Week 8 Assignment

I have learned through Michele’s Adventure and Godfrey her international contact who is an Early Childhood Education and Development Specialist from Kenya.

Godfrey shared

v  That their government is addressing the issue of equity because there are a large number of children who do not benefit from early childhood services due to inaccessibility and poverty.

v  That  Parliament is currently considering a policy that will make early childhood education part of the education system and therefore mandatory

Consequence:

I have become more aware of the issues in early childhood from an international perspective and I have realized that many countries are facing the same challenges in this area.

I have learned from the article Fostering Child Development through Empowerment, Unity, and Cooperation.

v   In a rural village in Paraguay, a Catholic Church relief organization named Pastoral Social, established Pastoral Del Nino. This organization employs a community-building model which teaches parents about their children’s needs and helps them by encouraging them to work together to strengthen the community.

Consequence:

I have learned that international communities employ programs and have organizations that are put into place to give it’s children, families, and communities a chance at learning skills that can benefit everyone as a whole and help educate the children and families alike.

Consequence:

I have learned that although I live here in the US other countries have similar struggles in their educational systems as we so, other countries set in lace programs and organizations to aid in the education of its children, and that the world as a whole is focusing on educating its future leaders.

One goal for international awareness:

I have resolved that I will continue to search for an international contact that I can communicate with. I was so impressed by Michele’s contact and how informative he was on the current issues in country. This type of contact can benefit me in my pursuit of this Early Childhood Studies Degree.

UNESCO'S Early Childhood Care and Education Web Page

The insights that I gained from Unesco were found under the news section. One article spoke on the role of education in a world of seven billion people.  Unesco believes that

v In a world of seven billion everyone has a right to an education

v Considers education to be the best insurance against poverty. It stresses the importance of education for sustainable human development and supports countries to improve access and quality and to redress inequalities in their education systems.

v Champions the efforts of 75 million teachers to provide quality education, and advocates for the training and recruitment of an additional 2 million teachers to achieve Education for All by 2015.

The article every child has a right to an education speaks on the Convention on the rights of the Child. On the occasion of the 20th anniversary of the Convention, the biggest challenge is to eliminate disparities in education and to ensure that the core obligations of States regarding the right to education remain in the forefront, not only for accelerating progress towards the Millennium Development Goals, but for pushing the Education for All agenda forward. The right to education is not only a human right in itself but also essential for the exercise of all other human rights.

The article Early Childhood Care: The Earlier the Better states that Early childhood care and education carries enormous potential to address this emergency. From the World Conference on Education for All in Jomtien in 1990 to the Dakar World Education Forum in 2000, UNESCO has constantly promoted an expanded and inclusive vision of learning. Over the past year, we have organized world conferences on inclusion, literacy and adult learning, education for sustainable development and higher education to further encourage this integrated, lifelong vision of learning. We also call it a holistic or a comprehensive approach. It simply means that we consider that learning enhances a person’s potential throughout life, from the earliest years through adulthood.

These articles opened reinforced my beliefs about early childhood education. I do believe that every child deserves the best education possible and that they deserve a teacher that will stop at no cost to make sure that they have imparted valuable and life changing lessons into a child

A Look At Inequity

 

Wow, this is fascinating we are studying this week about inequities and the newsletter that I subscribed to has an article about racial inequities. I am going to share it with you so that you can read it for yourself.

Racial Inequities: What Schools Can Do

EducationWorld is pleased to present this resource shared by the State Education Resource Center (SERC) in CT. This adapted material originally appeared in the SERC document Equity in Education: A Transformational Approach.
This article offers an overview of the problem of racial inequities in education and discusses changes that can be made in the area of leadership in order to meet this challenge. See part 2 of the article for additional strategies in the areas of professional capacity, school climate, school-family-community partnerships and teaching and learning.


W.E.B. Du Bois wrote in 1903 that “the problem of the Twentieth Century is the problem of the color-line—the relation of the darker to the lighter races of men in Asia and Africa, in America and the islands of the sea.” Over 100 years later, we continue to see that problem of the color-line in our schools today: incredible disparities between the educational outcomes of children of color and their White counterparts. “In nearly every category associated with positive academic outcomes,” according to Pedro Noguera of New York University, “students of color typically are underrepresented, and in categories associated with negative outcomes, they are overrepresented.”

The State Education Resource Center (SERC), as part of its commitment to improve the achievement of Connecticut's children and youth, provides professional development and information dissemination in the latest research and best practices to educators, service providers, and families throughout the state, as well as job-embedded technical assistance and training within schools, programs, and districts.

The state of Connecticut and the nation as a whole are currently confronted by what is being called the civil rights crisis of our time: the loss of our students of color to the racial predictability of the achievement gaps. But students of color are not failing; our educational system is failing them.
For centuries, we have avoided discussing institutionalized racism and its detrimental effects on our students of color as well as their White peers. Such avoidance is mainly due to the uncomfortable feelings and reactions brought about by racial discourse. Feelings of resentment and guilt are some of the most common emotions experienced by people who engage in racial discourse.
Conversations about race and culture are not meant to be easy, but without them we will never begin to understand the root causes of our racial disparities and challenge our current thinking.
Educators within our school systems ask repeatedly for prescriptive strategies that will help them improve the academic achievement of students of color on high-stakes tests. What we need is a pedagogical approach that focuses not on racialized instructional strategies but on creating an educational environment that is culturally relevant and respectful. Based upon the work of researchers and practitioners in the field, SERC [State Education Resource Center in CT] defines a culturally relevant and respectful environment as having the following elements:

1. Teachers who are highly aware of their own beliefs, attitudes, and biases and those of others;
2. Students who are empowered to use their own cultural characteristics, experiences, and perspectives for academic success; and
3. A curriculum that engages and affirms both students’ and teachers’ identities, cultural and experiential reference points, and world views in the process of learning.

Only when instructional strategies are implemented in a context of mutual respect will we begin to see the impact of our efforts. A culturally and racially relevant approach allows educators to relate to students and allows students to connect to the curriculum and demonstrate their knowledge in meaningful ways.
Potential Solutions to Addressing Systemic Inequities
Creating equity at the district, school, and classroom levels requires this systemic and culturally relevant approach. The literature is replete with information on the essential elements of educational reform. Based upon the work of the Consortium on Chicago School Research, SERC has considered five critical elements: Leadership, Professional Capacity, School Climate, School-Family-Community Partnerships, and Teaching & Learning. These elements are essential in order to achieve systemic transformation in education and ensure an equitable education for all children.
Leadership
According to Hilliard (1995), in order to eradicate the racial predictability of the achievement gaps, leaders must have the skill, will, and knowledge to uproot the underlying factors that contribute to them – qualities that are often overlooked. Educators need to examine the structural practices that perpetuate the isolation of students of color in an educational system that historically was not created for them. This requires leadership positioned to provide the necessary pressures and supports for the development of this skill, will, and knowledge.
Almost every approach to educational reform acknowledges the role of leaders in directing efficient and sustainable change. Therefore, educational reform efforts must begin with leaders who demand high expectations for all students. Any tendency of a district, school administration, faculty, and/or staff to rationalize the failure of students of color as “normal” must not be tolerated.
Whether that rationalization is one of complacency because of a history of persistent and pervasive failure, or abdication of responsibility because of poverty, or a misperception that certain families do not value education, does not matter. Leaders must challenge any attitudes and beliefs, including their own, that accept the failure of students of color.
To move to a climate of high expectations and achievement for all students, leadership must focus on assessment and instruction that are effective for all students and ensure that results are continually monitored against the goals set forward to improve academic outcomes. Leaders must facilitate opportunities for members of their staff and community to courageously dialogue about the intersection of race and education. The understandings generated by such dialogue will serve as the platform to develop structural systems, policies, and practices that lead to higher student achievement. Leaders must assist school personnel and community members to clarify their understanding of what the Aspen Institute Roundtable on Community Change (2004) referred to as the “forces that maintain the racial disparity status quo and constrain the potential success of strategies for change.” We refer to this understanding as professional capacity.
References (in order of mention)
Du Bois, W.E.B. (1903). The souls of black folk. Chicago: A.C. McClurg & Co.
Noguera, P. A. and J. Y. Wing, Eds. (2006). Unfinished business: Closing the racial achievement gap in our schools. San Francisco: Jossey-Bass.
State Education Resource Center. (2009). Culturally responsive pedagogy working definition. Middletown, CT: SERC.
Consortium on Chicago School Research at the University of Chicago (CCSR). (2010). Organizing schools for improvement: Lessons from Chicago. Chicago: University of Chicago Press.
Hilliard, A. (1995). The maroon within us: Selected essays on African American community socialization. Halethorpe, MD: Black Classic Press.
Aspen Institute Roundtable on Community Change. (2004). Structural racism and community building. Washington, DC: Aspen Institute


This was interesting to me. There was one statement that I want to stress and it is that educational reform efforts must begin with leaders who demand  high expectations from all students. I agree with this, I too ask my students for their very best that they can give me being as they are pre-k  students.

Global Child Development

The Global Childhood Initiative has three strategic objectives that are used to build a portfolio of activity.

      Early childhood Development

      Child Mental Health

      Children in Crisis and Conflict Situations

Applying the Science of early childhood in Brazil

The Center aims to use the science of child health and development to guide stronger policies and larger investments to benefit young children and their families in Brazil.

This project represents a unique opportunity for the Center to work with Brazilian scholars, policymakers, and civil society leaders to adapt the Center’s programmatic model for the local context in order to catalyze more effective policies and programs that will, ultimately, foster a more prosperous, sustainable, and equitable society.

Together, these organizations will engage in the following activities:

       Building a scientific agenda and community of scholars around early childhood development;

       Synthesizing and translating scientific knowledge for application to social policy. This will include working with the Center’s longtime partner organization, Frameworks Institute, to effectively communicate the science of child development in the Brazilian cultural context;

       Strengthening leadership around early childhood development through an executive leadership course for policymakers;

       Translating and adapting the Center’s existing print and multimedia resources for a Brazilian audience.

Articles on Early childhood Education

"Protecting Brains, Not Simply Stimulating Minds"

In an August 19 commentary in Science, Center Director Jack P. Shonkoff makes the case for scientists, practitioners, and policymakers to work together to design and test creative new interventions that mitigate the harmful effects of significant adversity in early childhood. As Shonkoff states in the commentary, "New strategies will be needed to strengthen the capacities of parents and providers of early care and education (beyond the provision of additional information and supports) to help young children cope with stress."

"Building a Foundation for Prosperity on the Science of Early Childhood Development"

Center Director Jack P. Shonkoff authored this article in the Winter 2011 issue of Pathways, a publication from the Stanford Center for the Study of Poverty and Inequality. In the article, Shonkoff describes how poverty harms the cognitive development of children and impairs the biological “memories” created by gene-environment interactions, and discusses what can be done to break this entrenched cycle.

"Science Does Not Speak for Itself: Translating Child Development Research for the Public and Its Policymakers"

Science has an important role to play in advising policymakers on crafting effective responses to social problems that affect the development of children, according to this article co-authored by Center Director Jack P. Shonkoff and Susan Nall Bales, a contributing member of both the National Scientific Council on the Developing Child and the National Forum on Early Childhood Policy and Programs.  The article, which appears in the January/February, 2011, issue of Child Development, describes the work of a multi-year collaboration and underscores the need to view the translation of science into policy and practice as an important academic endeavor in its own right.

"Neuroscience and the Future of Early Childhood Policy: Moving from Why to What and How"

This article, by Center Director Jack P. Shonkoff and Pat Levitt, science director of the National Scientific Council on the Developing Child, advocates for greater synergy between neuroscience and innovation in early childhood policy to improve life outcomes for children experiencing significant adversity. As the authors state, “Neuroscience can play an important role in catalyzing the creative, new thinking needed to shape a new era of policies.”  The article appears in the September 9, 2010, issue of Neuron

Can We Fix Our Schools? YES WE CAN!

There was an article Teaching is just impossible—isn’t it. In the article an educator spoke on how she taught in the classroom, observed the classroom, tutored and tested in the classroom. She stated that she discovered that there were only two types of schools, those that are successful and those that are unsuccessful.

Successful schools are typically suburban; primarily attended by well-dressed, well-cared-for, well-prepared students with involved and motivated parents. Successful schools exude an aura of excitement and optimism, a sense of order and purpose. The buildings are bright and cheerful -- and everyone is smiling.

Unsuccessful schools seem to be predominantly urban or rural. Students are overwhelmingly poor, members of minority groups, or both. Their parents often are under-educated, under-employed, or unemployed; many are alone, exhausted, and uncertain about how they can contribute to their children's education. Unsuccessful schools exude an aura of resignation and defeat. Teachers are harried; students are disorganized and inattentive. Even the newest buildings feel dark and close -- and everyone appears afraid to smile.

The educator spoke on how she believed the saying “ that we can’t fix our schools until we fix society”. She stated that many of her friends took early retirement because they believed this as well. But the reality of it is that you cannot fix society so what is left is fixing the school.

“In "Dispelling the Myth Revisited," the Education Trust identified 4,500 high poverty and/or high minority public schools that are also among the top performing schools in their states. These are some of the poorest schools in their states. They are also the best. The bad news is that we can't, in fact, "fix" society. The good news is that apparently we can fix our schools”.

Schools can overcome obstacles and become top ranking schools by looking at the characteristics of successful schools and emulating them.

*Effective schools have strong principals who demand the freedom and flexibility to hire and fire, to set curriculum and school policy. Effective principals provide instructional leadership. They support teachers' efforts to excel through training and mentoring. They find ways to help parents support their children's academic achievement but demand that students take responsibility for their own education -- regardless of the level of their parents' involvement.

*Effective schools employ teachers who support and mentor one another. Effective teachers concentrate on academic achievement. They recognize that all students need to master a set of basic reading, math, and English-language skills. They teach those skills first, and they consistently measure their students' performance through standards-based testing.

*Effective schools have a clearly defined mission, supported by specific measurable goals. That mission and those goals are communicated to staff, parents, and students, and everyone is expected to make a commitment to promote them.

*Effective schools expect students to excel and maintain a culture of excellence.

Yes, it is harder to teach today. It is harder still to teach in schools with a preponderance of poor or minority students. Kids have changed. Parents have changed. Society has changed. Educators, however, cannot throw up their hands in defeat because they are no longer greeted each morning by students who are ready and eager to learn. Schools have to change too. Some already have.

We can't "fix" society, but maybe -- just maybe -- we can improve society by fixing our schools.

This too can work for early childhood by emulating other successful programs. The thing is what is considered to be a successful early childhood program. I am sure that there are early childhood programs that are very successful, but there are more that are striving to get there. I take into consideration all of these things since I am a pre-k teacher. I want our program to be highly successful in the educating of its students.

Childhood Poverty in Mongolia

Alternative assignment. I chose to read about the people of Mongolia, and their problems with poverty. In 1990 Mongolia transitioned from a socialist, centrally-planned one-party state to a multi-party democratic state with a liberalized economy. The rapid social adjustment hit Mongolian families hard which caused the people to fall into poverty.

·         Unemployment levels rose and inflation and prices soared. This led to the decline of the social services and welfare aid for the people. Before transition, Mongolia's social services were of a high standard and accessible to all. Now, access to health care for poor families, migrants and those in remote rural areas is poor.

·         In 1998 a major survey indicated that 36% of the population was living below the income poverty line and that poverty in Mongolia tends to be higher in many urban areas than in rural. The lives of families beneath the poverty line also appear to have got worse over the 1990s.

·         Malnutrition is a growing concern - 30% of children under five in 1998 had a low height for their age and 10% were underweight. Many children and their families also show signs of nutrient deficiency. Some 51% of the population did not have access to safe drinking water in 1998.

Despite Mongolia trying to implement a better government for its people, the old adage is true. The rich or well off are becoming richer and the poor are becoming poorer.

March 30, 2010

 Recently, the United Nations Children’s Fund (UNICEF), with the cooperation of the Government of Mongolia, airlifted essential emergency supplies to children living in rural areas of Mongolia severely hit with extreme cold. Supplies included blankets, warm clothing, fuel for heating and for cooking, and hygiene kits.

Due to weeks of heavy snowfall, sixty percent of Mongolia is covered by between eight to sixteen inches of snow, with temperatures as low as negative fifty degrees Celsius. At least two million livestock have died of starvation, threatening the lives of nomadic herders, who rely heavily on agriculture and herding and who make up one third of the population of Mongolia.

Educational World Weekly Newsletter

I joined the Educational World Weekly Newsletter. This web-site has a lot of valuable resources and information in early childhood. This weeks newsletter included the feature story of No Child Left Behind: 10 Years Later. This article talks about the 10th anniversary of the signing of the Elementary and Secondary Education Act of 2001, or "No Child Left Behind.". It also discusses Adequate Yearly Progress (AYP) and its continuous struggles. The good news and bad news of No Child Left Behind.

Some of the positive effects of NCLB have included improvements to schools’ curricula and increasing attention paid to underserved subgroups within the student population.

Some of the law’s negative effects have included (1) a reduction in time spent on subjects not assessed by standardized tests, (2) a narrowing of content within tested subjects (for example, assigning shorter reading passages, as opposed to novels), and (3) a reduction in staff morale.

The newsletter also has a section called Early Childhood Resource. In this section there is an activity bank and it gave an idea that the schools could use to help celebrate the 100th day of school.

Encourage children to bring in canned goods. When you have 100 cans or items, donate them to a local charity.

Invite children to use paper, lace, glitter, and stickers to create 100 valentine cards. Arrange for the group to deliver them to the children's unit at a nearby hospital, senior citizens' complex, or nursing home; or mail them to servicemen and women around the globe

The link for this site is http://www.educationworld.com/