Professional Goals, Hopes and Dreams

In the area that I work, issues regarding quality and early childhood professionals seem to be discussed consistently. While many professionals outside of early childhood do not have the knowledge of what a quality early childhood program should look like, those within definitely do and hold early childhood professionals accountable. Working in a public school system does not always allow for the knowledge of early childhood to be shown as educators from as young as pre-kindergarten and Head Start are held accountable for certain aspects of achievement that may not be appropriate for their age. This happens when supervisors are unaware of developmentally appropriate practices for young children and expect results that may be too challenging for our youngest learners.

There are so many professional development opportunities available in my district but not all apply to early childhood programs. The ones that normally do are ones that need to be paid for on your own and make it tough to get to! Some of the professional development opportunities available through the district normally include time to understand the curriculum materials, classroom management, assessing young children, and learning ways to use technology. These are all types of professional development that I have been able to attend in the past two years. There are no actual requirements for professional development unless a course has been made mandatory (this happens normally once per year with material that needs to be discussed) but there is also no limit as to how many professional development classes can be taken either. For certification purposes, there needs to be a certain number of credits taken every five years, but beyond that there are no requirements.

Some of my professional goals include working to get all of my students reading by the time they leave kindergarten. This is one of the goals of the district but the level that they want all children to read on by the end of kindergarten is a bit too high in my experience. While it is achievable by some, if not most children, the district fails to take into consideration students with learning disabilities or even students that are learning English as a second language. Working to give these students confidence is a high priority for me and one I will continue to work on throughout my career.

A short term professional goal is to become a pull-out teacher and work with struggling students in both math and reading from kindergarten to sixth grade. If I have that position I feel that I can really help make a difference and instill confidence in students that have been struggling for so long.  While that position is just available for one year, I would hope to take what I have learned back to my normal kindergarten position to help with skills that students are struggling with later in their schooling. I have no desire to become an administrator, but I would like to come out of the classroom as I explained to help those students that really need it. Perhaps this will not happen this year, or even in five years, but I would like to be able to do this in the future.

Sharing Web Resources- Equity and Excellence

The Zero to Three website likes to keep their links to resources to another page on Zero to Three. The best links to outside resources that I can find are simply PDF files! One of the PDF files I did find was to Including Infants and Toddlers in Quality Rating and Improvement Systems, which goes over the QRIS system that came up in our lessons last week about quality and effective early childhood programs.

            The section I chose to thoroughly search was the section about child care. In this section, there are resources about choosing quality child care, preparing your toddler for preschool, as well as matching personalities between infants and toddlers and care settings. The section on choosing quality child care seems especially helpful for parents as there is a list of questions to ask and look for and information about licensing for the center.

            I have only received on e-newsletter and I spoke of it over a month ago! I signed up for three e-newsletters but have not received any more at this time! Perhaps some of them are quarterly and not weekly or monthly.

            The website talks about what to look for in quality child care, which is beneficial for parents. The website also talks about the QRIS rating system of early childhood programs which is important for both professionals and parents to be aware of. The QRIS rating system ties into the challenge of responsiveness of early childhood programs. It is important for the system, or a similar system to be used to rate the program’s effectiveness, equity, and excellence.

            In a previous week, I remember finding a statistic in a course reading about early childhood children of minorities being more likely to be expelled from programs. This stuck with me and on the Zero to Three website I found an article series titled Preventing Expulsion from Preschool and Childcare. This series begins with videos talking about implicit bias, why it is important, and ways to address it. There are also resources for policymakers as well as early childhood professionals on ways to reduce expulsion of young children. Although I have never encountered a young child being expelled, these are valuable resources for working with difficult behaviors for any early childhood professional!

References

www.zerotothree.org

            

Global Children's Initiative- Mexico

This week I focused on Mexico through the Global Children’s Initiative website from Harvard University as I am awaiting a response from my international source. The Aceleradora de Innovación para la Primera Infancia works to “address unmet challenges of children and families facing adversity” (Center on the Developing Child at Harvard University, 2010). Reaching out to create partnerships is key to the success of this program as well as providing workshops that focus on the unmet challenges of families and children in the local communities. Another important aspect of this program was to look at the current early childhood programs and figure out what needed to be altered to help the children and families, although it was time-consuming, there was a positive result. Coaching sessions for mothers and fathers are also available through this program for issues ranging from pregnancy, infancy, as well as play for parents.

All of these aspects of the program, Aceleradora de Innovación para la Primera Infancia, can help with the gap in equity of young children across not only Mexico but also in other countries. Reaching out to the community, educators, and families, seem to be the best approach all around for helping young children succeed!

References:

Center on the Developing Child at Harvard University. (2010). Global children's initiative. Retrieved from http://developingchild.harvard.edu/about/what-we-do/global-work/