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Thursday, March 29, 2012

Early Childhood Resources

Early Childhood Development Coalition (ECDC) is to provide opportunities for families and communities to prepare all children for success in school, thereby setting the stage for high school graduation, postsecondary education and a vibrant economy.

http://www.earlychildhoodswi.org/ResourcesForEducators.html

Professionalism is built upon individual integrity, responsibility, and ethical practices that demonstrate a profound respect for all children and their families. Ssn Juan College
NAEYC Standards for Early Childhood Professional Preparation Programs
NECTAC is the national early childhood technical assistance center supported by the U.S. Department of Education's
http://www.nectac.org/portal/journals.asp


These are resources from my class and/or other blogs that I feel would be useful:


TheNational Association for Bilingual Education is the only national professional organization devoted to representing Bilingual Learners and Bilingual Education professionals. NABE's mission is to advocate for our nation's Bilingual and English Language Learners and families and to cultivate a multilingual multicultural society.”



“Families and Work Institute (FWI) is a nonprofit, nonpartisan research organization that studies the changing workforce, family and community. As a preeminent think-tank, FWI is known for being ahead of the curve, identifying emerging issues, and then conducting rigorous research that often challenges common wisdom, provides insight and knowledge. As an action-tank, we conduct numerous studies that put our research into action and then evaluate the results.”




“The Board on Children, Youth, and Families (BCYF) addresses a variety of policy-relevant issues related to the health and development of children, youth, and families. It does so by convening experts to weigh in on matters from the perspective of the behavioral, social, and health sciences.”




Here’s a website out of The Netherlands.

“The International Step by Step Association (ISSA) is a membership organization that connects professionals and organizations working in the field of early childhood development and education. ISSA promotes equal access to quality education and care for all children, especially in the early years of their lives. Established in the Netherlands in 1999, ISSA’s network today stretches across the globe from Central and Eastern Europe to Central Asia, Asia, and the Americas.”




This web site is to give everyone an additional international flavor – http://www.aussieeducator.org.au/index.html

It is an Australian Educational website. In order to gain access to issues related to the early childhood one needs to click on the link to the right of the page. I found some interesting articles that support what we have been reading about in our course.




Yes, they are paying attention to US based studies and research! I like the videos that are included in these presentations from Harvard University.



The next two resources come out of Canada. The first one is called the Childcare Resource and Research Unit. It “is an early childhood education and child care (ECEC) policy research institute with a mandate to further ECEC policy and programs in Canada.”


They present articles from around the world and from Canada.


Canadian Child Care Federation.

The ‘organization is about the value of children.’

‘In order to protect and enhance our children, to promote their safety and their healthy growth and development, we are committed to providing Canadians with the very best in early learning and child care knowledge and best practices.

http://www.cccf-fcsge.ca/home_en.html


This looks like a great general resource which includes blogs by educational professionals about projects they have done with children, suggested articles, resources, and a radio link. It is for use by teachers and parents.
http://www.earlychildhoodnews.com/default.aspx

Saturday, March 24, 2012

Words of Inspiration and Motivation

These are words of inspiration and motivation to me as a parent and a teacher.

"All of us have to recognize that we owe our children more than we have been giving to them." Hillary Clinton This quote is from the keynote address at a fund-raiser for the Children's Defense Fund during the Clinton's first post election trip to Washington.

"Although education and the acquisition of skills is a lifelong process, starting early in life is crucial. Recent research—some sponsored by the Federal Reserve Bank of Minneapolis in collaboration with the University of Minnesota—has documented the high returns that early childhood programs can pay in terms of subsequent educational attainment and in lower rates of social problems, such as teenage pregnancy and welfare dependency. The most successful early childhood programs appear to be those that cultivate both cognitive and noncognitive skills and that engage families in stimulating learning at home." This passage is from the article Laying the Foundation by Kathy Cobb. The article is about Art Rolnick whom built upon previous studies to confirm that early education is a benifit to society.

In all my years of working with children I find this passage to be very true. I have children come back to visit from when I first started my job 12 years ago. This children are at the top of their class  and doing very well. I have even had parents email me their child's report card saying thank you for doing such a great job with their childrern. I also found that children with parents that are involved in their education do much better than ones with limited parent involvement.

"This is what it's all about. This is what drives me to do what I do." Raymond Hernandez This is a qoute from “The Passion for Early Childhood” a video that is part of my MS program at Wladen. He is refering to an event that was held on a Saturday and him seeing all of the families that had come out to support their children. My drive is the children and families that I serve. I love seeing the parents reaction when they see how much their children are learning and developing in the center. It gives me the drive that I need to continue doing what I do knowing that I am helping.  


Passion….orients us; it provides us with focus and direction. From this perspective, passion is longlived. It may be ignited quickly but, once ignited, it endures and even grows as we discover how much potential there really is.” (Hagel, J., 2009) My passion for working with young children was ignited when I was about nine years old and had to grow up quickly so that I could take care of my younger siblings. I was their “mother” figure.


References

Cobb, K. (2008). Laying the Foundation. Region (10453369), 22(2), 28-32.

http://ezp.waldenulibrary.org/login?url=http://search.ebscohost.com/login.aspx?direct=true&db=a9h&AN=32871008&site=eds-live&scope=site

Toch, T. (1992). Hillary Clinton, directing a sweeping `children's crusade.'. U.S. News & World Report, 113(25), 46.


Saturday, March 17, 2012

Personal Childhood Web

Personal Childhood Web

  • Alma Nolan: Alma was the angel that was sent to me at one of the lowest parts of my life. She was my last foster mother, she was the mother that I had always wanted, she was my 1st best friend, she was my savior. Her home was the first that I felt was truelly my home also. She gave me the strength to fight. She believed in me when no one else did. She gave me love and respect and encouragement. She actually talked to me and listen to what I had to say without judging me. This continues to influence me by the way that I listen to children and don't try to solve their problems by telling them what to do. I help them solve their problems by thinking of different solutions.
  • Ms. Pryor: My 6th grade teacher she was the first bi-racial teacher that I had ever had. She showed me that I was special by helping me to learn that just because I'm a bi-racial person doesn't mean that I should be treated different from my peers. She encouraged me to apply my self completely in school and not be a follower but a leader. This continues to guide me in helping children accept that even though they are all different they are all thesame.
  • Loretta Martin: One of my younger siblings grandmother. She was a tuff lady to like, but know I'm thankful for the way that she showed me that she cared about me. She always told me the truth regardless if it was painful or not. I learned that it's better to know and tell the truth than to tell a lie.
  • 2nd grade teacher: I don't remember her name but I remember her kindness and the fact that at the time she was the only adult that seemed to really care about me and what was happening to me. She also gave me the love of reading. I remember her telling me that if I really needed to escape my world I could pretend that I was a person in the book and let their life be my life for a little while.
  • Charlene: my mother, she gave me the drive to be more and do better than she was. She nurtured me by giving me love and giving me responsibility at a very young age. 

I made a space on my blog for this but there is no where to leave comments so I'm reposting it. If you go to the bottom of the blog page you can see the orignal posting. I'm still learning how to work a blog.





Saturday, March 10, 2012

A quote about children that is especially meaningful to you

To take children seriously is to value them for who they are right now rather than seeing them as adults-in-the-making. Thus, what we ask them to do should have "horizontal relevance,"...It ought to be "meaningful to them at the time" — for example, related to something that could happen on the way home from school. Mere "vertical relevance" isn't enough: there's a reason to be concerned if the only justification for learning something is that students will need to know it later — for example, as part of the following year's curriculum.
-Alfie Kohn (1999)
The Schools Our Children Deserve

Monday, March 5, 2012

Brown Bear, Brown Bear What Do You See

Brown Bear, Brown Bear What Do You See is one of my favorite children's books. I love that children learn many things from this book. It's easy for them to learn their colors, counting, animal names and about animals and that in your imagination you can make animals other colors than what they are in real life. This has always been one of the favorite books of all the children that I have taught. My son actually learned his colors from this book and about comparison. He compared the colors on the inside covers to an actually rainbow.

Current picture

Learning how to blog from my phone.


Hello

Chenieka