What I Have Learned (EDUC 6357)

One hope that I have when I think about working with diverse families and children is that they will grow up to be more accepting of differences. I hope that by exposing them to a variety of people in a variety of ways they will see the benefits we get from having many types. I hope that teaching them how to express interest and wonder without being rude will help them to relate to others in society and will give them tools to deal with new and unexpected situations.

One goal that I have for the early childhood field is to continue to push for quality education for all children. Although there are many problems with the No Child Left Behind legislation in the states, the sentiment behind it is sound. All children deserve a good start in life. It is the responsibility of society to help them achieve this.

On a personal note, I'd like to thank my colleagues in this class for your support and comments throughout the last 8 weeks. Your thoughts and ideas have pushed me to think more and harder about different aspects of diversity. Through the discussions I have broadened my views on diversity, equity and anti-bias education. Thank you.

Start Seeing Diversity (EDUC 6357)

For my art project I created a web page. The link is below.

https://sites.google.com/a/blijberg.nl/group-1-2/home/start-seeing-diversity

We Don't Say Those Words in Class! (EDUC 6357)

When I think of a time when a child made a comment about someone, the object of the comment was me. When I first moved to the Netherlands, I didn't speak any Dutch. I still tried to interact with the children of my husband's friends though. I remember one time when the 3 year old son of one friend was playing soccer with me. I said something to him in English about what a good shot he'd made. He looked at his mother and said something in Dutch. I later found out that it translated to " She makes funny noises." to which his mother replied "Just ignore it" or something similar.

The messages from this interaction are that people who speak differently don't really matter and there is no need to try to understand. When the mom told him to ignore it she was also implying that it was ok to ignore me. I don't think she meant it that way. I think she was suggesting that he keep playing and not worry that he couldn't understand me. That also gives the message that it isn't important to try to understand people who might speak differently to you.

In the video "Start seeing diversity: Race/ethnicity" (n.d.) the narrator remarks that when you don't acknowledge a difference children receive the message that there is something wrong with being different. An anti-bias educator could have used the situation described above to encourage a recognition that not everyone speaks the same way. The educator could have translated what was said and talked about other ways the child could figure out what was being said. I often use this approach in my class. When learning new vocabulary, I encourage children who are learning English to teach us that word in their home language.

References

Laureate Education (Producer). (n.d.). Start seeing diversity: Race/ethnicity [Video file].