- One hope that you have when you think about working with children and families who come from diverse backgrounds
One hope that I have when I think about working with children and families who come from diverse backgrounds is that they feel welcome and visible in my classroom. I hope that I can embrace the vision of anti-bias education and make it a prominent part of my teaching.
- One goal you would like to set for the early childhood field related to issues of diversity, equity, and social justice
One goal that I would like to set for the early childhood field related to issues of diversity, equity, and social justice would be that anti-bias education is embraced and made evident in classrooms to promote diversity, equity, and social justice.
- A brief note of thanks to your colleagues
I would like to thank everyone for sharing their thoughts and ideas during this course on diversity. I have enjoyed reading many of your blogs and I am looking forward to continuing to share ideas. Also thanks for all the comments I have received throughout this course!
For this assignment, imagine the following scenario:
You are working in an early childhood setting of your choice—a hospital, a child care center, a social service agency. You receive word that the child of a family who has recently emigrated from a country you know nothing about will join your group soon. You want to prepare yourself to welcome the child and her family. Luckily, you are enrolled in a course about diversity and have learned that in order to support families who have immigrated you need to know more than surface facts about their country of origin.
I would be working for Head Start as this is what I am most familiar with. The new child and her family are coming from Latvia, although I could probably choose most any country because I think that I would have to do my homework for any child coming from another country. I would have to find out what language the family speaks and learn some key words and phrases to help them feel more comfortable and welcome. I may have to seek out someone from a local college that speaks the language because we do not have anyone on staff that can help with this. I would also want to schedule a home visit prior to the child beginning in the classroom as Head Start is required to do this and it is a great time to observe the child and family where they are most comfortable. While I was at the home visit, I would ask the family questions about their culture, home life, and what goals they have for their child. I would use the information I learned from the family and my own research to bring in materials that let this child and her family know that they are welcome. I would also want to invite the family into the classroom to observe what goes on there and to encourage them to continue to volunteer. I would hope that the preparations I would make and the actions I take would help make this new child and family feel welcome in the classroom and with me. I would also hope that this new family would feel comfortable talking with me and the lines of communication would be open. My preparations would also allow me to better understand this family and be able to be more responsive to their needs and the needs of their child. I may be able to refer them to community resources that did not know about to help them or their child. I have always found it interesting and exciting to watch the children whose home language is Spanish grow and flourish, so a child from another country would be very exciting and I would hope to find a special place in their lives!
Like I said before, I don't get out much these days, but I have found myself paying more attention to what is being said around me. Yesterday, my daughter and I went over to my parents house to watch the olympics. As we were watching, we also talked about what was going on and made comments throughout our viewing. As they went to track and field events and the first women runners ran for the 100meters, my daughter made a comment about our olympic athlete looking like a man because her muscles were so large. Later, my mom made a comment about that athlete probably being a "dyke". As we continued to watch they talked about how this would be the last or only olympics for some of the athletes and I remember my dad saying something about how they would be too old when the next olympics rolled around. Each of these comments brought home different microaggressions and different "isms". There was sexism, LGBTism, and ageism. I was somewhat surprised by my daughter and how disgusted she was with the muscles the female runner had. She is an athlete herself and works very hard at her sport. I was terribly ashamed by the comment my mother made, it was so mean and hateful. And since when did age stop someone? These comments diminish the equity of these people, by making it wrong to be themselves. She is still a woman regardless of the size of her muscles and regardless of her sexual orientation. Some of these athletes will make room for new and younger athletes to compete and others will continue to work and come back in 2016 and perhaps show people like my dad that they are competitive at any age. This incident made me feel frustrated and ashamed. I am usually frustrated with my parents and the comments they make regarding most of the "isms" we have learned about. And I find myself wondering how I have such differing views when I grew up in their home. I also found myself becoming angry that they made these comments and that they believed they were true. In order for this to be an opportunity for greater equity, my parents would have to change their way of thinking and view of the world. I know that I can talk to my daughter about her comment and help her to see what her comment can do to someone.
