Welcoming Families from Around the World

The family I chose for this assignment is from Burma.  I chose this country because in the city where I live we have noticed an increase in people from this country. 

Five ways in which I will prepare to be culturally responsive towards this family:

1.       Learn the country’s geographic location and climate

2.      Learn about the country’s situation (why are people fleeing this country?)

3.      Learn about their traditions, culture, customs, religion and language

4.      Find someone in the community that can speak the family’s language so that I can welcome the family in my classroom and have an effective communication.

5.      Include materials, pictures, books, music in the classroom environment that reflects the family culture.

Families from different parts of the world immigrate to United States from different reasons I believe that one of the most important things is to know those reasons.  When a teacher understands the family culture she is able to build positive relationships with the family.  Identifying someone in the community that can help us to communicate with the family is beneficial for the family, child and teacher.  It is through communication that we build relationships and engaged the families into their child’s education.  Lastly, when children and families are reflected in the classroom environment they feel welcome and develop a sense of belonging within the group.

The Personal Side of Bias, Prejudice, and Oppression

I have a memory of an incident that happened to one of my co-workers few years ago.  My co-worker was African-American, and we were working in a white predominant neighborhood.  I remember she used to tell me that she was scared to go out of the office alone.  She felt people around the area did not like to see black people around.  She never wanted to be in the office by herself, and when she was by herself; she would lock the doors.  I always thought she was exaggerating a little bit.  One day they opened a hair/nail salon in the same plaza that our office was located.  She enjoyed getting her nails done, so she went to the salon to give it a try.  Surprisingly 5 minutes passed, and she returned to the office. We asked her what happened. She told us that they did not want to do her nails and told her that the spa chairs were not working. We thought that it was  weird that all chairs were broken so me, and another white co-worker decided to visit the place and asked to get nails done.  To our surprise they did not tell us that the chairs were broken and welcome us into their salon.  My white co-worker told them that she would never use their services because they just refused to offer services to her black co-worker.  They got into a big argument, and rude words were exchanged.  From that moment,  we apologized to our African-American co-worker and started validating her concerns around the neighborhood we were working.

This incident diminished equity because this salon was not willing to offer their services equally to all people.

I remember that I felt angry, embarrassed and powerless because there was nothing I could do to fix that situation.

Unfortunately, for an opportunity of greater equity in this case the salon owners needed to change and stop believing that they are superior to other ethnic groups.

Microagressions

In the early childhood field there are many examples of microaggression, but when I was thinking about one example this week the one that stood out to me was a case in which a male teacher was complimented.  I remember the compliment being said as “Oh Mr.____________is such a wonderful teacher to be a man.  So this means that man cannot be as good teachers as woman.  I think this is a case of gender microaggression.  We all know we need more male teachers in the field, but if we think that they cannot be as good as female teachers we will always have problems recruiting man in the early childhood field.

After learning this week about microagression, I think there  are more unconsciously racism and prejudices that people are aware of.  Now that I am aware of this I will be more careful in the way I communicate to other people.

Perspectives on Diversity and Culture

For this assignment, I interviewed 3 people with different cultural and educational background.  Two  people have a different culture than me.  Some of the similarities in their responses about culture are that culture refers to a group of people that shares customs and traditions including food, music, folklore and language.  Also, when they spoke about diversity, they all coincide that diversity is variety and options.  They all found that the question about diversity was more difficult to answer than the question about culture.  I noticed that when they spoke about culture they described what I learned is the “surface culture” and omitted the part of the culture that is known as “deep culture” which is what, people cannot easily tell unless they take the time to investigate and learn a culture. For diversity, no one mentioned that diversity made someone unique and was not associated with a group of choices ascribed or assumed by someone that makes his/her personal identity.

The way they define culture make me think of culture as a group of characteristics that identifies a certain group people, but also that they are there being  other options in the society that they can choose from, for example,  sports, religions, political parties, career, etc.

My Family Culture

A major catastrophe has almost completely devastated the infrastructure of your country. The emergency government has decided that the surviving citizens will be best served if they are evacuated to other countries willing to take refugees. You and your immediate family are among the survivors of this catastrophic event. However, you have absolutely no input into the final destination or in any other evacuation details. You are told that your host country’s culture is completely different from your own, and that you might have to stay there permanently. You are further told that, in addition to one change of clothes, you can only take 3 small items with you. You decide to take three items that you hold dear and that represent your family culture.

   

1.  I would take a family picture where my mom, dad, son, siblings and nieces and nephew are present because I would like to remember always how they look.

2.  I will take my grandmother’s Virgin Mary image because represents the values and beliefs of the religion that was instilled to me.

3.  Also, I will take a silver plate with my mother’s image that my husband gave me when he proposed to me.  When I met my husband my mother had already died.  My husband knew how much she meant to me, and he always wished he met her.  In that important date, to make my mother present he gave me a silver plate with my mother’s image for my silver chain.

If I were told to give up two items, I would have feel devastated because the three items have the same sentimental value to me.  They represent the 3 most important things of my life my family, my values and beliefs and my marriage.

As I was reflecting doing this exercise, I realized how strong I feel about my family and my values.  In the everyday life sometimes we do not stop to think about what makes us happy and what is important to us.  It is not until we are presented with situations such a catastrophe that we think who we are and what we want.

When I think of Research...

 Well, I have to say that I always thought about research as a long, complex and tedious project.  I thought that I would never have the skills and knowledge to do one and that research was always only for people extremely smart.  From this course, I learned that even thought is a long process that requires a lot of careful planning and designing, it is also something that can be accomplished.  I see research now as a vital and essential tool for the early childhood field, and a way to keep improving and developing best practices.

My ideas about research have changed because now I see it as something achievable.  It has a process, but the process makes sense to me in all aspects.  Before, I knew it was a lot of work, but I did not understand what it was involved in all that work.

I think that planning, designing and conducting the research will be based off your research question.  Once you have developed your research question then you can start thinking on the other steps.  Each step has special considerations that researchers cannot avoid if they want to make their research valid and reliable.

The biggest challenge I encountered during my research simulation was the research question.  Who would think that writing a question could be that difficult?  It took me 5 weeks until I last developed a research question that met all the requirements studied in the course.  Every week I refined and narrowed my question until I finally got it.

Thanks to this course I now perceive early childhood professionals as Scientifics in the early education field.  I believe that, with this knowledge any early childhood professional can be capable to conduct research that can influence the job we do in the field.

Thanks to all of you for reading and replying to my blogs.  I wish you all success in your upcoming courses.

Research Around the World

 The early childhood field is rapidly growing and expanding throughout the world.  Regardless of the country people are more interested in the well-being and healthy development of very young children.  The research topics most common around the world are quality of programs, family engagement, challenging behaviors and infants/toddlers as active learners among others.

While reviewing this week resources, I realized that other countries are as serious as USA about their youngest children development.  The information and resources available in the website Early Childhood Australia are impressive.  I found the information in the website so useful and great that I could not avoid bookmarking the website to use it as a personal resource and reference.

The Early Childhood Australia has 2 notable position statements:

1.         They have a position statement for children seeking asylum

2.         They have a position statement that acknowledges aboriginal and Torres Strait Islanders people as the original inhabitants and recognizes their culture and heritage.

With these two statements, they are demonstrating that they are serious about diversity and including all children in their country regardless their origin.  Also, respecting and recognizing everyone’s cultural background.