Perspectives on Diversity and Culture

After contacting several people and asking them what their definition of culture and diversity was, this was their responses...

Culture…

• the things that make up your life as a group, such as music, food, art likes/dislikes, holidays, and the particular way you celebrate those holidays, the way you raise your kids and how you treat elders.
• I think culture is when people, generally of a common area, share like values, beliefs, customs, moral values, food preferences etc. Although everyone doesn't necessarily have to believe or think exactly the same, but there are common ties that bind them together.
• is how you think, feel and at times what you believe in based upon your environment.

Diversity…

• all the different ways those items from culture are displayed. How vastly different one group of people enjoy -live life
• how vastly different one group of people enjoy-live life versus another group.
• is the differences in people. The differences in thought, preferences, race, beliefs, moral values, customs. Diversity can be within a culture or trans-cultural.

I was amazed that most of their answers were related to culture and diversity.  One way that influenced my thinking about culture and diversity is the way one of the answers were stated, "How vastly different one group of people enjoy-live life."  This is how most of use should be doing with our lives. ENJOY-LIVE LIFE!

My Family Culture

My family means everything to me so trying to imagine what I would take with me was a hard decision for me to make.  The first thing I would take is my bible, because if a catastrophic event happened my faith would need to be built back up and I know that God would always be with me where ever I am.  The second thing to show others about my family would be a family photo album to look back and remember all the good times.  The third thing would be my notebook full of how to make anything out of everything, because if I had to start all over I would have to learn how to wash my clothes, grow food, and how to make drinking water.  If this happen I would be scared of what would come next and figure out how to survive.  It is not hard to tell others about your family and we would all have to work together if we were all going to survive.  I have learned over the years after becoming a teenage mother how to make things in order to save money and that is one major thing I have taught my children to do. 

When I Think of RESEARCH......

When I think of research I think of a "puzzle" and start to think where and how do I start.  I have never been good at doing research or writing about research.  Throughout this course I have learned how to narrow down a topic to focus on one area that multiple areas.  It also takes a lot of time and can be beneficial to others to read and learn about the results, especially in the early childhood field and not all research is helpful.

 

When I received my text book titled “Doing Early Childhood Research,” I thought what have I gotten myself into which frighten me and will I make it through this class.  I have done research before but have always had a hard time looking up the information or is the information for my project was beneficial to me.  Now I know how to scan articles and understand how the article is written up to provide the information I need for my research project. 

Planning, designing and conducting research reminds me of a huge puzzle. Therefore, when planning, designing, and conducting research in early childhood field it is essential to have validity of the data and knowing the importance of the ethics in any research project. 

The challenges I encountered was trying to figure out the important information to add into my research simulation and writing out the hypotheses.  With the step by step charts each week and the comments from the teacher, I was able to complete and understand what information was important and how to write out my hypotheses for my research simulation.

As an early childhood professionals I will most likely never conduct research but will look into other research to gain information that will benefit me in the early childhood field.  It is important to continue learning and reading about new research for early childhood education in order to stay up with new insight to improve child’s developmental progress. 

 

This class was very beneficial to me and learning more about research.  Thanks to all my classmates for the comments through our discussions and blogs, you all have added more insight to my understanding of research.

WK5 "The Research in Practice Series" Early Childhood Australia.....

I looked into what Early Childhood Australia does for research and they have what is called Research in Practice Series (RIP). 

The site states, “The Research in Practice Series is a practical, easy-to-read resource, offering effective new approaches for those challenging issues which arise in the care and education of young children. Early Childhood Australia's Research in Practice Series is an essential resource for those involved in the early childhood field. The books are idea-rich and to-the-point. The Research in Practice Series focuses on the practical, 'hands-on' aspects of early childhood – making them ideally suited to early childhood workers. However, the wide range of topics covered throughout the series offers something to anyone interested in children's early years.”

I love the fact that the research page provided book that anyone could purchase and that they are all “idea-rich, to-the-point, and hands-on.”   

WK 3 Research that Benefits Children and Families "Early Intervention"

I read a research article that focused on families and children with a developmental delay or a diagnosed disability called “First Experiences With Early Intervention: A National Perspective.” This study focused on “families’ initial experiences in determining their child’s eligibility, interactions with medical professionals, efforts required to obtain services, participation in planning for services, satisfaction with services, and interactions with professionals.

It was exciting to read that more families interact with their medical professional than not, which shows that more families are concerned about their child’s development.   I was also excited to read that a very small number of families did not receive services right away.  This shows that families are concerned about their child’s development and the early intervention services is here to make sure children do not fall behind and get them ready for success.  There was a high percentage in family’s participating in planning with the professionals for services and would continue interacting with the professional and their child.  I have been in homes where a mother does not show interest in working with their own child and the only interaction that child gets is when I would come and work on the goals. 

Here is a chart of Percentage of children beginning early intervention services……..

 

The Chart below shows families and professionals working together……

 After reading I was glad to see that more families are concerned about their child’s developmental growth and works with their child when the professionals are not there to continue working on their child’s developmental growth goals.   I hope I am able to work with families that care about their child and not to many of the one’s I have worked with. 

WK2 My Personal Research Journey

Writing and researching about a topics has always been a struggle for me for as long as I can remember.  I have two things I would like to write about but have to narrow it down to one topic along with three subtopics. 

The first is learning more about my local Quality Rating Improvement Systems.  I would love to be able to provide information to child care centers (1) benefits in participating in a Quality Rating System, (2) ways to foster early childhood development, and (3) how others are or can invest in the quality care and education. I believe in a Quality Rating System and wish that my local child care centers would participate in which would provide the children quality care and education. 

The second big issue is, I thought about researching was about working with families to improve infants and toddlers developmental progress using every days's life experiences.  My subtopics for this topic was; (2) benefits in participating in an early intervention program like First Steps, (2) ways to involve families in the developmental process, and (3) how your daily routines can foster child development.

I feel both topics and subtopics are still to broad and not sure which topic to choose.  WHAT DO YOU THINK?

EDUC 6163 Wk 1 Hello

Hello to All in EDUC 6163.  For the next 8 weeks I look forward to reading everyone's blogs.