Sharing Web Resources

I have chosen to study the NIEER website and this week I have explored even further. I went into the Research section. This section contained an area called Access. It brought me to a section with links to various articles about access to high-quality early education.

This article stated the importance and evidence that supports the fact that local, state, and federal governments should expand access to quality pre-k and other enhancements of early education, especially for low income families as these children benefit the most from high quality education and will close achievement gaps for these children. Policy makers need to invest in policies that enable all children, especially those in low-income families, to access quality pre-k.

http://nieer.org/publications/nieer-working-papers/expanding-access-quality-pre-k-sound-public-policy

Children that are African-American may experience opportunity gaps from limited access to high quality early education. This may cause achievement gaps. These gaps are hard to close but can be preventable if more access to early education were available. Equity and excellence can only be achieved if access to high quality programs increases.

The recommendations in this article are:

·         Increase public support for high quality care and education along with support from the federal government to improve quality

·         Offer high quality programs to families living 200 percent below the poverty level

·         Federal incentives for states to expand access to state funded Pre-k

·         Improve data collection on specific income and ethnicities

http://nieer.org/sites/nieer/files/Equity%20and%20Excellence%20African-American%20Children%E2%80%99s%20Access%20to%20Quality%20Preschool_0.pdf

I looked at the most recent newsletter on NIEER’s website and found much information related to the topics we are studying. The first part of the newsletter was called Hot Topics. Under this section the very first article addressed a topic we are discussing. It was the federal budget proposal as stated Obama’s State of the Union address. Obama is putting forth initiatives to simplify childcare for families. It also tells Obama’s plan for expanding funding for preschool development grants and also add funding for childhood and expansion of the Child and Development tax credit.

http://nieer.org/publications/online-newsletters/volume-14-issue-3

  

I next went to Resources. That brought me to a wealth of information. I found a link to Wonder What’s Happening in Your State. I then went to Early Education in the News, next Pre-K funding across states, and lastly Preschool Yearbook. You can go there and find your specific state. It addresses all of the trends and issues we are studying. You can find out information on access, state spending and quality.

http://nieer.org/sites/nieer/files/yearbook2013.pdf

The website and the newsletter both contain information that adds to my understanding of equity and excellence in early care and education. The research is clear high quality education is so important for good outcomes for children and families. Children in low income families need high quality education the most. Quality early education needs to be attainable for all but most importantly for children living in low income families. The website and newsletter offer ample information about equity. I can see from the NIEER website that early education is at the forefront of conversation and debate.

The other new insights about issues and trends in the early childhood field that I gained this week from exploring the website and /or the e-newsletter is that these are current issues and trends for a reason. More and more families are looking for help in acquiring the very best for their children and family. The issues of early childhood are happening in all of our communities and going all the way up to the president and the federal government. All of these issues and trends go hand in hand. Children and families need access to quality programs. Expansion needs to happen to allow for more slots in early childhood care. There needs to be increased government funding to support these programs. Programs need to be assessed for high quality. We learned this week that responsiveness is part of equity. The NIEER website offered many resources for programs to access their own responsiveness to culture and language. There are many mentions to Head Start and Early Head Start. One insight that I have gained is that programs need to look at Head Start as a role model for equity in the early childhood field.

Getting To Know Your International Contacts-Part 2

These are the exact words of my conversation partner, Gem Munro in Bangladesh. I wanted to share his exact words as our communications are sporadic due to where he is at the moment. He emailed this to me just a few days ago. This may not speak to typical early childhood education or the typical education system at all but it does address creating an equitable situation for families in the poorest slums of Bangladesh and how one man is making a huge difference in the lives of children and families. He is making schooling possible where it would ordinarily be impossible as these families are too poor to attend school. This is equity. This is making a change to better children and families. This is affecting positive social change for the betterment of a society.

Please excuse my delay in answering your last email; travel in Bangladesh is quite hazardous these days, and I've been stuck in locations where internet access can be difficult.

As you are familiar with the work of Amarok Society, it won't come as a surprise to you that we don't treat our "clients'" poverty as their core problem. We regard ignorance as their core problem. It may seem a bit of a chicken-or-egg question, and it's true that poverty has been an impediment to them gaining the education they need, but the conditions that trap them in poverty are all products of ignorance: lives of disorder, filth and disease, lack of valuable abilities, over-reproduction, underdeveloped powers of thought, crippling customs such as early marriage and household slavery (for girls and women), mistaken expediencies such as child labour, pessimistic fatalism and the inability to envision anything better. Providing the mothers of our slums with education (primarily for the purpose of them, in turn, educating the children of their slums) creates the conditions permitting them to climb out of their poverty. Their lives become ordered and purposeful, health improves, they develop self-confidence and optimism, a sense of independence and individuality, and their view of what is possible in their lives widens. They undertake initiatives they wouldn’t have before, including business ventures. Their (much smaller) families, of course, enjoy these benefits, too. Husbands’ views of their own capabilities heighten, and their (many fewer) children become ambitious where futures were never considered before, and their ambitions are realistic, as they include a commitment to further education.

It’s a fact that the higher a person’s education, the higher her expectations for her life, and the greater her willingness and determination to fulfil those expectations herself. We didn’t create our programme in order to improve the financial condition of the mothers we teach, but we anticipated that as a secondary benefit, and that has been the case. We have plenty of reason to believe, at the ten-year mark of our endeavours, that the children our mothers teach will achieve a dramatic improvement in their financial situation (Munro, G. personal email communication, February, 3, 2015).”

My other conversation partner is Michael Hibblen. He is the principal of the American School of Milan. We had a Skype meeting this week. His school begins in early childhood. His school of early childhood starts with 3 year olds. The preschool sounds very much like my own school right here in Orlando, Florida. He was not able to speak much about issues and trends outside of his school. He did say that a typical Italian school has not changed much. They are very traditional. You will find a teacher in front of the classroom lecturing. The children will be completing many worksheets. He called it “drill and kill”. He said that each subject has a textbook and the children fill in the blanks. He said it hasn’t changed much since the 1960’s. Testing is done in the eighth grade and then again at the end of high school. The test results determine if you are able to attend college or university.

I asked him about standards in his school as far as his schools accreditation. ASM is accredited by the Middle States Association. They come in to reaccredit every five years. I questioned him about standards for his teachers and their level of education. All of his teachers have a Bachelors Degree and at least two years experience when they are hired. No further training or continuing education is required. Teachers do not move around once you are hired that is your classroom for the entire time you work at the school.

I asked him about equitability at his school. He told me that there is none. His school is private and costs a lot to attend.

I asked him about children with special needs that need support. He told me that they can only handle minor issues of children with varying needs. They only offer recommendations and the families can only get support outside of the school. If there are bigger issues, the child and family are asked to exit the school. They are not tied to any state or county laws.

The school is a full English emersion school. There are 52 nationalities represented mostly Korean, Italian and Saudi Arabian.

He described an early childhood classroom. The classroom is divided into clearly defined learning and play centers. There is a Dramatic Play, Library, Math and Manipulative, Art, and Carpet area. The children are given time each day for free exploration and discovery in each center. The teachers set up learning experiences in each center to promote and scaffold experiences to enhance learning in all domains.

When I asked him about excellence, he told me that everyone wants to be excellent. They determine excellence by looking for evidence and proof. They are constantly collected data on the children related mostly to literacy and reading. The data offers students learning proof. In the early learning school, assessment is done three times per school year (fall, winter and spring). In the first and second grade only reading is assessed. Informal assessment on whether they can count one to ten, letters and sounds recognition. They do have a social and emotional curriculum and assess social and emotional development. They have music once a week, PE twice a week in a gym, art, library and free outdoor play 30 minutes per day (Hibblen, M. personal Skype communication, February 4, 2015).

Inside of his school, I feel as though there is a balance between issues of standards and readiness. Yes, they are concerned with meeting standards for literacy but from our conversation, I feel as though they are interested in developmentally appropriate practice. The disparities I see are with children with varying needs. They are not responsive to working with anything other than typically developing children.

Sharing Resources

I have been researching the NIEER website (National Institute for Early Education Research to be found at http://nieer.org/. The amount of information is overwhelming in a good way. I enjoyed getting to know many of the sections and information that seem particularly relevant to my current professional development. The teacher section was of particular interest to me as it looks at teacher quality, teacher salaries and overall compensation, teacher training and professional development. This section had articles related to and enhancing everyday experiences in your classroom. I am also going to be interested in new ideas and my own growth as an educator working with children and families in the classroom. The idea of further teacher training is important to me as upon completion of my graduate degree, I hope to be able to teach future teachers. As an early childhood advocate, I see the need for early childhood educators to be respected in the field and should get higher compensation. Teachers with a higher level of education, higher wages will result in less turn around more qualified teachers in the classroom that will contribute to higher quality preschool.

I read a preschool policy brief on the website that helped me look at early childhood education outcomes in a different way. I understood that there are short term and long term benefits to an early childhood education. I did not consider the amount of health benefits. This brief talked about the many long term health benefits to adults that have had access to high quality education. Early childhood education improves adult health by improving child health. It improves adult health by increasing cognitive abilities, knowledge and adults tend to use that knowledge to make better health choices.

The above brief tells me that economists support early childhood education. High quality education has a benefit on the economy as a healthy society has positive economic returns in that it will reduce health care costs. There is a section called Economics and Finance. In this section there are numerous sources to find out about the economic benefits of preschool. I next went to current newsletter issue. The first three articles were from each of the three fields outside of early childhood that we have been discussing. It was in the very first section called “Hot Topics”. The first was a political view “Child Care Takes Spotlight in the State of the Union Address. A link was included to bring you right to the speech. The second article was “Growing Importance of Dual Language Learning” a look from the neuroscience field.  The third article was related to economists “Common Core Standards and Early Childhood”. These were the first three articles clearly showing that these are important issues and trends in the field and that these three fields have a vested interest in early childhood education.

A new insight that I gained this week is that there is a wealth of information out there at our fingertips. As early childhood educators it is so important for us to remain in touch and involved with current issues, trends and research. I also learned that having more knowledge on issues and trends will help us to be advocates for our field.

Poverty

My first conversation partner is Michael Hibbeln. He is the early childhood and elementary school principal of the American School of Milan, Italy. I have had one Skype call with him already. We were not able to connect this week but it is my hope that we will be able to communicate for future conversations. This is what we talked about in our first conversation. He is originally from Michigan. He and his wife have lived abroad and were interested in living in another country again. He applied to different schools and was hired by the ASM. It is a school of nearly 900 students beginning at age 3 and going up through high school. Children graduating from ASM will receive an American style High School Diploma. We spoke for a few minutes about their early childhood program. He said that there are three classrooms with 17 students. There is one teacher and a teacher assistant. AMS is an accredited school. They are an English emersion school. There are 52 different nationalities. Most of the families have at least one family member that speaks some amount of English. They do have translators. I told him the issues and trends that we will be studying in this course and he said that he would be able to assist me with these topics. We had a call confirmed for this week regarding issues of poverty but he was unable to keep our appointment time. I look forward to future phone conversations and learning more about his school in Italy. I hope to gain more insight into issues and trends in early childhood in Italy.

My next conversation partner is Gem Munro. The principal of the school I visited this week gave me his information. She met Mr. Munro when he spoke at a Rotary Club meeting in December here in Orlando, Florida. He is the founder of an organization called the Amarok Society. This organization has a unique way of going into the poorest most poverty stricken areas of the world and providing education. They are building schools but these schools are not filled with children. The schools are filled with mothers. The idea is to teach mothers to teach their own children and at least five other children in their community. We have only been in contact through email as he is in Bangladesh for the next few months. He wrote back immediately to say that he would be glad to answer any questions but his access to email is sporadic. I am waiting for his reply. In the meantime, I went on the website. The Amarok society offers a wonderful program that seems to have great results. The Amarok Society works in the poorest of slum communities. They teach very poor mothers who do not have enough money to send their children to school. They teach the mothers to read and to write in their language, math and also English. The mothers learn basis life skills about health, nutrition, child care and child development. The results are that these mothers, fathers and communities are gaining a respect for education. They are teaching children that would not otherwise have an opportunity to learn anything.

The insight that I have gained is a whole new way to look at educating and empowering a community. These families are in such poverty, they are too poor to attend any kind of school at all. This program gives families the opportunity to gain some knowledge and learn basic skills to help their families thrive in these dire circumstances. This style of education is one that I never expected. You would expect to see organizations building schools and filling them with trained educators to teach children. Mr. Munro goes to these remote slums with his family, trains teachers and teaches the mothers. The mothers are required to attend school for two hours every day and then the mothers go home and hold school in their own homes teaching the children what they learned that day. I am so surprised that the founder of this organization emailed me directly after my initial email. He has written a book called South Asian Adventures with the Active Poor. I plan on reading the book. For more information, I am including the link to their website http://amaroksociety.org/wordpress/

Sharing Web Resources

The organization I choose to research is The National Institute for Early Education Research (NIEER).  www.nieer.org. NIEER conducts and communicates research to support high-quality, effective early childhood education for all young children. NIEER looks at early childhood education to enhance children’s physical, cognitive, and social development, and subsequent success in school and later life. The Institute offers independent, research-based advice and technical assistance to policymakers, journalists, researchers, and educators. The Institute's research programs offer a vision of early education excellence in terms that are usable by policy makers and understandable to everyone. NIEER is interested in progress toward excellence in early childhood education. It looks to improve quality and increase access for all children to good preschool programs.

A current issue that caught my attention was a section on the website called STEM which stands for Science, Technology, Engineering and Math. It was under the heading of Nieer Current Projects. It caught my attention because it focuses on how to incorporate these subjects into the early childhood curriculum. It talks about how early science and math skills and knowledge enhance children’s school readiness and later success in school. This personally resonates with me because I really enjoy teaching science and math to my preschoolers.  I teach 3-4 year olds. I am interested in doing more research in this area.

It mentioned DLL in the STEM curriculum. Teachers can apply language development concepts and teaching strategies for DLLs to lessons. This fits right in with our topic of this week. There are many articles and a lot of information on enhancing language learning through STEM. I encourage you to go to the NIEER website.

Sharing Resources

The organization I choose to research is The National Institute for Early Education Research (NIEER).  www.nieer.org. NIEER conducts and communicates research to support high-quality, effective early childhood education for all young children. NIEER looks at early childhood education to enhance children’s physical, cognitive, and social development, and subsequent success in school and later life. The Institute offers independent, research-based advice and technical assistance to policymakers, journalists, researchers, and educators. The Institute's research programs offer a vision of early education excellence in terms that are usable by policy makers and understandable to everyone. NIEER is interested in progress toward excellence in early childhood education. It looks to improve quality and increase access for all children to good preschool programs.

A current issue that caught my attention was a section on the website called STEM which stands for Science, Technology, Engineering and Math. It was under the heading of Nieer Current Projects. It caught my attention because it focuses on how to incorporate these subjects into the early childhood curriculum. It talks about how early science and math skills and knowledge enhance children’s school readiness and later success in school. This personally resonates with me because I really enjoy teaching science and math to my preschoolers.  I teach 3-4 year olds. I am interested in doing more research in this area.

It mentioned DLL in the STEM curriculum. Teachers can apply language development concepts and teaching strategies for DLLs to lessons. This fits right in with our topic of this week. There are many articles and a lot of information on enhancing language learning through STEM. I encourage you to go to the NIEER website.

Establishing Professional Contacts and Expanding Resources

For Part 1 of the assignment this week, I tried to use the websites provided but was unable to make contact as most the emails were all returned. I then went on the computer to Google Maps and typed in early childhood learning centers in Milan, Italy. It pinned a school called American School in Milan. I immediately went to the website. I found a contact person with an email address. I emailed Sara Griffith and told her the name of our school and the project we are beginning. She sent an email back telling me that she is the admissions director and would not be able to help. She passed along my email to the principal of the early childhood center. He emailed me right away saying that he would like to set up a Skype meeting. We have a Skype call set up for this coming week. I am excited to be able to discuss issues and trends in the early childhood field with him and compare and contrast the US and Italy. I am also working on reestablishing contact with my cousin in Israel. I traveled there last year with my mom and we met for the first time. She teaches English but her dad told me she has many contacts. Phone calls are hard because of the eight hour time difference. I found out that the best way to reach her is through an app called “What’s App”.This is an app used for text messaging overseas without worrying about additional charges. You just have to make sure the other person has the app as well. I look forward to a growing relationship with my cousin through this project. I hope that my colleagues will have a similar experience when establishing international contacts.

For Part 2 of the assignment this week, I chose two websites to research and study further one is Zero to Three: National Center for Infants, Toddlers, and Families and I have signed up for their newsletter. Upon initial browsing of the website, I found it to be very informative and easy to manipulate with information useful for families and professionals in the field. I also chose The National Institute for Early Education Research and signed up for their newsletter as well. Again, upon initial browsing of this website, I found it informative. I think I will gain valuable knowledge and insight into the current issues and trends in the field. I look forward to the continuing journey. I hope that other colleagues will choose these same websites and newsletters so that we may be able to share what we are learning and engage in meaningful conversation regarding our growing list of resources in the field of early childhood.