Goal #1 "Each child will demonstrate self-awareness, confidence, family pride, and positive social identities" (Derman-Sparks & Olsen Edwards, 2010, p. 4).
Goal #2 "Each child will express comfort and joy with human diversity; accurate language for human differences; and deep, caring human connections" (Derman-Sparks & Olsen Edwards, 2010, p. 4).
Goal #3 "Each child will increasingly recognize unfairness, have language to describe unfairness, and understand that unfairness hurts" (Derman-Sparks & Olsen Edwards, 2010, p. 5).
Goal #4 "Each child will demonstrate empowerment and the skills to act, with others or alone, and prejudice and/or discriminatory actions" (Derman-Sparks & Olsen Edwards, 2010, p. 5).
I hope to help each child that I work with develop a positive self-identity, to develop empathy towards others, and to develop the confidence and knowledge necessary to stand up for themselves and others when something is unfair. In order to accomplish this each child's family culture needs to be visual in the classroom, and I will need to develop lessons to help the children learn about diversity and acceptance, depending on what their needs are. One of the things that I learned from this course is that modeling is important and taking advantage of teachable moments is also important, but it takes more for children to truly learn about differences. If we don't expand on the teachable moments children may never feel comfortable with their own social identities and with the differences of others.
For the families that I work with I hope to develop respectful and trusting relationships that benefit each child's learning and development. I learned from this course that some families will need more support than other families and that it requires "authentic listening" to accomplish this. Authentic listening is done by using what we hear to act and make adjustments (Laureate Education, Inc., 2011).
I would like to thank all of my classmates and my instructor, Dr. Janet Kien for all of their support throughout this course. The comments on discussions and blogs were encouraging and I enjoyed reading all of their posts as well. It helped me to see a variety of perspectives and apply the information to real world experiences that others had. Thank you for sharing.
References:
Derman-Sparks, L., & Olsen Edwards, J. (2010). Anti-bias education for young children and
ourselves. Washington, DC: NAEYC.
Laureate Education, Inc. (Producer). (2011).
Partnering with families [DVD]. Strategies
for working with diverse
children. Baltimore, MD: Author.
Mary,
ReplyDeleteThanks for always having great information in your posts that I can use to learn and grow as an early childhood professional. I agree with the importance of expanding on teachable moments and modeling for your students. We have just a big influence on the children we are around each day and they are watching and listening to everything we do, even we don't think they are listening!
Courtney
Mary,
ReplyDeleteYou have some great and ambitious goals. I love your comment that if we do not expand on teachable moments, children may never feel comfortable in their own social identities and the differences of others. I totally agree with you about this. This is so true. We may have the best laid out lesson plan, but if a teachable moment arises, this will far outweigh any lesson we may have come up with. Great post and I wish you luck in the final course.
Mary,
ReplyDeleteThank you for all your honest sharing and valuable insights. I have always enjoyed reading your discussion and blogs. I entend to keep mine ongoing, and I hope that you will too. It would be nice to check in with others from this program as we move into these real world situations and teachable moments alone. You did a great job of outlining your priorities as an anti-bias educator. The children and families you come in contact with will be forever changed for the better as a result. Thoughts and best wishes to you as you continue the journey in anti-bias education and improving the lives of young children and their families. It's been a pleasure... Good luck with your final course, too. Now, the journey truly begins!