When I Think of Research

 

During this course I was a little uncertain about it because I wasn't really knowledgeable of what it was all about.  Having taken this course I truly have a new understanding of the structure of research and reporting the findings.  I believe that I have acquired a lot but I also know that I can learn a lot more and improve on the information that I have been presented with to.  I wasn't knowledgeable of the process and now that I am I will pay more attention to studies done and how each part is important to the others because it helps form the broader picture. 

 Designing a research study on a common topic isn't an easy task. As a researcher, it helps that you have obtained some other studies, articles, books or other resources to support what you are covering in your study. Because many times the support you find will help give the study credibility and show whether others are on the same page.  Creating a plan is a good and important ideal so that you know what it is you're investigating but really conducting is the hardest part because now this part has many other variables that can help make it or break it.  The conducting of the research is sometimes way more critical than the plan because as the research goes on the plan, method, process can change according to participation especially if your study needs others to contribute to get a clear and concise meaning.  

Some of the challenges I found were in writing my applications of part 2 papers.  I sometimes, forgot to put in the sources to support what I may have believed in, said or thought  I don’t believe that I was off course with my stated opinion but I didn't always strengthen my words with sources showing that someone else concurred or felt the same. I can say that I didn't always execute into it in each paper, but I did improve at finding sources with or without the resources given to show support. 

 

One thing that I can say is that early childhood professionals have their work cut out for them whether  inside or outside of the classroom.  Aiding and teaching others, especially children, is an overwhelming task but I am thankful to each and every one who has pledged to training, teaching or preparing us all too either is in the field of early childhood education or educating preschool children. It is gratifying either way because it is something much needed.  

I would like to say thank you to all of you for your feedback and through all of you I have learned so much. You made this class so much easier than I thought it would be. I want to wish you all of you good luck in the rest of your courses and I am hoping to see all or some of you in future classes.

 

 

 

 

 

 

Research Around the World

 

    While looking the website of Early Childhood Australia I found many resources in the early childhood field. The one thing I found was a publication tab and there is a section for their Research in Practice Series. In this area you can write, advertise or even subscribe to the Research in Practice Series.

  Also while exploring the website I found out what some of their current topics up for discussion along with some remarkable perceptions that help broaden my knowledge of  early childhood education Australia. They have a program called Kids Matter, and what this does it works with early childhood educators and other care services to help ensure and support mental health and welfare of young children and their families. By working together they instill prevention and early intervention framework.

  Some other topics that you can find in the ‘Research in Practice Series’ include quality of early childhood education, professional partnership, supporting literacy in the early years, and many more. I find it encouraging that Australia is researching some of the same topics to the ones that are being researched here, in the United States.

    Another noteworthy topic I discovered was their new Digital Business Kits for Early Childhood.  These kits have been created to equip early childhood managers, teachers, staff and families to becoming more educated on how to use technology to make a bigger impact in the sector of early childhood education through quality high speed broadband connection.  This will enable them to expand their knowledge and skills by being able to explore, learn and see from a global perspective.

 "Who will help shape children's lifelong technology habits if educators don't participate? Young children often seem more "tech savvy" than many adults but they are not yet tech mature.  They need parents, educators and leaders to make wise informed choices on their behalf" (Early Childhood Australia, 2015).

 http://www.earlychildhoodaustralia.org.au/

 

  

Research that Benefits Children and Families

I am very much interested in working with special needs children. So I am always looking for articles or anything that would help me to help them. So when I was looking up some information I found a website that would help me to set up an inclusion classroom to fit the different needs of a child. One thing I want to do is have special needs children with regular students and to teach them to work together. I work in a special ed. Classroom now and it is wonderful to see how excited they get when their partners come to work with them. I want to make sure that the special needs child does not feel left out.  One thing they mention is and this is something all teachers can use make sure to model appropriate behavior, make sure there is room for all children to move around, make sure the environment is set up for all sensory modalities, and that there is a program set up for social skills. I am really looking forward to teaching an EC classroom for all children with or without special needs and to help make it affordable for all.

Including Children with Special Needs: Are You and your Early Childhood Program Ready?

www.naeyc.org/files/yc/file/200903/BTJWatson.pdf

 

Your Personal Research Journey

My focus for this class is affordable childcare for children with disabilities. I have learned from personal experience that it is hard to find quality and affordable childcare for special needs children. My grandson is special needs and finding childcare that was affordable and could handle him was very hard. Because of his behavior he is only in school for an hour a day. If schools cannot handle him how will we be able to find quality childcare. We are not able to get a voucher to help pay and most places want more than we can afford. If we can get our government representatives to focus on this maybe help will come to all who need it. I am not saying it is only for children with special needs but even low or middle income families need it also.

I truly believe that there are trials and that they have existed for quite some time, but I also believe that change is on the up rise of things and we can make a difference if we don't lose hope.  A solid start has been made by many professional in this field to focus on the need for early childhood education but we must continue to keep plugging forward and know that we can have an abundant finish if we don't lose heart. We are all taking these classes because we about the children and we want to give them the best and quality childcare we can.

 

Final Blog Assignment

The experience that I gained from learning about the international early childhood field showed me that we have a lot of similarities and also many differences. The three consequences I gained from this assignment have been:  Teachers everywhere are lifelong learners, we are always learning from others to help improve our success to our classroom. Having the compassion for the children and wanting to see them to learn, grow and succeed in education and life. This is something all educators in the world want to see happen. It has also helped me appreciate how they are able to teach their children in unreasonable conditions.

The one goal that I have would be to stay knowledgeable of international awareness.  I would join an international organization that keeps me informed about countries and their early childhood education schools. I would want to be an advocate to help globally by sending them supplies they need to help the teachers to be able to succeed in educating the children.

Getting to Know Your International Contacts—Part 3

I have not heard from my international contacts so I decided to read the article.

While reading the UNESCO’s web page I discovered that there is a massive shortage of teachers in sub-Saharan Africa. With the shortage of well trained and motivated teachers is of particular concern in Africa, notably in Sub-Saharan Africa where 902 000 additional teachers are needed to reach the target (source: UNESCO’s Institute for Statistics, 2013). We know that every child in the world has the right to a quality education and with the shortage of qualified and motivated teachers is a major hurdle to this right. For too many children, more schooling has not resulted in more knowledge and skills.

The present programs of teacher’s education and training have unsuccessfully to provide the new teachers with the necessary skills and knowledge to teach effectively. One thing that happens is quality and equity are sacrificed to deliver some type of schooling. We all know that there is no short cut to quality education and learning. So with this in mind UNESCO Dakar is leading capacity-building projects for teachers in the neighboring areas which will improve the different countries’ institutional and organizational capacities.

They plan to outline and execute training programs, develop and review teacher-related policies, and contribute to knowledge production and sharing on teaching. Presently, there is a need for one million new teachers in sub-Saharan Africa.
 
Another important focus is the development of national and regional qualification structures for teachers in West African states. They wish to enable the definition of professional standards and clear professional pathways as key elements for the identification of teaching as a genuine profession and teachers’ mobility across countries.

The way this relates to my professional goals are because I believe in professional development to help educate teachers. With the help of UNESCO, teachers in Africa will have the same opportunities to provide quality education to all children through training and professional standards.

 

 

 

 

Sharing Web Resources

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The web resource that I decided to check out was Zero to Three, I had done a little research and reading on it awhile back for a class. I thought this would be a good time to check it out again. Checking it out I seen several links to different spots, I seen one that caught my eye and it was some letters MIECHV TACC. So curiosity caught the best of me, they stood for Maternal, Infant, and Early Childhood Home Visiting. What this program is for they visit the home of families to safeguard the health and safety of women, infants, and children. We have a program like that and it is called Healthy Families.

Another site I looked at was Early Head Start and looked over the cultural and linguistic responsiveness. The thing that I thought was they have a Head Start Bilingual Glossary which is a list of the most common terms used in the Head Start program. This is a glossary created to promote accurate and reliable translations from English to Spanish. With the Spanish language being rich and diverse, it is always a challenge to find common terms that most Spanish speakers in the U.S. will understand so in some cases multiple translations are provided to accommodate regional differences in usage.  Here are just a few examples:

school bus autobús escolar   Temporary Assistance to Needy Families Programa de Ayuda Temporal a Familias role play dramatización, juego de roles
sensory and motor skills destrezas o habilidades sensoriales y motoras sensory disorders trastornos sensoriales sensory screening prueba de detección de trastornos sensoriales, cribado de trastornos sensoriales
snack refrigerio, merienda Social and Emotional Development Desarrollo Social y Emocional social services servicios sociales social skills habilidades sociales software software

When I looked up the equity and excellence I found a few things that they are trying to do. They found some barriers and came up some changes. They were to empower and support communities; shift from family involvement to culturally competent family engagement; reduce language barriers by providing materials in native language. Another thing is they want to do is expand the supply of qualified, bilingual, and bicultural birth-to-three professionals.  Another change that they had want to make was to make available information and empower parents by helping them understand child development, ways to advocate for learning, and how to become their child's advocate whom I think is very important to help children succeed.

http://zerotothree.org/

 

 

 

Getting to Know Your International Contacts—Part 2

I have not heard from any of my contacts so for this blog so I am using information from the Harvard website. Reading about several different countries I have learned quite a few new things. One thing that I found interesting is this program called Saving Brains that is being develop to improve the results of children who live in poverty.  What they are doing is using several different interventions to nurture and protect the early brain development in the first 1,000 days of a child's life The great  thing about this program is working around the world to help save and protect all children.  I love the idea of this program because it is looking out for the children. In Brazil, they are forming several partnerships in order to create a science-driver early childhood program.  They are training Brazilian policy makers on how to apply developmental science to inform programs and policies.  In Canada they have a program called Alberta Family Wellness Initiative which believes in the science of child development to educate public policy.  What they are working on is researching early brain and biological development, mental health, as well as addiction.  They are also educating the policy makers, healthcare communities, and the public about the information that they find.

What all these countries are doing is very important for the welfare and education of all children. They are helping them to develop a better life for them and for their children too. Children are special and a gift from God and we need to take care of them all. The earlier we start with the education the better it is.

http://developingchild.harvard.edu/index.php/activities/global_initiative/

 

 

Getting to Know Your International Contacts—Part 1

During this course, we have had to contact different Early Educators from different parts of the world. I have not heard from any of my contacts so for this blog, I have read UNICEF’s article about childhood poverty in Indonesia. From reading this article I learned many things. Some of the things I learned are deficiencies, such as poor nutrition, are permanent by the age of 24 months and have lifelong cognitive, physical and reproductive repercussions for children.

The United Nations Convention on the Rights of the Child promises every child the right to

a suitable living for their physical, mental, spiritual, moral and social development and the right to the highest possible standard of health. It also advocates children’s right to access information and for their views to be heard. The impact of climate change is already and will continue to affect how well those rights are fulfilled.

Without accounting for the climate change, Indonesia has almost always struggled with high levels of malnutrition among children and women of reproductive age, and it has among the highest out-migration rates in South-East Asia. Nutrition and migration describe the essence of a child’s health status and the degree of their social protection. They are determinants of a child’s survival, of their physical, cognitive and social development and of the foundations for realizing.

For Indonesia, poor maternal and child care and feeding practices are the main cause of undernutrition in children and women. Recent data have shown declining rates of exclusive breastfeeding (from 40 to 32 per cent between2003 and 2007), poor complementary feeding (only 41 per cent of children aged 6–23 months are fed as per the World Health Organization

recommendations) and caring practices as well as poor maternal nutrition (BPS, 2008). There is also little access to health services, safe water and sanitation. This is compounded by high absolute poverty levels.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Establishing Professional Contacts

This is the website that I chose for this assignment it is a community of many organizations in other

countries that are for the education of young children. One of those that I e-mailed to ask to communicate with me about their education for the young. I have always had an interest in the Netherlands.

NetherlandsInternational Step by Step Association
Sarah Klaus
Email: sklaus@issa.nl

The second one I chose was from Croatia not sure why just sounded great.

Croatia
Open Academy "Step by Step", "Korak po Korak"
Nives Milinovic
Email: nives@korakpokorak.hr

Expanded Resources

Pre[K]Now: A Campaign of the Pew Center on the States
http://www.pewstates.org/projects/pre-k-now28067
(Newsletter: http://www.pewtrusts.org/news_room_alerts.aspx )

 
 

 

 

My Support

 

When it comes to support I have my family and co-workers. My strongest supporter was my husband until he passed away four years ago. He was the one who encourage me to take the step into getting my BA. I guess you could say he still supports me because I thought if he believed in me then I can go all the way and get my Masters. I also have my son and his wife encouraging me to do my best and telling me I will succeed. My co-workers are there showing me how to do things in the classroom and will help me to figure out things on my own and with them I am learning and they are learning from me. We work has a team and this helps me to be a team player and it helps me to never give up on a dream.

My one challenge is that for the first time I am going to be in charge of the class for one week. I am going to make lessons plans and set up groups, this is something I watched the teacher do and he thought it would be helpful to me to understand what it is like to teach a Special Ed class. I am nervous but I know that they will support and help me to feel comfortable. It is great that I know the children because I worked with them last year.

If I did not have the support of all these wonderful people I would not be where I am today. We all need a little help and support sometime in our life. I also have my faith which helps me each and every day.

My Connections to Play

When I was younger I would spend most of my time outside playing with my sisters and friends.  We would ride bikes, go to the park, or just hang out.  My parents felt that we needed to have outdoor time to be able to burn off energy and just have time to explore.  We really love to play out in the rain and use to jump in puddles and of course play in the mud. What do you make in the mud pies of course and then we would throw them at one another.  Then jump in the puddles to wash off the mud. The one thing we always played when the weather was really bad was play school.

The way play is today is that children do not have much time outside has we did has children. With all the Technology children are more adapt to be inside to play video or computer games. I also think most parents are scared to have their children outside if they cannot be with them because of all the dangers. My daughter-in-law rarely lets my grandchildren outside because she is too busy so when they are at my house I take them outside to play has much has I can.  We go swimming, waterpark or just play in the yard.

Children need play to learn to grow and to use their imagination and just have fun and fresh air.  They need more outside then just what they get at school.

 

 

Relationship Reflection

       Relationships are important because starting from a young age you build relationships and keep on developing them has you get older. Having a healthy relationship gives you a reason to be happy and to help during stressful times.  When my husband died my mother-in- law was there for me from making the arrangements to listening to me when I needed someone to talk to.

  Some people that I have a special relationship with are my mother-in-law, my son, and my grandsons. My strongest relationship was with my husband he was my best friend and was always there for me. Another person that I had a wonderful relationship with was my friend of 20 years we went through a lot together but we had each other’s back and I am her son’s godmother.

     I believe that the way these experiences have helped me in the early childhood field is that I have learned patience, listening, and to be non-judgmental. There is many different ways to learning and getting to know how each child learns and let them know how special they are. It will also teach you to form a relationship with the parents and other teachers.     

 

       

Testing

     There are many test’s out there to be able to figure out where a child is at in their skill set. There is the aptitude test is a way to figure out where a child’s IQ is at. The achievement test that can tell what a child can and cannot do which is normally done in the third grade and up. One of the most important is the national assessment of educational process that test the reading, math, and other skills in the educational world. When a child has a special needs are tested through a star test and Stanford-Binet IQ set is done

 

     I believe making in sure we fully know where a child is at in what they know before we continue in teaching a child is the most important thing in the educational world. My reason for saying that is you will not teach a 2 year old stuff that a 9 year old would know and do. It is always important to not stressing out the child more than they need to be because they will not be willing to learn anything you want to teach them. 

 

     In China, children do not start till age 7. They are tested by the requirements of the Republic of China Compulsory law of 1986. This means a child has 9 years of schooling. In turn, it is a 9 year schooling process in which 6 years children work on math, physical, music, art, nature, moral and society, and practical work. The remaining 3 years children are tested and do college exams to figure out what jobs they would be able to do.

    

Reference:

  

     Berger, K.S. (2012). The developing person through childhood (6^th Ed.) New York, NY: Worth Publisher

     http://sitemaker.umich.edu/vanschaack.356/synopsis_of_public_schools_in_china

 

 

Violence has a stressor

 

I believe that violence is a stressor for many children. I had a friend whose son was shot and it took a toll on his children. They were scared to sleep and started doing worse in school.  They would not trust anybody except their family. Violence to me is one of the biggest stressor for everyone but really bad for the children. They do not understand what is happening and why people would be so mean and want to hurt another person.  According to an article in the Daily Science; "We know that exposure to violence is linked with aggression, depression, post-traumatic stress symptoms and academic and cognitive difficulties in the short term, but little is known about the long-term effects of such exposure," said Elizabeth Susman, Jean Phillips Shibley Professor of Biobehavioral Health, Penn State. "Our data show that the stress reaction to violence exposure is not just immediate.”( www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2012/07/120703162630.htm).

To help them along their parents got them into counseling to help deal with their emotions and to help them find other ways to deal with the stress of it all.

A country that I am interested in learning more is Kuwait my son was stationed there and he told me some things that sounded interesting.

I was wondering how the children were doing after the war. According to the article I read the children are still having problems many years later.

People suffered from this brutal and fateful period when the country was under occupation, either by being forced to start over from scratch or by working in a new job, building a new house. Many people fell into poverty.

Experts have identified a number of different unhealthy emotions felt by those who lived through the occupation. The emotions themselves are not particularly different or unique from what children experience in many other situations. However, in this PTSD context, the Kuwaiti children are experiencing a number of these emotions simultaneously and with greater intensity. And this intensity, if left untreated, increases with time. Anxiety is the most common aspect of post-traumatic stress disorder especially in children. It is an unpleasant emotional state. It is frequently followed by physiological symptoms that may lead to fatigue or even exhaustion. It is something that I hope the children and all the people can get over what has happen and learn to be happy once again.

Penn State. "Exposure to violence has long-term stress effects among adolescents." ScienceDaily. ScienceDaily, 3 July 2012. <www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2012/07/120703162630.htm>.

Post-traumatic stress disorder in Kuwait." 123HelpMe.com. 30 May 2015
    <http://www.123HelpMe.com/view.asp?id=44228>.

 

 

 

Safe Water

Access to healthy water is important to me because I have seen what it is like not to have clean water. So many people in the world does not have clean water and children get so ill and many die. In the United States about the only time we do not have fresh water available is after a severe storms of floods. Most of us in the U.S. have easy access to bottled water or water  filters that we can use.

In Africa where there is lack of clean water 1 out of every 5 deaths under the age of 5 is due to a water-related disease. Most of these waterborne diseases are not found in developed counties because they have a sophisticated water systems that filters and chlorinate to eliminate all disease organisms. Clean and safe water is essential to healthy living. As you might know there is lots in poverty places that have no water in Africa because they cannot afford to clean the water.  So if someone does find a source of water than everyone rushes to it and then the clean water is gone.
The information that I have learned and would share is by talking about this with my students and together maybe start some type of fundraiser to help those in Africa to help the children over there. I worked at a school that we did to a fundraiser to help dig a well in Africa so they could have clean water and the children felt proud because raised enough for two wells.