My hopes......

My hope for early childhood education is universal preschool in giving every child an opportunity to attend preschool and not continue to the cycle of classism.  I believe equality amongst us all will close the gap of prejudices and stereotypes.  This week homosexual couples won the war on equality and further define the word for thousands of children living in same ex marriages.  It is not about being biblical but understanding social justice that we are all created equal.  I hope in promoting and advocating for universal preschool that I can stop the increasing gap of classism and all the negativity that surrounds differences.  Early childhood education is about creating possibilities and I want to be on the team that creates those possibilities for every family and their child. 

On that note, I want to thank everyone for your support, comments, motivation, and passion.  Although, we never saw each other face to face you were all inspirations in me continuing to strive to stay in school and pursue my dreams.  God Bless each and every one of you and may you all find happiness and success in all your future endeavors!

Impacts on Early Emotional Development

I chose to explore Djibouti Africa because I have a friend who recently came back from that region assisting in Aid as a U.S. Marine and he told me of all the hardship that the small communities endure compare to the luxuries we have as Americans. 

The challenges that young children and the people face in Djibouti are the high risk of contracting the AIDS virus.  Nearly 16,000 people out of the 850,000 population have HIV and 9,000 of them are women and 1,000 are children.  The fact that Djibouti is a poor community and that drugs such as Katz are the main resource for money is a poor indication of the influences that confront these children on a daily basis. 

The fact that children are exposed to prostitution and sickness amongst their family as well as, their community is scarring the lives of these young children.  They are facing adult problems in a time in which they should be discovering life not being exposed to the dark side of it. 

As a person it kills me to see young children struggle or feel as if they have no opportunities because eof the tragedy that they face.  I believe, HIV/AIDS is not a diagnosis for death but, a certificate to live and make a difference in the world.  As anti-bias educator, I must be aware of the issues surrounding young children and know that I need to provide them with a classroom of support and security.  Challenges build integrity and I need to remember that I should never judge a book by its cover but, encourage that child to be the best that they can be. 

Unicef. (n.d.). Retrieved from http://www.unicef.org/infobycountry/djibouti_54193.html

 

The Sexualization of Early Childhood

My reaction to this shared reading is it is absolutely true every bit of it and very alarming for our young children.   Unfortunately, we live in a much sexualized society in which we think teen thongs and American Pie are cute and funny.  However, what it is doing to our society and young children is not letting them be children and saying this is who society accepts and your self-image should reflect that.  I currently have a student in my class she is 5 and getting ready to go kindergarten and on numerous occasions she has displayed sexual behaviors or comments.  She dances very provocative to kids music, she always ask the boys if she is pretty and often gets very jealous when a boy she likes plays with another girl.  I caught her yesterday licking and sucking her arm at nap and when I asked her what she was doing she stated she was kissing a boy.  I have addressed this issue several times with the parents and each time they state they do not know where she is getting this from because they do not watch those types of media but, the abundance of knowledge she displays about sex tells me otherwise. 

The examples of sexualization I see in messages impacting children are in Cartoons such as Johnny Bravo, SpongeBob, and the innuendo of children’s movies such as Creedo or ParaNorman.  The fact that Nickelodeon has two separate channels one for the children ages birth to 5 and then for 6 and up is a very good indication of the media portrayed in such shows as Sam & Cat and Big Time Rush.  I recently went on their website also and videos of Justin Bebier and Selena Gomez were up.  I mean heck Justin is on the acne commercial what boy does not want to look like him and what girl doesn't want him!

Unintentionally or not the message displayed in cartoons and different types of media is giving young children a perception in their mind of what is socially acceptable to be or look like.   Self-image is such a critical development for children and can be until adulthood.  Influencing them to be a certain type can be life changing to their development and overall self-esteem.  We see younger and younger and younger children even boys dealing with being bulimic or anexoric even though there is an obesity crisis.  We are killing children and their innocents and the sad part is we don’t even know it.  We just think it is cute that John or Jane wants to be like their mom or dad or a pop star.  

Levin, D. E., & Kilbourne, J. (2009). [Introduction]. So sexy so soon: The new sexualized childhood and what parents can do to protect their kids (pp. 1-8). New York: Ballantine Books. Retrieved from: http://dianeelevin.com/sosexysosoon/introduction.pdf

Evaluating Impacts on Professional Practice

The specific ism that I experience in my daily life is that my family is of mixed culture meaning my husband is black and I am white and our children are three children are biracial.  Although, this normally does not come into play in the classroom, I recently added some of my family pictures and got some interesting silent reactions from a few of my parents.  However, those silent moments did not last for long as some of my children pointed out that my husband was black loudly.  For the most part I do not experience direct isms from the children.  Instead, they see me as Ms. Michele there teacher and that I love and take care of them.  However, I have had one parent make some off the wall remarks which her child has express in conversation about my family stating that her house is bigger and that my kids cannot afford the same big swing set she has because her mom knows where I live and it’s in a poor neighborhood.  When the child expresses moments of those indiscretions and stereotypes I take a deep breath and then discuss different houses people live in and look at books with all the children and discuss how different families can live in the same or different houses as others.  I discuss classism on the children’s level at President Obama and African American living in the big White House.  The consequences I use in stereotypes and prejudices for my families and parents is by turning their misinformation into correct information and making it a teachable moment to take home.  Derman-Sparks & Edwards (2010), states that being silent is a prejudice when you don’t discuss isms or bias in the classroom.  The best empowerment you can give a child is to teach their parent that their bias is an ism.  I can say as a teacher I have learned more from my children than I was ever taught in the classroom about life and perspective.  So instead of trying talk that child out of her belief.  I gave her some new information along with books and pictures and waited her out her perception of classism and biracial families.  Proud to say she still loves and draws pictures of my house next to hers which we hang in the classroom. 

Derman-Sparks, L. & Edwards, J. (2012). Anti-bias education for young children and ourselves. Washington, DC: NAEYC.