Professional Hopes and Goals

As this course draws to ta close, I reflect on my hope and goals as I continue to work with children and families from diverse backgrounds. My fervent hope is that I continue to provide an environment where they can come and feel safe and with my knowledge give an unbiased voice of reasoning, a listening ear and a supporter of their needs. I am constantly reminded that in providing accurate, authentic information about the differences among children - beliefs, attitudes, values and customs - that one encounters in the classroom every day is important to the process of exploring diversity with children.

One of my goals is to expand our current library with books that are more diverse, that show different family lifestyles  people of different ethnicity, different religions. I have begun my research and I am awaiting for the final approval  I can't express how excited I am for this next chapter.

Thank you for your continued support, I greatly admire and respect everyone's opinion each week. I wish you the best in your continued studies at Walden. Continue to strive to be the beacon of hope, change in your community and nation. This course only goes to show that we can do more, there is work to be done in the field that we know has its challenges and greatest rewards.

Welcoming Families From Around the World

Every moment of every day, teachers' personalities, preferences, judgments, values, and abilities are on display. Our classrooms are filled with children who possess unique personalities and capabilities, children who may be quite different from ourselves in many ways. 
Our challenge in today's current education climate is "to see each student as a growing, dynamic, developing, stretching being-a fellow human creature-with specific needs and demands and hopes and desires and potentials" (Ayers, 1995, p. 2). 
When a child emigrates from one country to another, the parents usually seek a school that is deemed as being the right "fit" for their child's needs.When a child moves from Sao-Paulo, Brazil to Japan, there are ways that I can be culturally responsive to that child's needs.

Early educators can play a paramount role as young children move through fluid identities and start recognizing and navigating within and across spaces of cultural differences—e.g., between home cultures and the socially-dominant school culture. Being mindful that I must support my child and the others children need, in order to address the multiplicity of cultures present in  the classroom:

the children could sample how the holidays were implemented across cultures (Souto-Manning,2010). One teacher writes about her experience, "During my week, the first day we talked about who Santa was and what countries he visited. We talked about how holidays are typically a time for giving. In addition, we discussed Kwanzaa, Hanukkah, and the Chinese New Year. I recall one of the kids’ favorite parts of their experience that year was a parent coming in to help make ornaments with the class. That parent presented first-hand experience and shared stories while actively engaging the children."

Involving more parents and capitalizing on funds of knowledge. Funds of knowledge are cultural artifacts and knowledge present in households which underlie family practices, cultural resources that are important in familial networks.

Embodying the stance of an ethnographer, learning about the histories behind children’s cultural contexts and values.

Fostering and observing dialogues at varied times-sometimes it happens at circle time, during meals and snacks; sometimes with the entire class, or with a small group of children.

Challenging assumptions and start embracing and applying a true sense of diversity in the classroom. To put it very simply, for example, Christmas (often called winter holidays in the school context) takes place in the summer in Southern Hemisphere countries such as Brazil and Australia.

With these ways I would incorporate into my teaching, I hope that from learning about the cultural knowledge and practices a child experienced at home, it is integral to incorporate these way all year ling. From learning alongside with your students and their families will you be able to honor diversities. the more parents and families are involved the better, whether they come and read a book or simply talk about their cultural practices, it is important to always get as much involvement as possible because they have the first hand knowledge.

                                                      

References

Ayers, W. (1995). Introduction: Joining the ranks. In W. Ayers (Ed.), To become a teacher: Making a difference in children's lives (pp. 1-4). New York: Teachers College Press.Childhood Education, 87(5), 337-340. Retrieved from http://search.proquest.com/docview/875892825?accountid=14872

Souto-manning, M., & Mitchell, C. H. (2010). The role of action research in fostering culturally-responsive practices in a preschool classroom. Early Childhood Education Journal, 37(4), 269-277. doi:http://dx.doi.org/10.1007/s10643-009-0345-9

The Personal Side of Bias, Prejudice, and Oppression

I recently watched an episode of Grey's Anatomy where Dr. Bailey, one of the resident doctors had to deliver news to a patient that his cancer. Dr. Weber's new roommate, a racist old cancer patient named Gene, was steadfast against entering an assisted living facility. Gene, the cancer patient then pulled out a chess game and said "I'll play white and you'll play black because 'you know' ". Dr. Bailey happens to be a black Doctor. 





Equity is about fairness.  It represents a belief that there are some things which people should have, that there are basic needs that should be fulfilled. As I watched the show I immediately thought to myself, I can only imagine doctors who suffer prejudices everyday from people who judge them. But then, this possibly happens to every profession. We may see a woman CEO approaching the platform and we wonder if she is introducing the male guest speaker. Or the black doctor and we wonder, why isn't he a white man. These issues do exist in each professions.


Changes in the attitude of the society in terms of acceptance. The world is evolving  we need to evolve our thoughts, decisions, actions to go along with the evolution. Diversity is the making of a great nation, but minds not in the 21st century. 

Practicing Awareness of Microaggressions

From reading of articles and watching the media segment this week, I have learned about the meaning of microaggression. Honestly, this was the first time I even seen the word, apparently my Microsoft word as well doesn't even recognize it as one word but as two words micro aggression.

This week, I reflected over my past, present and future only to recognize that these really are everyday indignities that have the intent of being a compliment with no ill-intent. I witness them everyday and often they are towards me.

Just yesterday, I was out with my co-workers, and I complimented each on their style of dressing, "oh cute top", "oh nice shoes". My co-worker said to me, oh that color looks great on you, you know because you have dark skin. Now that I am aware of this term, I do not think my co-worker's intention was to raise an issue about my color, she thought she was making a compliment in return to the compliment I extended to here.

This weeks observations have changed my perception on the different types of discrimination, racial profiling and stereotyping. I have become more observant to everyday conversations around me, as i reflect on these everyday situation I am cognizant of the damaging effects that this can cause. Although microaggrssions occur often with no ill-intent, we must be aware of our own personal biases.

Perspectives on Diversity and Culture

An effective method to deepen my grasp of any topic is to listen to and then reflect on the ideas of others. This week, I was given the opportunity to  use this method and ask other people what they think about diversity and culture.

When i reached out to my co-worker Josh who resided in New York, to my mother who resides in Texas and to my manager who resides in Japan, the responses I received were similar to those being currently discussed in this course. The discussion on diversity, the responses on the different aspects of diversity included:

• Multiculturalism relating to communities containing multiple cultures
• Cultural diversity as it refers to having different cultures respecting each other's differences
• Political ideas

Overall they support the idea that diversity is valuable and it covers ethnicity, gender, religion, as well as other identifiable differences in lifestyles and background.

Their definitions of culture also resonated throughout some of the discussions we have in the course, including:

• shared belief, customs, arts
• a particular was of thinking, behaving, or working
• the characteristic features of everyday existence shared by people in a place

The overall consensus being that culture is a system of knowledge shared by a relatively large group of people.

Additional aspects of diversity excluded were social identities pertaining to vocations and avocations and stigmatized identities (Deaux, 2001). When I mentioned these other aspects of diversity, they eventually agreed that those were also aspects to diversity. The discussion on culture proved very exciting when I spoke on cultural discontinuity, both my mother and my co-worker shared their experiences, my manager understood the concept but wasn't readily able to identify any experiences. 

This discussion lead me to understand the importance of understanding the role of culture and diversity. The individuals included in the discussion shared their experiences and I was able to understand why their points of view differ from mine on certain aspects. It was a great learning experience,not my manager is asking that I share each week what I have learnt and I am very happy to share my learning experience with her.

References

Deaux, K. (2001). Social identity. Encyclopedia of women and gender, 1–2, 1–9. Retrieved from https://class.waldenu.edu/

My Family Culture

                   A major catastrophe has almost completely devastated the infrastructure of my country and as a surviving citizen I am evacuated to another country. Thankfully my immediate family is among the survivors of this catastrophic event. The only information I know is that my host country's culture is completely different from my own and I may have to stay there permanently. I am only allowed to take 3 small items with me, the three items that I hold dear are my family photos, my bible and my passport.
                  My family pictures are dear to me and hold a special place in my heart, although my immediate family would be with me it means not all my family would be there. It would give me a time to reflect on the happier and special moments captured on film throughout my lifetime. My photos are especially meaningful to me because I have lost family members and this allows me to remember them. 
                My Bible is very dear to me because of my faith, having that experience living in another culture that does not share the same religious beliefs as your own, you have three choices- to draw closer to what you believe in, find a new religion or loose your way. I value my faith and one of the physical items in my faith is the bible, so my bible would be my second option.
              Undoubtedly, because of this mass exodus we would be required to have some form of identification to enter into another country unless there was a special provision made between the governments. Even then I would still like to have some form of identification and my passport while it is a government issued id it always reminds me of the various places I have traveled to around the world.
             Admittedly, if I were told that upon arrival I can only keep one of these personal items, I would be able to part with my family photos and my passport. Firstly, my immediate family is there with me so once we are together that is the only thing that matters to me, family being together and we are safe and out of harms way second I would have arrived into the country so my passport would have effectively served its purpose.
             An insight I have gained from this experience is how difficult it is to choose just three important items to you, the truth is there are persons who have gone through this exact experience while some had some warning and were able to take items there were others unable to salvage anything after a catastrophe. 

When I think of research....

When I think of the very first week of this course to the eight week of this course I realized that a lot of work has been done in a relatively short period. Research involves a lot of work, notwithstanding that, I can now understand the different aspects that make a great research study. I now have a netter understanding on how to present and conduct a research situation and to present the facts pf the studies in a way to ensure that ethical procedures are followed and accuracy is achieved.



My ideas about the nature of doing research have changed by the different methods involved in creating a final study. I understand the importance of examining key factors in documents, where to read first and what to focus on. Importantly, not to be intimidated by the word "research".



With the aspect of planing, designing and conducting research in early childhood it is important to develop a research topic and to make steps on how to execute each step successfully. 



Some of the challenges that I encountered was developing a strong research question. I had a lot of trouble developing exactly what I wanted to find and how to properly explain that through the form of a question. It took a great deal of time and analyzing of the purpose of what I was trying to do in order for me to meet that challenge and properly manage it. As well as recognizing a valid hypothesis, but I eventually understood these challenges by continually reading over the terms.

To Early Childhood Professional, to researchers, to my fellow classmates I give three cheers for the hard work involved in this field. I have a better appreciation and respect for the work that is given in such a demanding and challenging field but in the end, very rewarding.