My Connections to Play

"If I get to pick what I want to do, then it's play...if someone else tells me that I have to do it, then it's work."
-Patricia Nourot

"The essence of childhood, of course, is play, which my friends and I did endlessly on street that we reluctantly shared with traffic."
-Bill Cosby

While I was growing up, I had some health problems and as a result, I do not have very many memories of my childhood.  However, I do remember that my friends and I lived close together and we would walk to each others houses to play.  Back then, we could play in the neighborhood without supervision and our parents encouraged us to play.  Unfortunately, children cannot play these days without supervision and due to overcrowding, there are not many places for children to play. Additionally, children do not have to entertain themselves like we did, because of the numerous forms of media that are available to them.

Relationship Reflection

Relationships are important to me because I think that it is important to have positive people in my life who love and support me. Having these relationships also makes me a happier person.

My husband: I am very fortunate to have a great relationship with my husband; he is my best friend. We have been together for 15 years and married for 11 years. Our relationship is not perfect but we have worked very hard to make it great. In the beginning of our relationship, there was a lot of miscommunication but we learned to communicate our feelings and our wants and needs. This relationship is positive because we trust, respect, and support each other. We know how to compromise and we have learned that sometimes we just have to agree to disagree.

My Mom: Mother-daughter relationships can be very complicated.  My mom and I have had issues in our relationship but we have resolved them by talking about them and compromising. I know that my mother loves me and that she would do anything for me. I can depend on her and trust her. Even though we live far away we make an effort to maintain our relationship by talking on the phone every week and seeing each other as often as possible.

The biggest challenges that I have experienced in developing and maintaining relationships have been trust issues and respect.  My sister & I are not close for this reason.  From experience, I have learned that I cannot trust her if I confide in her. Our biggest issue, however, is respect.  My sister is 5 years older than me and she still thinks that she can tell me what to do and that I should do it. She doesn't respect the fact that it is my life and as an adult, I need to make my own decisions, whether she agrees with them or not.  There have been many times that she has made decisions about her own life that I completely disagreed with, but I respected that it was her decision to make.  Trust has also been a challenge in a lot of my friendships.  In the past, I had several friends that I thought I could trust but I found out otherwise.

I consider my relationship with my husband a partnership.  We always make all of our major decisions, which affect both of us, together.   If I have to make a personal decision, that doesn't affect him, I still talk to him about it because I want to know his opinion & because he's good at making me see other points of view or other possibilities (not one of my strengths).

My relationship experiences may impact my work as an effective early childhood professional and my ability to be an active contributor because they have taught me about effective communication, compromising, and respect.  I am able to respectfully communicate with parents and my co-workers.  Furthermore, I know that it is sometimes necessary to compromise which is sometimes necessary in the workplace.

When I Think of Child Development

"The child must know that he is a miracle, that since the beginning of the world there hasn't been, and until the end of the world there will not be, another child like him."
-Pablo Casals

"If you want your children to be intelligent, read them fairy tales. If you want them to be more intelligent, read them more fairy tales."
-Albert Einstein

"Play gives children a chance to practice what they are learning...they have to play with what they know to be true in order to find out more, and then they can use what they learn in new forms of play."
-Fred Rogers

Testing for Intelligence?

In my opinion, accountability is the only positive aspect of the current standardized testing requirements.  When I was in high school, before NCLB was passed, I had a few good teachers, but they were the exception.  I had several teachers that would regularly show movies in the classroom instead of teaching because they were either too burnt out or lazy to teach.  I also had some teachers that were well-intentioned, but they had no control over the classroom so they spent most of their time dealing with discipline problems.  In both cases, the students were the ones that paid the price because these teachers were not being held accountable.

Obviously, standardized testing does not currently contribute to viewing children holistically since reading and math are the only areas that are emphasized. Standardized testing should include other areas besides reading and math (and sometime Science) because every child is intelligent in their own way.  I think that if children have to be tested, that the tests should include the multiple intelligences because it will give educators more insight into the child’s strengths.  Furthermore, it may prevent damaging a child’s self-esteem if they are not good in math and/or reading and it would enable the child to understand where they excel.  I do hope that changes will be made to the current system of standardized testing because I have seen how much stress it causes both teachers and students.  As Barrier-Ferreira (2008) stated, “because the stakes have reached disproportionate levels, educators are often forced to abandon all things unrelated to the test and consequently lose sight of what is important: the whole child” (p. 139).

I chose to research how children are assessed in Scotland.  Children are assessed quite differently in Scotland, than they are in the United States.  They use assessments instead of standardized testing and they are not assessed every year.  They follow are program called “Building the Curriculum 5” and children are assessed periodically and when transitioning from one school level to another.  Furthermore, the focus is not primarily on reading and math.  According to the document Building the Curriculum 5: A Framework for Assessment (2011), the purpose of the assessment is the following:

To ensure children and young people are making progress across all aspects of planned learning, assessment will place a greater emphasis on literacy and numeracy across the curriculum, health and well-being, Information and Communications Technology (ICT) and higher order skills, including creativity (The Scottish Government, 2011, p. 7).

It appears to me that Scotland uses a more holistic approach than the United States.

References

Barrier-Ferreira, J. (2008). Producing commodities or educating children? Nurturing the personal growth of students in the face of standardized testing. The Clearing House, 81(3), 138-140.

The Scottish Government, Edinburgh (2011). Building the curriculum 5: A framework for assessment. Retrieved from http://www.educationscotland.gov.uk/Images/BtC5Framework_tcm4-653230.pdf

Consequences of Stress on Children’s Development

I was very fortunate to not grow up with any major childhood stressors.  My father-in-law, however, was raised by alcoholic parents and he lived in extreme poverty until he left home at 17.  The alcoholism is what caused the family to live in poverty because his parents would spend all of their money on alcohol instead of food for their children and when he did eat it was usually high fat and high calorie food.  Years ago, my father-in-law told me that there were many times that he went to bed hungry and that there were many times that he was so hungry that he ate lard because there was no food in the house.  As a result, when my father-in-law was 17-years-old he lied about his age in order to enlist in the United States Navy so that he would at least have three meals a day for four years.  Unfortunately, there were long-term affects to the malnutrition that he experienced as a child.  He developed heart problems in his 40’s which resulted in his first heart attack, and then he eventually had two more heart attacks and had to have a defibrillator implanted.  Unfortunately, he passed away last year of Congestive Heart Failure.

In 2012 UNICEF conducted a study of child poverty in the world and found that Romania has the highest rate of child poverty.  Numerous factors were measured in this study, not just the amount of food that the children have.  I also included money, environment, clothing, access to books, and outdoor activities (UNICEF, 2012).

UNICEF (2012). Measuring child poverty: New league tables of child poverty in the world’s rich countries. Retrieved from http://www.unicef-irc.org/publications/pdf/rc10_eng.pdf

Child Development & Public Health

The public health topic that I chose is nutrition/malnutrition. I chose this topic because there was a time in my life, after both my husband and I were laid off, when we struggled to buy food and when we had barely any food at all. At that time, we had to go to the local food box where we could buy a lot of food for very little money. When you can barely afford to buy food, you learn to settle for what you can get.  Unfortunately, the cheap food is usually high in fat and low in nutritional value.

I chose to research nutrition/malnutrition in Guatemala. According to the World Food Programme (2012), "the undernutrition rate for children under 5 is 49.8%" (para. 1).  Additionally, Guatemala has the 4th highest percentage in the world of children suffering from malnutrition.  Poverty, drought, natural disasters, and low taxes have also contributed to the problem.  More than half of the population of Guatemala live in poverty and "around 16 percent live in extreme poverty" (Nyobo, 2012, para. 11).   The malnutrition of children in Guatemala has caused stunted growth and lower IQ's.

This information may impact my future work by making me aware of the problem of malnutrition among child. Specifically, if I think that a student of mine is suffering from malnutrition, I will offer any help that I can to them and their family.  For example, I would make sure that there are resources out there to help them such as food stamps or food boxes.


Nyobo, T. (2009, February 18). Fighting chronic malnutrition among impoverished children in Guatemala. UNICEF. Retrieved from http://www.unicef.org/infobycountry/guatemala_48087.html.

World Food Programme: Fighting Hunger Worldwide (2012, November 29). Guatemala. Retrieved from http://www.wfp.org/countries/guatemala/overview

Childbirth in Your Life and Around the World

I have never given birth nor have I ever seen anyone give birth. My only experiences regarding the birthing experience has been visiting the mother and baby after the birth. As for my own birth, my mother has told me that I was very late. Originally, my mother's due date was at the end of March but when I didn't show up then the doctor changed her due date to April 15th. However, I was in no hurry (according to my mom) & the doctor had to induce her on April 26th.

While researching birth in other countries, I discovered an article about harmful birthing traditions in East Timor (aka Timor-Leste) that are contributing to a high mortality rate. In East Timor, after giving birth the mother will make a fire and live next to it (with their baby) for up to 3 months. They do this because "the heat from the fire is believed to help dispel "dirty" blood" from the body after birth" (IRIN, 2009, para. 4).
Another tradition that contributes to the mortality rate is the use of birth attendants called 'dukuns'. 'Dukuns' are not trained medical professionals and their harmful practices "include encouraging the mother to push before she is ready, and placing rice or other substances in the birth canal to 'lure the baby out'" (IRIN, 2009, para. 11). 
Obviously, there are not any similarities between the birthing practices of East Timor and my own birth.  However, it makes me very thankful that if I do give birth eventually, I won't have to worry about these harmful practices.


IRIN: Humanitarian news and analysis. (2009, April 15). Timor-Leste: Gently combating harmful childbirth traditions. Retrieved from www.irinnews.org/Report/83929/TIMOR-LESTE-Gently-combating-harmful-childbirth-traditions