Wordle: Early Childhood Passion

 

As a part of the introduction to my Capstone for my Master's in Early Childhood Studies through Walden University, my colleagues and I were asked to reflect on the themes presented throughout our degree program and choose five themes that resonated most with our passion for the field. The theme that I am most passionate about is play-based or child-initiated learning. I believe that children learn best about the world around them by having the freedom to explore it through play. Play enables children to interact with their environment and develop all areas of growth. As an educator, I believe that it is my responsibility to provide a supportive environment for my students to be able to explore while still being available for assistance or gentle guidance. 

The second early childhood theme that drives my spirit as an educator is that of testing and assessment. I believe that testing and assessments should be used as tools to determine the current developmental status of a child in order to assist the teacher and parents in creating a positive support system for enabling the child to reach their greatest potential. Children should not be expected to fit into a stereotype and be penalized for under-or-overachieving goals set for them. Tests and assessments are created to reflect the idealized expectation for the typical child at a certain stage in life. However, if researchers truly understood early childhood development, they would realize that there is no such thing as the typical child. Assessments need to be used as a tool to assist in planning activities to support the child, not as a guideline for the child to meet. 

Leadership, advocacy, and nurturing positive relationships all combine to form my third passion in the field because they all link together to highlight important aspects in my role as an Education Coordinator for Head Start. As a leader, it is my responsibility to obtain and share up-to-date information and research in the early childhood field. Collaborating with early childhood professionals, I strive to educate families about the importance for advocating for their children and learning about the supports available for improving the quality of education not only for the child but for the family as well. Parents who understand the importance of being a voice for their children are able to form positive relationships with their children and each child's educator. This cohesive partnership between parents and educators promotes nurturing relationships for the children to grow up in, resulting in a group of children who are more likely to achieve or exceed developmental milestones throughout their childhood as long as these supportive partnerships remain in tact. 

Communication with Colleagues

Over the past few months, I have had the privilege of working collaboratively with my colleagues from Walden University. We have been working on this journey together toward achieving our Master's degree in Early Childhood Studies, but taking the information that we have been given and applying it to our own career paths. It has been humbling to see how far we have all come in our understanding of the early childhood field and I enjoy reading the progress that everyone has made. The revelations about how we can apply the information to our own programs and then reading the success stories that result when our education improves the quality and outcomes of the services that we are providing to our families makes this journey very worthwhile. I just want to take this time to thank all of my colleagues from Walden University for taking the time to read my blog and discussion posts and truly provide me with feedback that pertains to how I can become a better educator. I truly wish you all the best of luck as you continue to pursue your degree and make a difference in the lives of children everywhere!

Tiffany Booze

The Adjourning Phase

When I reflect back on the groups that I have participated with in the past, I am led back to when I was in high school, where I was a member of several of our school's choirs and the varsity cheerleading squad. All of these groups held high standards for how they performed. My high school choir was given the honor of performing at one of the top cathedrals in New York City. Also, our cheerleading squad competed in the Nationals competition at Walt Disney World  twice and ranked among the top five in our division both times. When it came to my senior year of high school, saying goodbye to both of these groups was very difficult because I enjoyed working with the members of each of the groups and was going to miss performing with them. With each group, we held an awards banquet at the end of the school year. The purpose of the banquet was to reflect on our journey and celebrate the accomplishments that we had made as a group and as individuals. Ten years later, I still miss performing with these groups and often reflect with some of my friends about the memories that were created.

When looking into the near future, I imagine some of the same feelings and events will surround the adjourning phase of working with my colleagues from Walden University. Even though I have not met any of my colleagues personally, I feel a strong connection with my classmates because of thoughts that we have shared and memories that have been formed. I am looking forward to completed my Master's degree program at the end of October and am hoping that I will be able to attend graduation in January, so I can finally meet some of my colleagues in person. I have enjoyed the many opportunities that I have been given to communicate and collaborate with my colleagues because it has enabled us to form professional bond that I believe will keep us connected even after graduation.

Communication Conflict

One source of disagreement that I am currently having at work is the idea of implementing the Family pages for our Teaching Strategies GOLD program. I currently feel like it is a resource that could be very beneficial for our families in helping them understand more about their child's progress and give them a tool to readily access information about their child's development while in our program. One of my colleagues, however, feels that by implementing the use of the Family pages, it would require our staff to input the same data into another database, resulting in wasting valuable time that could be used for planning and family advocacy.

One way that I can work to resolve this conflict in a nonviolent manner is to show respect for my colleague's opinion. She has been working with our program longer than I have and has a closer relationship with our home-based staff, which is the group of teachers that she is concerned about. By choosing to respect her opinion and listen more closely to her reasons for why she is opposed to adding the responsibility of using the Family pages, I can come to a better understanding of both her as a person and as a strong contributor to our program.

Another way that I can work to resolve this conflict is by responding to her reasoning in a positive manner. I can respond to her by restating her reasons in order to justify that I was listening to her. After restating her reasons, I can then state my point of view in a way that is reflective of her reasoning, but is still founded on my beliefs.

This particular colleague and I do have a positive relationship and generally work well together. Her opposition is simply based on the fact that our home-based staff already have many requirement that force them to prioritize which duties will get done first. However, after I review the Family pages application of the GOLD program, I may be able to find a way to compromise with her and ease the requirements of this portion of our staff by requiring them to do less than what she believes is required in this task.

Communication Evaluations

I really enjoyed reviewing the results of the surveys for this week's application assignment. In addition to my participation, my mother and a colleague also completed the surveys, basing their results on how they thought I would score myself based on my communication skills. I found it interesting that all three of us placed myself in group 1 for the listening styles survey. I would have to agree that I am very people-oriented. I really try to focus on the message that is being relayed and the person who is relaying the message. In a conversation, I would much rather listen than speak. I have always been a quiet person, even in a professional setting. One surprising revelation that came from the results of the verbal aggressiveness survey is that I tend to be moderately aggressive. I like to view myself as passionate, especially when it is something that I care deeply about. If there is something that I know should be said or heard, I relay that message, even if it means that the person receiving the message could possibly be hurt by it. There are times where I do regret what I say, but for the most part, I think long and hard before I say something. This survey, however, made me realize that I may want to use more caution and evaluate my level of aggression depending on the situation that I am in.

One thing that I found interesting in the readings for this week was the concept of cognition for one's self. I know that I have a low self-esteem, which often carries into my professional life. I try to be a perfectionist at work because I have a fear of making a mistake or not being good enough. Whenever I lower my standards for something, I feel as though I have let other people down. I know that this is an area that I need to improve because my low self-esteem can potentially be sensed by the children and families that I work with. I want to teach them to think highly of themselves and be proud of their accomplishments and abilities, but first, I need to believe in myself. The other topic that I found interesting this week is the reliance that we tend to have on technology in order to communicate with others. Again, I am guilty of relying too heavily on technology because I can hide my feelings behind the text. I use technology because I do not want others to see my fears about bringing up a touchy subject or discussing a concern with a parent who potentially may not handle the situation very well. But, as a leader, I need to be able to have the confidence to interact with all types of individuals on a face-to-face basis and accept the fact that everyone makes mistakes and people often are uncomfortable in one-on-one situations.

Cultural-Based Communication

This week, we have been discussing how culture influences our communication style and our views about how other individuals communicate. I will readily admit that I am generally a shy person, no matter who I am around. I view myself as a strong listener, speaking up only when I am truly passionate about something. However, my role as an education coordinator does not allow me to take the back seat in communication scenarios, so I have to be willing to step out of my comfort zone in order to address people in many different circumstances.

I do tend to communicate differently when I am around people who have a different cultural background than myself. For instance, if I notice that a person may not be a member of my community, I tend to weigh more heavily on my role as a listener than as a verbal communicator. I also tend to avoid eye contact during conversations with these people because I fear that I am being judged and may possibly offend them if I make eye contact and they are uncomfortable with it.

In order to communicate more effectively with people from all cultural backgrounds, I first need to stop judging and trying to decide whether or not a person comes from a particular background or not. It should not matter what that person's background is. If they are willing to have a conversation with me, then I should be willing to respect them. Another step that I can take to effectively communicate is to find something in common with the other participant. Common interests or communication styles enable all participants to be able to offer understanding to one another. I can also try to put myself in the other person's place and view things from their perspective. By viewing the conversation from their point of view, I show that I am willing to fully participate in the conversation and honor their opinion, even if I may not fully agree with it.

Observing Communication Without Sound

This week, I chose to watch an episode of Army Wives. I chose this television show because I have always been interested in watching it, but have never had a chance to do so. While viewing the show without sound, I noticed that I was really focusing on observing the characters' emotions and body language. Based on the body language of the characters, I noticed that there was a lot of jealousy between some of the groups of wives. I could also sense the tension in some of the relationships based eye movements and posture Once I turned on the sound of the show, I realized that many of my feelings about the characters were validated. By being able to listen to the sound, I was able to gain more information the nature of the relationships. If I had prior knowledge about the show, I would admit that my feelings toward the characters would persuade my observations and force me to focus on certain interactions among the characters instead of being able to take the objective approach that I did.