Practicing Awareness of Microaggressions

The memory of microaggression that I will share towards myself comes in the form of a microinsult. Growing up and as an adult I have been told several times that I do not “sound black” when I am speak. I take offense to this. Being told that I do not “sound black” implies that black people only hold conversations full of grammatical errors and use slang and vulgarities. I make sure that I let everyone who implies or makes this silly statement towards me that I take offense and that they are insulting me and stereotyping me.

The information that I have obtained this week on microaggression, discrimination, prejudice and stereotypes will help me as I move forward in my career and as I raise my children because I am now more aware and will watch what I say. I recently attended a meeting where another director was telling a story about how her 5 year old daughter was telling her she did not have anyone to play with on the playground at school because she “didn't speak Dora.” The director laughed about it and then ended the story with “but she is not prejudice or anything.”  When people feel they need to tell me that they are "not prejudice" I usually think that they are. Children must be taught at an early age that there are people around them who speak languages other than English and that the language that the children were speaking was Spanish and not Dora. We cannot take these teachable moments for granted and laugh them off we must use these moments to help prevent these children from eventually growing up to use microaggressions and offending people in the future.

Perspectives on Diversity and Culture

I completed this assignment while visiting friends for the weekend so I posed these questions to them along with my husband. The cultural differences included gender and age. They collectively came up with the definitions for culture and diversity. Culture was defined as a person knowing where they have come from, their roots, traditions and being able to pass that onto the next generation. Diversity was defined as being exposed to and being able to adjust to your environment including how your react when you are around people who of a different tradition or culture than your own.

Based upon the answers that I received I believe the answers did reflect some of what we have studied in this course. I think that the answers that were given were generalized statements that I believe the majority of people would provide if posed the same question. Unless you have been involved with taking a course on cultural diversity most people do not think deeper or past the obvious. I am guilty of the same but am glad that I have enrolled in this course and am looking forward to the next few weeks and the things that I will learn. As a result of this exercise I think that there should be more discussion or training on this topic beginning at the high school or middle school level in order to raise awareness and possibly prevent some of the events related to lack of cultural awareness that we are hearing of in the news these days. 

My Family Culture

If I had to relocate to a new country due to the scenario in this week’s assignment I would take a photo album/scrapbook, bible and cookbook. The scrapbook would allow me to have photos and memories of my family and friends. The bible will allow me continue to study and practice my religion. My cookbook would allow me to continue to cook and pass down traditional foods to my children and others that I come in contact with in my new country.  

If I found out upon arrival that I had to leave two of the items behind I would leave the cookbook and bible because I can rely on my prior knowledge to get me through cooking and God is always with me and I can practice my religion without having to have the bible on hand.

Insight that I have gained this week is that I hadn't thought about what I would truly do or take if I had to leave my home country and live somewhere new due to a catastrophe. I have seen it many times on the news and have close friends who had to relocate as a result of Hurricane Katrina in Louisiana but I don’t think it really sank in as to what they went though until I put myself in that place this week. I will never take not having to do this (sudden relocation) for granted again. 

When I Think of Research.........

The most important insight or skill that I have learned from this course is how to read research. The breakdown that we received at the beginning of this course helped me to see what parts I need to read and what parts I can skim or skip over. I think this benefited me a lot as I would sometimes get so confused when looking at research that I would just say forget it and just use another source for information in the previous courses. I have also learned how to identify valid resources and vocabulary words such as quantitative, qualitative, mixed method, triangulation and validity as it relates to research.

I have to admit I was not very excited when I saw the name of this course as our next course but I am glad that I made it through. I would have to say that research is not my passion but know that I could get through it if I had to.

The lessons that I have learned about planning, designed, and conducting research in early childhood are that you must first make sure the benefits of the research outweigh the risks and the ethics involved in the research process.

Some of challenges that I have encountered during this course was knowing whether I was on the right track during my simulation. This was something that was new to me and I was confused a lot of the time.

I would like to wish all of my colleagues luck as we continue on this journey together. We are almost there!

Research Around the World

The website that I chose to explore this week was  from the European Early Childhood Education Research Association (EECERA) found at http://www.eecera.org/.  Some of the topics found in the journal included play, motor-skills, social-emotional interaction and technology and outdoor activity.

An article topic that caught my attention was entitled “How often do you play with your child? The influence of parents’ cultural capital on the frequency of familial activities from age three to six."This article caught my attention because I have children who are between the ages of three and six. As a working parent who is also attending school I find that it is often hard for me to find time or the energy to play with my children and keep up with all the things that I have to do throughout the day. According to the abstract:

The article analyses the role of parents' cultural capital as a mediating factor between families' social and ethnic background and the frequency of stimulating familial activities in early childhood. Using the data from the German longitudinal study ‘Preschool Education and Educational Careers among Migrant Children’, it is shown that parents' cultural capital completely mediates the effect of mother's education and part of the ethnic origin effect. Additional longitudinal analyses reveal that the influence of parents' cultural capital changes over time and is most pronounced at the earliest measurement.

I was not able to read the full article as I had to have had a subscription but I feel that it is important to find time to play with my children and am looking forward to the break between the semester and the warmer weather so that I am able to go out and play with them and share times and cultural capital with my children.

European Early Childhood  Research Journal, 2014

Vol.22, No.1, 4-13, http:/ /doi/full/10.1080/1350293X.2013.865355

Research that Benefits Children and Families—Uplifting Stories

I do not know anyone who has personally participated in a research study but I do know people who I believe have personally benefited from the research process. My mother was diagnosed with breast cancer in 1996. She is currently in remission but I believe if it had not been for scientific research and the people who participated in the medical studies prior to my mother’s diagnoses she may not be here with us now. I believe the research process is critical to the preservation of life and for the betterment of our society but only when it is done is a safe and ethical manner.

I also located an interesting article that relates to my simulation topic of social/emotional development and its influence on a child’s future. In this study 1000 children were followed for 30 years in order to see how their ability or development of self-control as a child affected their health, wealth, and criminal offending. This study suggests that parents should focus on strategies that will encourage their children to develop self control as early as toddlerhood. Children will benefit from the development of self control and may be less likely to suffer from ill health, substance abuse, poor finances or perform criminal acts in the future. The study can be found at: http://www.pnas.org/content/108/7/2693.full.pdf+html

                                                                                                                                      

Reference

"A gradient of childhood self-control predicts health, wealth, and public safety," Moffitt et al., 2011, Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences USA, Volume 108, p. 2693 - 2698.

Personal Research Journey

The simulation topic that I have chosen is school readiness. I would like to know what factors contribute to a child being ready for their elementary school journey. How does a child’s parental involvement impact their readiness, does a child’s social/emotional developmental state play a factor and also how does play contribute to a child’s school readiness.

I currently work with preschool children and have a child who will enter preschool next year and one who is in Kindergarten this year so the topic of school readiness is a personal one for me. I would like to be able to provide the parents that I work with researched based information and I would also like to make sure that I am doing everything possible to ensure that my children are ready for school.

I look forward to learning and sharing with my colleagues as I continue on this journey so please feel free to provide me with any insight or resources that you feel are relevant to my topic and I will do the same.