Professional Hopes and Goals

One hope I have when I think about working with children and families who come from diverse backgrounds is to always make them feel at home.  Whether it be in my classroom or in my home, I want everyone, regardless of their age, race, ethnicity, or sexual orientation, to feel loved and accepted.  I want to bring unity into my community and that can only begin at home.  I am blessed to be a part of a church that is multi-cultural and encompasses this acceptance in their mission so my children are being raised by both myself and our church in a way that is not only accepting of peoples differences but celebrates these differences.  I would love for more families to incorporate this into their home.

The main goal I would like to set for the early childhood field related to issues of diversity, equity, and social justice is work with educators and other professionals to help them understand these issues as we have been learning about them over the past eight weeks.  There are certain attitudes and prejudices that could be overcome through education and reflection.  I believe this is one goal that could help change the educational system and specifically the early childhood field because once people understand their own personal bias and prejudice, they can work to better themselves. 

I want to thank all of my colleagues for their support over the past eight weeks.  You guys have been amazing!  Thank you for taking the time to read my blogs and providing feedback.  I look forward to another wonderful eight weeks with you again!!  Best of luck to you in the future.

Welcoming Families from Around the World

For this week’s blog assignment, I am going to imagine that I worked at a child care center in which a new child was enrolling.  For this scenario, we will say that this child and their family recently emigrated from China.  How can I prepare myself and my classroom to welcome my new student and their family to my classroom?

The first thing I would do is take a good look at myself, personally, and evaluate any bias or prejudice I may have toward this family, before I even meet them.  Understanding my personal feelings about them ahead of time is important because I do not want to compromise my relationship with a new child and their family because of some personal opinion or bias.

Once I have done some soul searching,  I would research where they came from, the area in which they lived in while in China.  I would learn as much as I could by looking things up online and reaching out to community resources to gain information about their country, culture, and belief system.

The next thing I would do was to make sure that their culture was represented throughout my classroom.  I would make sure they could see things in the environment that were familiar to them and their culture, as with all of the other cultures represented in my classroom.  I would be sure Chinese food and clothes and baby dolls were in the housekeeping center and that pictures displayed throughout the classroom displayed people from China in real world settings. 

I would also like to do a home visit.  During my home visit, I could get to know the parents and the child on a more personal level in order to help them feel more comfortable once the child begins in my classroom.  I could ask questions about their family, their interests, expectations, and also gain a good understanding of the family dynamics and overall function of the home just by spending time with them.

The last thing I would do is to talk to the class about the new child enrolling.  I would share with them the child’s name and other pertinent information as well as a picture of the child so the other children can put a face with the name.

I believe that each of these preparations will help the child and their family feel  comfortable, in addition to helping me and the rest of the class feel more comfortable.   Doing these preparations are really not that difficult  Taking the time to go the extra mile, really will pay off in the end.

The personal side of bias, prejudice, and oppression

Just before I graduated high school, I began dating a guy several years older than myself.  A few years into our relationship, things were going well.  I ended up getting pregnant and we had our first daughter.  A few months later, we decided to move in together.  Everything went well at first, then I realized that we had completely opposite views of what women were supposed to do and not do.  I grew up in a home where there really wasn’t much difference between my brother and I.  He and I shared household chores such as mowing the grass or cutting wood or changing the oil in the car.  I did not feel any different just because I was a girl.  Unfortunately, this is not how my boyfriend felt.  He made it perfectly clear that a woman was to cook, keep the house clean, and take care of the kids.  This was fine with me in the beginning but I quickly got tired of being told that I couldn’t do things around the house, especially since it was my house.  Needless to say, I did not tolerate this well and our relationship ended, not for this reason but this definitely didn’t help our relationship.

I do not feel like this was an equitable situation because nothing ever seemed fair.  I was constantly being told what I could or couldn’t do just because I was a woman.  I couldn’t take out the trash, or wash the car, or mow the grass because those were a man’s job, even if I had to wait for a man to do them.  I was constantly frustrated because there were things I could do and had time to do but was not allowed to do them.

In order for this incident to be turned into an opportunity for greater equity, his bias toward women needed to change.  I understand that the traditional viewpoint that women belong in the kitchen was what he grew up around, but I feel like now times have changed.  There are many things that women can do just as well as men.  Until he could accept the fact that women’s roles have changed throughout the years, he would never overcome this bias toward women.  I am amazed at how strong his bias really is when it comes to women.  Our relationship ended 7 years ago and he still feels exactly the same today than he did then.