Professional Hopes and Goals

 

   When I think about working with children and families who come from diverse backgrounds, I hope to have received the knowledge on how to successfully cater to the needs of the child and family as of assisting in proper educational support in the classroom and developing a strong relationship with the family create a sense of comfort for them and being able to join together to better help meet the needs of the child.

         One goal I would like to set for the early childhood field related to issues of diversity, equity, and social justice is to learn how to reduce negative attitudes and responses that create unintentional forms if bias and create a more colorful classroom that in no displays any exceptional of children and families of diverse backgrounds, better-yet, making them more of a priority.

      

        I would like to say thank you to all of my colleagues that I have gotten the chance to work with in this course. From having the chance to take in the many insights you have shared in your discussions and having the chance to give tips and ideas to one another… Thank you!! It has been a pleasure to work with all of you, and I hope to see you all in our next glass. Good luck on your educational journey J

Welcoming Families From Around the World

Guinea

        As working as a head start teacher, I was recently acknowledged that I would be receiving a diverse student and family from the Country of Guinea. I had never heard of this country, which means I am illiterate of anything, regarding its history, practices, social living, beliefs, education, religion or anything else connected with this country. I slightly worried about how I could help this new child and family of the country of Guinea adapt to my classroom and new environment without having much knowledge on their homeland, then I came to the conclusion that practicing these particular steps of being culturally responsive in the classroom could be a major staring point to success.

 The five ways I chose prepare myself to be culturally responsive towards this family were to:

1. Collecting resources and reading up to advance my knowledge on this particular country to gain possible insights that could relate to my family I will be working with. Also going outside my classroom and asking for guidance and advice from my other fellow teachers.

2. Prepare myself to carefully avoid and watch for cultural conflicts in the classroom, forms of biases or prejudices of any way and to be able to meet all needs of this new student coming into my class just as I do for my other students.

3. Decorate my classroom with pictures, textbooks, toys and other material that gives a welcoming atmosphere for the child and family and helps to show that this particular culture is accepted and matters as well

4. Think of and create activities that are helpful in promoting one's self-esteem, and activities that also gives the new child a sense of expressing themselves to their classmates along with the other classmates to be able to express themselves to one another, which may lead to more interaction with one another.

5. Plan a conference with the new family, allowing them to ask any questions they may having, to give them the opportunity to speak of any suggestions they may have, in hopes to form a relationships with the family to be able to learn more about any boundaries they may have to avoid overstepping them.

 I believe that these preparations would benefit both the family and I by me being able to better assist this family by catering to their necessities respectfully, teaching their child to my fullest potential and learning how to prepare and teach those students of diverse culture in my classroom and for future references as well.

Ultimately, I believe that these steps of preparation will help this family feel more safe and secure away from their homeland.


The Personal Side of Bias, Prejudice, and Oppression

 

 

           I remember an incident once where I witnessed a form of bias and prejudice. I and a couple of my friends and relatives were out celebrating our friend's birthday, upon this celebration we decided to go to this particular restaurant to eat. After we were seated by the lady that greeted us in the front, a waiter came moments later and asked what kind of drinks would we like. everyone gave the waiter their desired drink of choice, except one of our male friends at the table. with a stale face, he replied, " I don't want this faggot serving me a drink". Everyone at the table was astonished. the waiter, surprisingly kept a smile on his face and stated that he would have our drinks out shortly and walked away.

 

           The biases and prejudice in this incident diminished equity, due to the fact that our male friend did not want to be served by our waiter, simply because he was a homosexual male, was judged by his physical appearance and feminine accent. Because our waiter happened to be in relations with those of the same sex as his own, he was not treated equally as others and publicly humiliated by the comment that our friend directed towards him.

 

This incident made me feel very embarrassed and sorry for the young man that waited on our table and for my friend, to find that he had such a bias perspective towards homosexual men, and last for myself for unknowingly being involved with a person as such. I never thought that I had been friends with anyone who was so judgmental.

 

My friend would have had to be the one to change in order to turn this incident into an opportunity for greater equity. because of the fact that we as humans are different, non are the same, meaning different sexual orientations as well. My friend's perspective and attitude towards homosexuals would have to be changed, and he must learn to accept people as they are and treat them as human beings.