I had the opportunity this week to be the recipient of microaggressions! In a conversation with a casual friend, I was telling her of the opportunity that I have been given to return to my old kindergarten classroom after taking two years off to stay home with my children. Her comment was, "You'll really miss sleeping in and having all that down time at home." I was quite shocked by her comment, knowing what it implied, finished checking out my groceries, and left the store with a quick goodbye. I was offended by her comment which suggests that the last two years that I have been a stay-at-home mom have been characterized by sleeping in and having all kind of time to myself. I believe that too often that is the stereotype of a stay-at-home mom, when in fact it is usually a very different lifestyle. I am up earlier now then when I worked, and have roughly a half hour of "down-time" between the going down and waking up of children when I can down my lunch and go to the bathroom without having someone accompany me!
This experience has given me a better understanding of microaggressions and their impact on the person who is the target. I am sure that the comment was not made to be malicious, as mircoaggressions usually are unintentional, but it sure felt like an attack on my character and my job. Having experienced this has helped me to be more careful about the assumptions I hold regarding culture and lifestyles, which will make me more sensitive to the words that I say.
Saturday, July 21, 2012
Saturday, July 14, 2012
Perspectives on Diversity and Culture: Week 3
I talked with three of my friends about their definitions of culture and diversity. These are their explanations:
1. Culture is everything that makes us the same and different from those around us. Diversity is understanding the differences as acceptable.
2. Culture- religion, dress, food, laws, and social norms that a group of people share in common. Diversity- bringing different groups together to one place.
3. Diversity is what makes things (living and not) or people different. Culture is the way humans express their diversity.
What I realized through these three different but similar responses is the understanding that my friends have of true culture and diversity. I expected the standard responses, stating race and ethnicity, but saw the depth of their answers as reflecting the true ideas behind culture and diversity. I believe that their definitions, particularly when combined together, state all the ideas that we have expressed throughout this course without eliminating any important aspects! Talking with them about diversity has allowed me to see the importance of understanding, particularly in the way that I now know diversity and culture express themselves.
1. Culture is everything that makes us the same and different from those around us. Diversity is understanding the differences as acceptable.
2. Culture- religion, dress, food, laws, and social norms that a group of people share in common. Diversity- bringing different groups together to one place.
3. Diversity is what makes things (living and not) or people different. Culture is the way humans express their diversity.
What I realized through these three different but similar responses is the understanding that my friends have of true culture and diversity. I expected the standard responses, stating race and ethnicity, but saw the depth of their answers as reflecting the true ideas behind culture and diversity. I believe that their definitions, particularly when combined together, state all the ideas that we have expressed throughout this course without eliminating any important aspects! Talking with them about diversity has allowed me to see the importance of understanding, particularly in the way that I now know diversity and culture express themselves.
Saturday, July 7, 2012
My Family Culture: Week 2
Blog: My Family Culture
Imagine the following:
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.
The three items that I would choose would be our children's birth certificates, our family bible, and the family scrapbook. I would choose our children's birth certificates because that would be all they would have of their origin, complete with their names, birth dates, our names, and our town where they were born. It would be a lasting piece of their identity. I would take our family Bible, as it is the basis of our religion for our family. The words in the Bible can bring comfort, identity, belonging, and peace, all things that our family would be missing during this chaos. For our family, our Bible is the only book that we would need to find all the answers that we would be asking. Finally, the last item I would take would be a scrapbook that I made for my firstborn, in the weeks prior to her birth while we were waiting for her arrival. This scrapbook contains pictures of my husbands and my grandparents, parents, and our sisters/brothers and their families. It also contains birth dates for everyone, a small description of each person, and some words of wisdom from them about life in general. I created this in order for my daughter to know the important people in her life and would take it with us as a remembrance of our extended family that we probably would have lost contact with.
If upon arrival in our new country we were told we could only keep one thing, I would keep our family Bible. I would be able to write the important dates of their births and birthplaces in the pages, along with the names and information that is found in the scrapbook. The Bible would then contain all three items in one, and would remain the backbone of our family's faith. Although I would be sad to lose the other two, in the end it is my children's eternal life that I am concerned more about then if they know where they were born. The Bible would give them the most opportunity to share in our family's faith.
This exercise was one that I had to look at on Tuesday (when I usually get all my work done for the week) and I put it aside until today as I was almost sick to my stomach to think of this scenario. I am one who doesn't watch the news because it fills me with uncertainty to think of the future difficulties that my children will face, so to think of a catastrophe such as this was one that I did not want to address right away. It was also a little more difficult to think of what I would take with us based on culture, rather than immediate need as I was first thinking that I would take my children's comfort items (their bears & blankets that they sleep with every night) for their own security rather than the things that would give them cultural background. Their immediate comfort, which would come from their security items, seemed more important to me at the time!
Imagine the following:
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.
The three items that I would choose would be our children's birth certificates, our family bible, and the family scrapbook. I would choose our children's birth certificates because that would be all they would have of their origin, complete with their names, birth dates, our names, and our town where they were born. It would be a lasting piece of their identity. I would take our family Bible, as it is the basis of our religion for our family. The words in the Bible can bring comfort, identity, belonging, and peace, all things that our family would be missing during this chaos. For our family, our Bible is the only book that we would need to find all the answers that we would be asking. Finally, the last item I would take would be a scrapbook that I made for my firstborn, in the weeks prior to her birth while we were waiting for her arrival. This scrapbook contains pictures of my husbands and my grandparents, parents, and our sisters/brothers and their families. It also contains birth dates for everyone, a small description of each person, and some words of wisdom from them about life in general. I created this in order for my daughter to know the important people in her life and would take it with us as a remembrance of our extended family that we probably would have lost contact with.
If upon arrival in our new country we were told we could only keep one thing, I would keep our family Bible. I would be able to write the important dates of their births and birthplaces in the pages, along with the names and information that is found in the scrapbook. The Bible would then contain all three items in one, and would remain the backbone of our family's faith. Although I would be sad to lose the other two, in the end it is my children's eternal life that I am concerned more about then if they know where they were born. The Bible would give them the most opportunity to share in our family's faith.
This exercise was one that I had to look at on Tuesday (when I usually get all my work done for the week) and I put it aside until today as I was almost sick to my stomach to think of this scenario. I am one who doesn't watch the news because it fills me with uncertainty to think of the future difficulties that my children will face, so to think of a catastrophe such as this was one that I did not want to address right away. It was also a little more difficult to think of what I would take with us based on culture, rather than immediate need as I was first thinking that I would take my children's comfort items (their bears & blankets that they sleep with every night) for their own security rather than the things that would give them cultural background. Their immediate comfort, which would come from their security items, seemed more important to me at the time!
Thursday, June 21, 2012
Reflection on Research
As I complete this last week of Research in Education, I have gained knowledge and understand regarding the process involved in creating and carrying out research. The first insight that I have gained, and probably the most important, is the sheer quantity of time that is required during the planning phase of research. From my limited perspective, prior to this course, my understanding of research was the time application during the data collection portion of research. After concluding this course, I am aware that the planning portion of the research design is probably the most intensive part. Another insight that I gained from this course are the many considerations that must be taken into account when designing research. From equity to bias, and cultural aspects to consent, there are so many ideas that must be looked at in order to conduct valid, relevant research.
My ideas regarding the nature of doing research have changed in that, although the planning process is intensive, it is a must in order to be successful and validated in your research. I feel confident in my ability to define a research question and plan the research design. Although I would need to be under the guidance of an experienced researcher, I believe that I could be successful in the process of research design.
One of the challenges that I encountered was choosing a topic of research that would be relevant to not only the field of education, but to my specific interests. After choosing that topic, I also faced the challenge of redefining the idea into a workable research question. This took a few tries and many considerations, but I was finally able to define a specific hypothesis for research. Another challenge was simply trying to understand the limitless options in regard to the different types of research and the ways to go about collecting data. There are many considerations when choosing the data collection methods and choosing the right one for my specific question took some understanding and thinking before I was able to identify the one that would work the best.
Saturday, June 2, 2012
International Research: Australia
I chose to look up information regarding Australia's early childhood research. I chose Australia because during the last course, my international contact was from Australia. I learned a great deal about early childhood from my correspondence with her. Trish is the director of an early childhood center that was made up of about 60 children. The main ideas regarding early childhood care in Australia is centered around the development of National Standards that oversee all early childhood centers within the country. The development of these National Standards has lead to an overhaul of the early childhood system in Australia and the new push is towards excellence in all centers.
From my contact with Trish, and from reviewing the website provided for this week, I learned that much of the current research in Australia is the same as in the United States. One such research aspect is the idea of higher levels of education for early childhood workers. With the new standards in Australia, the level of education required for early childhood teachers is increasing as the research shows that better care is provided by those teachers with higher levels of education. There is also a push in the standards for play based learning in classrooms, which comes directly from the current research regarding the way children learn. Low wages are also a current issue in Australia as the research also shows that those teachers who are paid better wages are more likely to stay with the career reducing staff turnover, which has been shown to have a positive effect on the children in early childhood programs.
I learned a great deal of information regarding the early childhood changes that are currently taking place in Australia. I think the information on the website, along with my knowledge from the last class, has provided me with a better understanding of the importance of quality national standards and the impact that they make on children in early childhood programs. I think in the near future, we will begin to see some of these changes taking place, particularly thanks to the current research on topics such as teacher education, higher wages, and play based learning.
From my contact with Trish, and from reviewing the website provided for this week, I learned that much of the current research in Australia is the same as in the United States. One such research aspect is the idea of higher levels of education for early childhood workers. With the new standards in Australia, the level of education required for early childhood teachers is increasing as the research shows that better care is provided by those teachers with higher levels of education. There is also a push in the standards for play based learning in classrooms, which comes directly from the current research regarding the way children learn. Low wages are also a current issue in Australia as the research also shows that those teachers who are paid better wages are more likely to stay with the career reducing staff turnover, which has been shown to have a positive effect on the children in early childhood programs.
I learned a great deal of information regarding the early childhood changes that are currently taking place in Australia. I think the information on the website, along with my knowledge from the last class, has provided me with a better understanding of the importance of quality national standards and the impact that they make on children in early childhood programs. I think in the near future, we will begin to see some of these changes taking place, particularly thanks to the current research on topics such as teacher education, higher wages, and play based learning.
Saturday, May 19, 2012
Research Competency: Week 3 (Daycare vs. Home)
Option 2: Imagine that you possess the means and the knowledge to conduct research studies about any topic in the early childhood field. Imagine further that you are not restricted by the reality of the present. Imagine that your study will make a major positive contribution to the well-being of children and/or their families. What topic would you choose? What can you imagine the positive contribution(s) would be?
If I could choose any topic to research and had no limits to my research capabilities, I would choose to research the impact of raising children at home versus in a daycare setting. The debate between choosing a career over raising children is a topic that I have always been interesting in learning more about. As a former professional (teacher), who had two young children in daycare and gave up my career during the pregnancy of child number three to stay home due to the high cost of daycare, I can see both side of the argument. We loved our daycare and felt that it provided a loving, nurturing, educational setting for our children, but also see the value in them being home with me during their early childhood years.
I would focus my research on the long-term effects and outcomes of children who were raised in a home setting (being cared for by a parent) and those who were cared for in an early childhood setting on a full-time basis. I would look at different characteristics such as attachment, social abilities, educational success, and health issues. I believe that this research could provide valuable information to mothers and families who are having a hard time deciding on the best option for their children. The conclusions of the research could have a great impact on early childhood as it could create a positive light for daycare, or provide the opportunity for changes that could lead to a more home like setting for early childhood programs. I believe the research would have a great impact on children and families who are looking for answers when it comes to daycare versus staying at home.
If I could choose any topic to research and had no limits to my research capabilities, I would choose to research the impact of raising children at home versus in a daycare setting. The debate between choosing a career over raising children is a topic that I have always been interesting in learning more about. As a former professional (teacher), who had two young children in daycare and gave up my career during the pregnancy of child number three to stay home due to the high cost of daycare, I can see both side of the argument. We loved our daycare and felt that it provided a loving, nurturing, educational setting for our children, but also see the value in them being home with me during their early childhood years.
I would focus my research on the long-term effects and outcomes of children who were raised in a home setting (being cared for by a parent) and those who were cared for in an early childhood setting on a full-time basis. I would look at different characteristics such as attachment, social abilities, educational success, and health issues. I believe that this research could provide valuable information to mothers and families who are having a hard time deciding on the best option for their children. The conclusions of the research could have a great impact on early childhood as it could create a positive light for daycare, or provide the opportunity for changes that could lead to a more home like setting for early childhood programs. I believe the research would have a great impact on children and families who are looking for answers when it comes to daycare versus staying at home.
Saturday, May 12, 2012
Research Competency: Week 2
For my research topic, I would like to focus on behavior issues and discipline in the classroom. This is an issue that faces many childcare settings and is something that many teachers struggle with. I have decided that the initial subtopic of this broader topic will focus on the connection between parenting styles and child behavior. I am a firm believer that parents play a crucial role in the behaviors of their child. I understand that there are instances where all children will act out regardless of the parents, but that there is a larger connection between the interactions between the child and parent and the overall temperament and behavioral patterns in children.
I chose this topic as it is one that I have dealt with in many areas. In the daycare where my daughter was for the first year of her life, there were several children who displayed negative behaviors and they seemed to baffle the childcare providers. I often felt that my daughter did not get as much attention from the caregivers as she was well behaved and had an easy temperament. Once I became a kindergarten teacher, I was faced with many instance of children who displayed negative behaviors and I could often link them with certain aspects of the parenting styles that their parents displayed. I believe that as we strive to work with children from all backgrounds, it is important to understand the role of parenting styles in the behaviors of the children. This will provide the opportunity to gain a better understanding of the children and the background that may also provide clues to their behaviors.
My personal experience so far with developing a research simulation has been slightly frustrating. I am not sure if I am on the right path with it and that is particularly discouraging. I am also hoping that I have the information right when it comes to research versus a literature review. In my mind, I am conducting my own research when looking up information regarding a question I have, but according to this course I am simply doing a literature review. It is a little perplexing thus far.
I did enjoy filling in the research chart for this week's resources. I think it gave me a better understanding of some terms that I would have simply read over and not understood in greater depth. It allowed me to take the time to fully grasp the meaning of some research terms. It also allowed me to reflect on the research process and think ahead to the parts of the research that I would enjoy the most. I am still unsure that I am enjoying this class, but am finding the information worthwhile none-the-less.
I chose this topic as it is one that I have dealt with in many areas. In the daycare where my daughter was for the first year of her life, there were several children who displayed negative behaviors and they seemed to baffle the childcare providers. I often felt that my daughter did not get as much attention from the caregivers as she was well behaved and had an easy temperament. Once I became a kindergarten teacher, I was faced with many instance of children who displayed negative behaviors and I could often link them with certain aspects of the parenting styles that their parents displayed. I believe that as we strive to work with children from all backgrounds, it is important to understand the role of parenting styles in the behaviors of the children. This will provide the opportunity to gain a better understanding of the children and the background that may also provide clues to their behaviors.
My personal experience so far with developing a research simulation has been slightly frustrating. I am not sure if I am on the right path with it and that is particularly discouraging. I am also hoping that I have the information right when it comes to research versus a literature review. In my mind, I am conducting my own research when looking up information regarding a question I have, but according to this course I am simply doing a literature review. It is a little perplexing thus far.
I did enjoy filling in the research chart for this week's resources. I think it gave me a better understanding of some terms that I would have simply read over and not understood in greater depth. It allowed me to take the time to fully grasp the meaning of some research terms. It also allowed me to reflect on the research process and think ahead to the parts of the research that I would enjoy the most. I am still unsure that I am enjoying this class, but am finding the information worthwhile none-the-less.
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