Start Seeing Diversity Video" Blog: Gender, Gender Identity, and Sexual Orientation

Your response to those who believe that early childhood centers should avoid the inclusion of books depicting gay or lesbian individuals such as same-sex partnered families.

My response to this would be, we can’t discriminate against anyone. We have children who come from several backgrounds. All of our children are treated with the same level of respect and one type of family does not hold more value than another.

•How you would respond to a parent/family member who informed you they did not want anyone who is perceived (or self-reported) homosexual or transgender to be caring for, educating, and/or interacting with their child.

My response once again would be we don’t discriminate against anyone. A person sexual preference has no bearing on our decision to allow them to work in our facility. If they are qualified based on standard procedures their personal life is not an issue. I would give them the option to find a facility that can provide them with what they need.

Final Blog Assignment

Over the past few weeks I have had the opportunity to learn about the international early childhood field. There is so much information about what goes on in other countries. The first consequence I saw from my experiences is the limited ability to try and remain or even develop contact with other professionals internationally. Second consequence would be understanding the differences in the way our educational systems are designed and ran. The third consequence would be comparing what we do to what someone else does and thinking this may work best for us without fully understanding why it’s being done that way. We have to ensure that if something needs to be changed or done a certain way, it is done so based on the needs of the children and their families.

My goal is to continue to work on developing contact with an international contact. I believe this is a great opportunity that will help my growth and development as a professional in the early childhood field.

Getting to Know Your International Contacts—Part 3 week 7

The Pod cast talks about equity and excellence within the early childhood field and what professionals can do to enhance the field. Dr. Vasquez encourages early childhood professionals to be more assertive and take action against how we are being viewed as early childhood professionals. She helps us to understand that we are more than baby sitters and we do does not lack being professional. Although some progress is being made in relation to how we are viewed there is still work to be done. In this field we have to show what we are doing. Help others understand the process of what it takes to educate young children.

 Dr. Vasquez also so explains the human value of early childhood education. She helps us understand that it is important to go to school and receiving necessary training but human value, which can’t be taught, is also an important part of working in the early childhood field. It is equally important to respect and value professionals who have been in the field for many years and those who are new to the field, both bring a different contribution to the early childhood field. We should be able to make this transition without wasting or devaluing important resources already in place.

 

According to the international website UNESCO, universally agreed on criteria for quantifying ECCE quality does not exist, but they take into useful factors such as personnel training, pedagogy materials, parental education and involvement, and service setting. Learning materials is culturally and developmentally appropriate, focusing on child-centered interactions.

In areas where government resources are limited efforts are made to have pre-primary education placed in more formal settings or have the age of entry into the program lowered.

Because they can be pedagogically innovative and cost effective, the promotion of alternative services to under privileged children often raise concerns about sustainability and quality, In these cases a policies are put in place that allows the government to redistribute resources by reducing the amount of funds available to those who are more privileged.

References:

Course Media: "Excellence and Equity of Care and Education for Children and Families—Part 3" (approximate length: 12 minutes). Conversation with Delila Vasquez (Director of Program Services, Los Angeles Universal Preschool) about issues of equity and excellence related to EC professionals.

United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization (UNESCO)
http://www.unesco.org/new/en/education/themes/strengthening-education-systems/early-childhood/

 

Sharing Web Resources ( Week 6 )

Both websites I chose has valuable information related to early childhood education. The outside links on the ACEI website are very informative and offer all types of information within their region and across the globe. I research an area of the website entitled advocating education for all and discovered that ACEI has endorsed a letter to the United States House of Representatives asking for their support for education for all.  The letter signed by over 40 national and international organizations dedicated to advancing education, health, food security, democracy and governance, economic growth, peace, security, and human rights around the world was written as part of the Global Campaign for Education – U.S. Advocacy Day initiative. The Education for All Act is designed to build upon current U.S. efforts to ensure universal access to quality education for all children, and to develop a comprehensive global education strategy that addresses key barriers to education access. It also includes a provision that the U.S. engage with international education initiatives, such as the Global Partnership for Education, in order to help further these goals, and work with countries to strengthen systems that lead to sustainability.

The website does contain information that adds to my understanding of equity and excellence in early care and education. The letter to the House of Representatives asking for support for education for all is evident of this. They also have other links within the website that contain information related to equity and excellence.

Exploring the website this week, I understand how important it can be to collaborate with other countries on issues related to early childhood issues. By doing so, we open up opportunities to children and their families that can richly enhance the educational experience. We also gain knowledge and understanding that can help us increase equity and excellence in the early childhood field.

Reference:

Association for Childhood Education International
http://acei.org/

Getting to Know Your International Contacts (Week 5)

      In the pod cast Dr. Vasquez describes the effects of certain issues that effects excellence and the equity of care and education for children and families. Dr. Vasquez explains the adverse effects of achievement gaps, school readiness, standards and assessments and gives both positive and negative aspects of each one and the effect they have on children. She describes how much of the focus has been taken off what best for the children and placed more on the academic aspect of learning. She describes how each topic is directly related to the other and that these issues are not new and what can be done to improve them. She also states the demands that are being placed on academics are causing a much wider achievement gap and we are not giving children the tools they need to be successful. She reminds us that our first commitment is to the children not to fix them but to work with them. It is extremely important to know the children we work with and build positive relationships in order to know the right thing to do for them.

      In Zambian, to address the knowledge gap the Zambian Early Childhood Development Project (ZECDP) was launch in 2009 by the Zambian Ministry of Education, the Examination Council of Zambia, UNICEF, the University of Zambia, and the Center on the Developing Child at Harvard University to measure effects of an ongoing anti-malaria initiative on child development. They combine existing measures with newly develop measures for preschool age children that provide a broad assessment in the Zambian context. The goal of the project is to improve what we understand about child development as well as  

      Un Buen Comienzo (UBC), “A Good Start,” is a collaborative project in Santiago, Chile, to improve early childhood education through teacher professional development. The idea is to improve the quality of educational offerings for four-to-six-year-olds, particularly in the area of language development. This project is also designed to intervene in critical health areas that improve school attendance as well as socioemotional development, and it seeks to involve the children's families in their education. UBC also incorporates a comprehensive evaluation: a cluster-randomized experiment in all 60 schools. This type of longitudinal evaluation in early education has not been carried out in any other country in Latin America and will place Chile at the forefront of demonstrating the impact of a high-quality early education. 

When humanitarian crises hit around the world, nongovernmental organizations rush into the fray, intensively focused on urgent survival needs, not necessarily on longer-term impacts that may take an even greater toll on the country and its citizens. Theresa Betancourt, a Center-affiliated faculty member who studies children in adversity and has worked alongside NGOs, wants to help them see that farther horizon: Combining short-term survival efforts with attention to children’s developmental needs only magnifies the long-range benefits for individuals and societies. Betancourt, who is currently studying both former child soldiers in Sierra Leone and children whose parents have HIV/AIDS in Rwanda, says that one reason NGOs may not have incorporated the latest thinking into what they are doing is that there just haven’t been enough studies done on global child mental health. “I can’t change that NGOs work on very tight timelines and are underfunded,” says Betancourt. “But what I can change is having research that’s more oriented towards addressing some of the key questions that they need to understand and then being good at being in those circles, so that we can translate that evidence base strategically.”

Reference:

(http://developingchild.harvard.edu/initiatives/global_initiative/)

 

Course Media: "Excellence and Equity of Care and Education for Children and Families—Part 1"

Sharing Web Resources

All the information on the National Association of Child Care Resource & Referral Agencies web site is relevant to my professional development. It provides information for parents and professionals that assist in helping find quality care for children and their families. The website offer links to online training courses for professionals and child care providers that can help in developing knowledge that is relevant to practices within the early childhood field.

The child demographics portion of the website made me look at issues of poverty, and children not having access to quality care in a new perspective. As we have been studying it is evident that the issues of poverty affect the livelihood of young children and their families. All children should have access to quality care regardless of their economic status.

The public policy information on the websites is encouraging because so many people are on board with what needs to change to improve policies and laws that will enhance the quality of education and make it possible for all children to receive it. The action center link allows us to take action to strengthen child care laws that affect the well-being of children.

On the National Association of Child Care Resource& Referral Agencies website there is a ranking of State Child Care Center Regulations and Oversight “We can do better” conducted on each state, the District of Columbia, and the Department of Defense on 11 required programs and four over site benchmarks. According to the results states are making progress on improving care provided to children, but more work needs to be done.

 

References:

National Association of Child Care Resource & Referral Agencies

http://www.naccrra.org/

 (Newsletter: http://capwiz.com/naccrra/mlm/signup/ )

 

Getting to Know Your International Contacts

Dr. Cathy Grace, director of Early Childhood Development, Children's Defense Fund, shares information on the effects of poverty on the early childhood community.

Poverty is an issue that has plagued not only our country but other countries as well. It is a much bigger problem now than ever and it has a damaging effect on a child’s development.  Poverty has a much more damaging effect on children who are born in poverty rather than if conditions were to change after they have reached the age of 8.  Poverty comes with different issues that are physical, mental, and emotional that can take the life out of people.  Families don’t have enough energy to accomplish daily task. Children who are stricken by poverty lack the strength and energy to perform well in school or any other activities.

Today in the United States we have the highest number of children living in poverty than we have had over the past 20 years. In order to bring on change we must start within the community. We have to speak out and take a stand for those who are not able to speak for themselves. The only way a child’s voice can be heard is through us by advocating for their rights. We have to ensure policy makers and government officials are not putting the rights of young children on the back burner. We have to ensure the rights of citizens are being protected. If we lose sight of these issues now and our rights are taken away this could lead to much bigger problems down the road.

We often assume that people living in poverty are not working, but that is not true. Most families in poverty work two to three jobs but are still considered to be within the poverty guideline because there wages are so low. We also assume people who do work may not be willing to further their education. This is why it is very important to get a better understanding of what poverty is and how it has affected so many people. As long as we continue to assume we will never truly understand what it is going to take to address and fix this issue.

In China they have developed key finding and recommendations to address their poverty issues. To address the issue of unemployment and insecure employment, Improved access to relevant and marketable skills that will enable people to find work in a changing job market, re-employment opportunities, and microcredit schemes to assist unemployed and low-income people to start their own small businesses will be made available and increasing the minimum wage so that it is higher than the MLSSA (Minimum Living Standard Security Allowance). Second they would like to improve education and skill levels of poor adults which may include affordable loans and subsides for low income families to have access to technical and vocational skill training. Third, they would also make accessing education for poor families easier by removing cost barriers that may prohibit a child from receiving the best education.

 

References:

http://www.unicef.org/infobycountry/index.html

Course Media: "The Effects of Poverty on the Early Childhood Community"