plane, in a new country, where a new language is spoken. By speaking to the parents and gathering information from them, it will help to make that transition go as smoothly as possible.
Saturday, October 11, 2014
The Personal Side of Bias, Prejudice, and Oppression
I've written about this before, but I will do so again to address the real side of bias, prejudice and oppression this week. A month into my new position at a child care center I experienced an extreme act of aggression, prejudice and hatred. On a fairly normal Sunday afternoon a man chose to come to my place of work and open fire in the parking lot of our building. He hurt several people, and killed two innocent people. This man specifically came to the building because of his bias towards the Jewish faith. The choices that he made hurt the entire community, and changed the lives of several families in an instant.
This man spewed hateful words as he committed this hate crime, and let his pure prejudice towards Jews be openly known.
This specific incident really opened my eyes to the topic of bias, prejudice and oppression, because before this I had not really experienced much in my lifetime. I became very aware of the hatred some people have for specific religions.
Many women have experienced some sort of bias by their 30s, I have chosen a field that really embraces women, and opens HUGE doors for them, so I have not had to deal with oppression related to my gender. However, that doesn't mean that I'm not aware of it. Many friends of mine have been turned down positions because of their gender--only to be passed up for male applicants who are less educated and less qualified. It is very hard for them, and me, to understand this inequality. With this specific case, in order to turn it into an opportunity for greater equity, I thin that there need to be stricter guidelines for equal opportunity employment. I see "EOE" on many job postings, but I wonder who monitors this?
This man spewed hateful words as he committed this hate crime, and let his pure prejudice towards Jews be openly known.
This specific incident really opened my eyes to the topic of bias, prejudice and oppression, because before this I had not really experienced much in my lifetime. I became very aware of the hatred some people have for specific religions.
Many women have experienced some sort of bias by their 30s, I have chosen a field that really embraces women, and opens HUGE doors for them, so I have not had to deal with oppression related to my gender. However, that doesn't mean that I'm not aware of it. Many friends of mine have been turned down positions because of their gender--only to be passed up for male applicants who are less educated and less qualified. It is very hard for them, and me, to understand this inequality. With this specific case, in order to turn it into an opportunity for greater equity, I thin that there need to be stricter guidelines for equal opportunity employment. I see "EOE" on many job postings, but I wonder who monitors this?
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