Communities of Practice

Both local and state organization in Early Childhood Education are important CoPs within our field. I myself find that I am part of several communities of practice. I am part of my companies community of practice among the other directors in my corporate district. This is a group of individuals who hold the same position at other area schools, allowing for a sounding board with other questions.

Other local CoPs are the local Director's Network through our local Child Care Council, local resource agency; I have attended several meetings discussing important changes to our licensing requirements for the state. Another CoP that I have become a part of in the past is NAEYC, I am a member, along with our state and local chapters. Each of these communities offers assistance and unlimited resources of support.

Although, I am very happy in my current role, I do not see myself as a director of a school for the rest of my career. I will continue to look for positions within the state agencies, and local resource organizations. There are limited roles available in Accreditation organizations, I would like to become an event organizer for the training events held nationwide. My true passion is in curriculum and training the adults who teach our young children. Another opportunity that I may explore in the future is with our local college communities, teaching young adults who are emerging into the field.
These roles require more time within the field to understand the importance of training others.

Word it Out!!! PLAY

Play. One of the best times as a child is now known as one of the most important times during a child's academic schooling.

Wordle It Out!

Wordle it Out! Issues and trends in Early Childhood Education. We must all be advocates for our young students and their families. These are the issues I find most working in the field: poverty, hunger, bias, collaboration, worthy wages, and teacher prepartion/career ladders.

Our Future in Early Childhood

As I look ahead, eight weeks from today...we will be accomplishing no minor feat. A Masters in Early Childhood, only those who work in the field and understand the importance of education pursue this degree. Most of the people I have met outside our field, think it odd I love working in the environment I do. The fast paced and sometimes stressful responsibility of caring and educating upwards of 65 young child (in our small center).

I am fortunate to work with a strong group of women, managing my sister schools and ensuring I understand the company policies. What I bring to the table is the knowledge and excitement gained throughout this program.

Three years ago, I began this program under a different specialty, I thought I would be a teacher. After 18 months of courses, I decided I wanted to be an educator and administrator. I am encouraged by our professors and others within the field, hoping to one day educate other adults to guide young children.

I look forward to hearing all of your thoughts and feelings about early childhood education over the next eight weeks. I hope you enjoy my thoughts, as well.

Family Child Care Home Center

A Family Child Care Home is not far from what I have always dreamed. I had high hopes of opening my own at one point. My focus is now on opening my own Child Care Center, out of home. While thinking back on my center and how I would change it, many ideas come to mind. 

We live in a fairly rural area I would include many aspects of our overall culture. Agricultural is common among families, home gardens and farms are not unfamiliar. A large portion of our outdoor education would revolve around this aspect of people's lives and educating young children how to properly care for crops. In addition I would make sure there were books, music, dolls, dramatic play props, puzzles, drawing materials, blocks, and wall hangings that express different cultures. 

Anti-Bias education would be a priority of mine, as this is a reflection of my teaching style and my home. Some of the strategies I would use would be:

Encouraging children to express their emotions and work out conflicts

Support discussion and activities about people's attributes

Help children try ALL activities

Incorporate children's family traditions

Partner with my families to ensure acceptance

These strategies and a loving environment would allow children to thrive and learn in a judgment free space. 

THANK YOU!

I want to take a moment to thank each and every one of you for your time and effort throughout this course. This last year has been a whirlwind for me and these course have helped me steady each week. Your experiences and comments have brought to light new ideas and insights to consider during my professional career. I wish the best for each one of your and I hope to hear from you soon.

Team Development

This week while discussing team development and working in groups I started to reminsce about my time as a group leader for an overnight summer camp. This was an interesting group of women (it was a girl scout camp) working together to provide fun experiences for girls 6 to 16 years old. This group of co-workers and myself began working in 2004. We lost some members the summer of 2005 but that group ended up being one of the best groups I have ever had the pleasure of being a participant.

We went through all the stages of team development and became and extremely productive group. After two summers and living together our training week turned into a week of fun and preparing, not learning new skills or teaching others. This group was particularly difficult to leave but we handled the stage of adjourning through communication during the year and reunions throughout the years. As graduate students the adjourning stage is graduation and commencement. This is how we come together and celebrate the success of our class.

Adjourning allows a team to reflect on the good and the bad.

Nonviolent Communication and the 3R's

In my professional career I am currently dealing with staffing problems. Conflicts between staff members and different programs. In my recent learning I have found several strategies to help me through these conflicts.
The first strategy that would help is connecting with other's needs and values. This will allow me to understand where my staff members are coming from and how to negotiate an understanding. Another strategy is about emphasizing compassion. This will motivate better than instilling fear, guilt or shame in a situation.
In my situation, the best thing is to look at the situation from their view and see how I can explain what needs to happen for the greater good.

Nonverbal Communication and Television

For this experience I chose to record and watch an episode of WWE Divas. My fiance normally watches the show and I am doing work so I never pay attention. After I recorded the show on Sunday evening, I watched it on Monday on mute. This was an interesting experience as I found myself trying to understand the basis of the "real life" reality show. It was difficult to understand the entire story. Especially because this is apparently reality television and I do not normally watch these shows. You can tell there is tension between some characters and that they are resistant of a new comer but not any real detail about their interactions.
One thing I learned from my horribly wrong assumptions is that it is not a good idea to pass judgement on a situation you no nothing about because it will come back full circle and teach you the lesson. I believe if I had been a regular viewer of the show it may have made more sense on why certain people were fighting but other than that I was a bit lost.
Just remember never assume you understand the situation without all sides of the story. You may be horribly mistaken. 

Communication Role Models

Working in the non-profit organization that I work within, I encounter many new faces and role models throughout my career. One of my more prevalent role models is my executive director, Pedro. I am fortunate that he understand the early childhood education field and supports us, but on top of that he is an excellent communicator. During the last month I have learn many new techniques, including how to receive information without asking a direct question. He is dedicated and articulate when speaking with others, showing me how to actively listen throughout a full conversation and take something away from the process.

I strive to hold that calm and collected method of communication with colleagues, employees and other agencies. Hoping to set a good example for my staff and colleagues on how communication can achieve goals you set for a program.

Communicating Differently?

The idea of culture, diversity, education and perception are all relatively “old” concepts for me as a educator. However, the in-depth look into each portion has shown me new light. I find myself constantly aware of who I am speaking with, but not because of their race, gender, religion, sexual orientation, or political affiliation. It’s because we speak about our differences and I am aware of how my words can hurt others without even thinking about it.

I find that I do not speak different with people of different cultures but I may be more inquisitive during communication with people of different cultures. For the last two weeks I have been focused on how I communicate with others and I noticed with the majority of older people I am using polite phrases more often. I am constantly aware that I do not want to disrespect anyone that is older than myself or that has more experience within my field or company.

Strategies to communicate more effectively are easy enough to come by. I believe that every person can work on themselves and how they communicate. I find that I need to be a more active listening and participant in communicating with colleagues within my association. Another strategy that I will use is to develop appropriate knowledge. I will spend time learning of different cultures and learning others communication codes. The third strategy I would use would be to develop motivation. “A competent communication wants to learn and improve.” 

Assumptions in Communication

The show I chose to view was Rookie Blue. I watched an episode a couple years ago when it first came on the air but I have not viewed one since.

I chose to view this past week’s episode. I recorded on the DVR and replayed without sound. I must say the communication used in this episode was more non-verbal than direct verbal communications. After viewing this episode I realized how much we as educators and people rely on non-verbal communication throughout our lives. There are a couple police officers who I believe to be in relationships because of their body language. There are a couple that are friends and a couple that do not like each other. There are two male police officers who seems to be having a tension between them.

The officer with the tension between him and other fellow officer seems to be having a rough time with addiction. He is seen speaking with a dealer (based on the materials this actor was given). He seems upset and anxious with his tense shoulders and jumpy behavior.

After I viewed the show with sound, I was incorrect on the relationship between a detective and one of the officers. It seems from their conversation they are no longer a couple. Although non-verbally the sexual tension is still their between them.

If you were to watch a show you knew well the assumption from non-verbal may have been much closer because you would know the relationships between the characters and the plot as the storyline grows.

My experience and insight from this exercise is that we as humans need to be more careful about how we make assumptions of situations without knowing all of the facts. This is especially helpful in early childhood education while dealing with different families with many different cultures.  

Communication with Others

One person in my life who can communicate effectively is my boss. He is the executive director at the community center and is able to hold a full conversation with anyone that walks into the building. He communicates with everyone effectively because he observes the situation before beginning to communicate. He uses body language and verbal communication to form a cultural context for the discussion. 

In my short time working with him I have already began to mirror some of his habits for communication. For example, I am willing to be flexible with my behaviors to ensure my communicator is comfortable in the nature of the communication. This helps when speaking with staff and families.  

Our Hopes

When thinking about my hopes, I am faced with a struggle. I am very fortunate to truly enjoy working for the company I work with and to enjoy my co-workers presence. I hope that in my career working with children and families from diverse communities I am able to offer some support and education to parents and guardians about the importance of school readiness and provide the best rated childcare center in the capital district within the year.
One goal that I have set for myself is to include training for my staff members on issues of diversity, equity and social justice. This is to ensure a cultural  competent staff and accepting atmosphere. This goal is set on a one year plan.
I wanted to thank each of my colleagues throughout this course and program. We are fortunate to work and study in a field that works hard and strives to provide quality education for young children. Allowing our communities to strengthen through our work. Great job everyone!

Family Origin and Welcoming Different Family origins

Looking as a childcare provider/school worker a new family has arrived in the office. They came over from Pakistan.

The first thing I would do when learning of the new immigrant family would be to research their home country and city. Learning about the language and traditions of their country. I would also spend time learning about the climate, agriculture, and sports/music. The second thing I would do would be to learn a few simple phrases in their primary language to show them respect to their culture. I would try to line up a translator to ensure communication between myself and the family to ensure proper care for their child. I would try to prepare a welcome packet for the family of all important information so they have it in writing as well as take the time to explain the policies of the center. The last thing I would do would be to set up a meeting with the child's teacher and all over staff to ensure a cultural responsive atmosphere upon the child's arrival.

I would hope that this preparation would allow for the teachers to learn more about the family they will be working with and for the family to feel welcome and invited into the early learning community. Coming to a new country must be a bit scary and having a welcome environment for their children would put them at ease to immerse themselves into the community.

Microagressions

In my time as an educator I have been faced with many different cultures and situations. This week being a short week, I had less students and less things were happening. However, one major microagression that I saw was with two students. After the beginning of our program they spent some time arguing over some toy but as the fight continued name calling began. At this time one of the students was sent in to see me regarding what they said. I was a little confused, as an administrator I don't normally deal with name calling situations. This is when I found out the student called another student "White Girl." Now this other student is lighter skin but not white. The little boy didn't understand what he said wrong, he is 7. 

I was a little hurt by the comment, as he used the term as a form of negative name calling. He obviously heard someone say it but he didn't understand what he said wrong. 

My observations within programs is that parents perceive the program and staff in a certain way. Stereotyping their behaviors and actions. Most parents will walk into a situation in attack mode to counter any prejudice they perceive. 

My Family Culture

The challenge of uprooting your life and being evacuated to another country with a completely different culture is a difficult task to swallow. What's even harder is choosing just three items to take with your family? Just three small items to describe your culture.

For my family there is an important point to make, besides the human members we have three pets. These are included in my family, not the items we would take. I think this is an important point to make because these animals are not just pets but family. Lucky (dog), Thomas (cat), and Izzy (cat) are all additional members with my fiance and daughter.

For our family, one of our photo books would need to come with us. This would be needed because it holds precious family moments and photos of our departed dog, Cinnamon. The second small item we would take would be one of our laptops. We hold most of our photos on the laptop and even in third world countries you can find locations that would allow for the use of computers. Our laptop/tablet would also allow for the communication between other family member through video (when accessible). The third item is more difficult to come up with, there is just so much that we use on a regular basis that describes our culture as a family. But it would probably be a kindle/some books for our daughter. We are both avid readers and love to read to our daughter. Without that, I think our lives would be disrupted.

Our photos are important because they show our families history. This is important to me because each family holds different experiences in a different light. Our adventures and big moments are the most important to us, this is shown through our photo books. COmmunication between our extended families is very important to our small family. I come from a loud Italian American family that is connected through many generations, where my fiance has a very large extended family of first cousins and aunts/uncles. Keeping in touch is important. Literature is important to us because it shows how important learning is to us as a family.

If someone told me I could not keep all the items upon arrival I would be very upset and frustrated. Unable to live where I wanted with my family and being kept from our extended family in a culture unlike our current one would probably break my spirit if I was told I was unable to keep what little I had left.

This exercise taught me that there is a lot that we could live without but the few items that mean the most I would not part with, but the most of all is keeping us all together.

building research competencies throughout my career

This course has opened my eyes to another level of early childhood education/studies. The methods of conducting research have expanded in my eyes and opened new career paths for the future, as well. I enjoyed learning about triangulation and the methods used during qualitative research. As a student, I am familiar with research but until this course we never discuss multiple methods data collection.

 After this course, I realized how in-depth the planning and designing of research studies can be to complete a competent study. Each step is important to the overall completion of the study, itself, and the contribution to the early childhood field of study.

The one challenge that I met well learning about research methods, was the amount of time needed to conduct these studies. I believe that for a study to be valid, the research must be given the time to complete all aspects without any time constraint to pressure their results.

The final question to answer would be how my perception of the field changed throughout this course. I would not say my perception changed about the early childhood field. However, my eyes are open to the research that still needs to be completed and the advancements that need to be made within the field to better serve the children we educate and their families.

It has been a great eight weeks working with my fellow colleagues and learning about their work experiences.

Early Childhood Australia

I chose to look into the Early Childhood Australia webpage. Below I have listed to link and basic information provide by Dr. Myers. 

Early Childhood Australia: This is the Australian equivalent to the U.S. based NAEYC. You can access several links to early childhood research from the menu on the left side of the home page.
http://www.earlychildhoodaustralia.org.au/

Some of the current research topics being explore "down under" are school readiness, baby sleeping, child health and childhood obesity, and the Early Learning Years Framework. These resource themes are available on the sidebar on their homepage. 

I was wondering around the webpage when I noticed their code of ethics portion after exploring I was excited to see a literature review within this section. Ethics is very important for me as an educator and student.  

I enjoyed reading a bit about the Every Child magazine and the guidelines for authors. 

What is Equity?

For my research project simulation I will be researching how equity effects early childhood education and the educators who work in the field. From a professional stand point this research effects me as I review staff requirements and pay rates. Personally, I feel early childhood educators need to be given more respect and offered more training within  the field. Although my overall focus is equity in the field of early childhood education the subtropics will be focused around educator requirements and standards of learning for children. This is a very broad beginning but I think with a little refining and suggestions for directions from colleagues this topic can be researched in depth.