Reflection on Laura

As I reflect back on my response, I would not particularly change what I have said, I would more so add a perspective. 

 Having worked with the infant and toddler age group, and personally having gone through the steps of dropping off, I always thought that having this perspective was correct, as I have originally written in my response.  But as I reflect, I need to consider the teacher's perspective and give credit to the teacher.  We as teachers try so hard to build and maintain the relationship between each individual child.  I suspect now that the good-bye not only went good because of the steps that the father has taken, but I believe that the relationship the teacher has constantly strived for is beginning to be shown in this instance.  For the second part of the question, the father did the little actions to communicate to his baby that this is the transition, that he is leaving, but we also need to consider the teacher's perspective.  In such a busy morning of setting up, and getting the classroom ready, and having to welcome in the other babies that are probably having a difficult time as well, the teacher stopped whatever she was doing and she took the time to receive Laura, which were also acts of trust that is communicated to Laura.  Laura kissing her dad, was an assurance that Laura was ready to leave her dad, and she was ready for Ivetta to receive her.  Laura initiated this kiss, which to me now thinks that this baby has trust for her teacher, she's ready for Ivetta, she trusts her enough to leave her dad, Ivetta and Laura has a relationship.  Now, Laura may not be fully adjusted but she definitely has trust for her teacher.  What her teacher is doing is all intentional for the building of the relationship between her and Laura, and possibly between whatever other children she takes the time to relate to.  

My response is very reflective on what Laura notices inside of the mirror.  But to further examine this instance, I still feel that she does not recognize her self, though she is beginning to.  She notices her reflection, and she is breaking down and examining each part of her body, such as when she moves her arm, the arm in the mirror moves as well.  But as I further think of this instance, I think of what I do in the mirror, sometimes I look in the mirror to compare myself to what I see on others.  So, now I think that Laura is looking in the mirror to notice that "hey I have this thing on my body that is just like the lady who carries me."  She may also look in the mirror to perfect her performance, as do I at times when I look in the mirror to exercise.  Laura may eventually want to pick up a ball, that she can't seem to grasp, but as she reflects in the mirror she can see the actions she is doing, and it assures her if she is doing it right or not.  

As I read this response compared to my past response, I notice that I am continually reflecting how me as a person uses things in compared to me as a teacher.  Sometimes I do not actually take the time to step back and reflect on how really the things I am using actually can be used.  

Who is the learner?

“Just as scientist must unlearn much of what they believe if they wish to master a new paradigm, so, too, ordinary readers have to be able to expunge misleading conceptions and construct new knowledge, if they are able to appreciate a hitherto unfamiliar concept.”

I feel that being in school this long has a huge impact on me to grasp onto concepts and learning about early childhood education.  Now what will happen when I have completed my schooling?  Will my disciplined mind to learn, crack?  How will I stay focused on continuing to learn all that I can? 

To care for children, and to let alone research children daily has also an impact on us as educators to continue to learn and grasp onto the updated researches about early development.  So how do we stay up to date?  How do we keep our minds open for new information? 

My site just changed the way we sanitize and disinfect.  This change alone, though it is so minor, changes the way I clean the classroom, the way that I find time to create sanitizing solutions, how am I going to fit this change into my schedule with the children?  What a minor change, but it can definitely have a huge impact.  So how will  you use new information to benefit your classroom and your teaching with the children? 

How will you make your learning visible?  I never thought of this question pertaining to me.  But as I learned in this reading, not only is the children the learners, but I am too.  So how do I make my own learning visible?  How would you make your learning visible? 

By:  Jadelynn Davis 

Are you questioning me?

Are we asking questions to be answered?

As I reflect upon my own teaching, I find myself asking questions that I allow one child to answer, and then move onto the next.  Often times, usually during a group discussion, I ask one thoughtful question that I am prepared for the entire class to answer.  In these two scenarios I think to myself, am I really preparing for the children's participation?

As I continue my reflection, I notice that the one child who answers my questions are often times the same children.  After reading this text, I think about, am I allowing children the time to think?  Am I preparing them with the right tools and information for their minds to expand?  Have I prepared enough prerequisites for the children to understand the question I am asking them?

All of these answers in the text are rich and full of meaning.  I notice that even the shortest answers are the greatest.  "You think better"  "They're in your head"  "It's easy you concentrate more."
Children know so much and as teachers, YES!! it is our duty to bring out these ideas.

So, how do we plan this?  How do we plan questions?  How do we prepare information?  I thought that questions just come out instinctively as we listen to what children are saying?  What if no one answers, where do we go from there?  How do we know if questions are too hard, to hard to comprehend?   How do we plan for questions to be thrown back at us?

"A child may ask us questions in areas where our knowledge is scant, and we become confused by our own uncertainty, in relation to both the topic and how to handle our confusion in front of the child."  

As the text sums up, yes we are asking questions, to investigate the child, to bring about ideas, to learn as the children learn, to document the child's knowledge, and so on.  But what's greater is when the children come back and ask us the question.  When we have those blank stare moments of, "What should I say," or "How do i explain this concept?"  As the text describes, children are not only asking us to find a answer as well, but they are watching us, they are watching how we gather information and how we delegate the answer.  They are listening to the examples we present, whether it be from a book or drawn upon our own experiences.  

Children are brilliant.  They have the answers to the questions we pose.  And these questions are what brings out the hidden knowledge children are harboring within their vast minds.  

By:  Jadelynn Davis

     

Project Zero & Reggio Children (2001). Making learning visible. Reggio Emilia, Italy:

Reggio Children.

Who are you to judge?

“They saw what happened, but judged the child instead of seeking his intention and creative idea.”

People are so quick to judge, and it's sad to say that often times I fall into that trap.

-I'm quick to judge a child according to their appearance

-I'm quick to judge a child according to their parents 

-I'm quick to judge a child according to their abilities

-I'm quick to judge a child by the way they draw

-I'm quick to judge a child by what they say or perhaps what they cannot say

-I'm quick to judge a child by what toy they choose

-I'm quick to judge a child according to the friends they play with

I'm quick to judge, but when I remember to just sit back,  erase these judgments, and look through a new slate -- observe the child and his abilities, I am almost always baffled at how surprisingly wrong I am of the judgments I have preluded.  

REMINDERS needed for us teachers

--“We teachers need to remind ourselves daily to remember that there is meaning in a child’s behavior. Discovering that meaning helps us support children.”

Our duty is to the children.  We are the children's advocate.  It's not our job to fill these empty minds.  Instead it's our job to break their ideas, creativity, strengths, and all tat good stuff out of their minds.  

--“Teacher and child stand shoulder to shoulder with much of the same, uniquely human, perspective — wanting to know, to accomplish, to grow, to follow their imaginations and curiosities. The teacher, caring, adds her own desire to help the child achieve his own intention.”

When I look at children through a new lens, I get a sense that CHILDREN are just the same as I am.  In fact I feel that the roles have reversed, instead of children doing the learning, in actuality I am.  I have to research the child.  I need to do the write ups and observations.  I need to see whether or not children are interested in bugs or not.  Looking at children through a new lens reverses the role and I now take the role of the learner, learning each child, and adding what I feel is appropriate for the child to grow. 

--“Nel Noddings[95] writes that caring is not something you are, but is something you engage in, something possible in every interaction.”

“While I saw their kindness to the children, I didn’t see respect for them. Love was present, but love alone wasn’t enough!”

I just read Nel Noddings book "Caring," and attended a seminar by a Woman who spoke of Nel Noddings "Caring."  When I first thought of caring, I thought that its just a phrase that I say to display my affection, for example, "I care about you."  But caring is more then just a phrase or an adjective.  It's a verb, it's an action.  It takes actually having to care for someone.  So with this said, to care for our children within the classroom takes more then just passing handouts to them.  I actually need to take the step to know them, to know who they are, to know what they want.  I actually have to do for them, I have to provide for them, see them as an individual, help them, accompany them, walk at the same level as them, and so on. 

--“As we try to change our Image of the Child from one who is weak and needs us to protect him to one who is strong, competent, and has his own ideas, needing us to find the materials and times for him to explore and create, we are called on to make changes in our own teaching dispositions.”

This is a phrase I find myself struggling, especially when I go through a situation with a child who "cries."  Children who cries are my triggers, and I often fall into the trap of seeing the child as weak and who need me to come to their rescue.  At times I need to step back, not jump into the situation.  I need to remember that in actuality this child is strong, so what do I do to bring out his words instead of a cry.  What can I help this child with?  How can I bring out his strengths?

--“We have an obligation to encourage the terrific thirst to make sense of the world little children experience from the day they are born.”

If there is something i'd like everyone to remember, is to remember this.  Children love to learn.  As teachers we need to bring this love out.  We need to help these children, not stuff them with rules and paperwork.  We need to remember that they are still children, as much as we learn of them, they are trying to make sense of the entire world around them.


So what would you remember?  How do you remember these things?  How do you go day by day with these new lens?  At times do you take it off?  Do you fall back to your old ways?  What do you do to keep these new lens on?

By:  Jadelynn Davis

Excerpt From: Sydney Gurewitz Clemens & Leslie Gleim. “Seeing Young Children With New Eyes.” Leslie Gleim, 2014-01-28. iBooks. 

Check out this book on the iBooks Store: https://itun.es/us/6f7k2.l

A child, or childish?

Children are most often disregarded for their capabilities, especially those who misbehave. Clemens and Gleim discuss using documentation to gain an understanding for children. 

“Believing that the child is competent, we have to figure out his or her behavior when it seems odd to us. We have to learn to see better. Regularly writing down what we see — and regularly taking photos and recording — are tools for improving understanding.”

How do we see better?

Through observing, having our full attention, eyes, ears, mouth, movement, focus, all on the child.  Children are fascinating humans, so fascinating that we adults need to decode children’s true abilities, and help them break through to reveal them. 

“Finding strength and competence in children who appear to much of the world as incomplete or incompetent has made me adopt an unwavering belief that all children are born competent, capable and rich.”

Such a powerful message, that Gleim believes that all children are BORN!! competent, capable, and rich.  

            What do we do to bring out these competencies?

            Is by 4 years old too late?

How do we find the strength and competence in children who are incompetent?   

“Do you respect her? Can you think of her as competent, strong, and full? This isn’t easy, but it is necessary.”

Yes, it is necessary.  We need to see each child as full, strong, competent, and with respect.  Through observing, through documenting, through researching each child, and then each child as a group, building each child, and then continue to research over and over to unravel what the child has been storing since birth. 

So if we teachers go through this researching and documenting, what do we do with it? 

Is it only for parents to see?

Do we share it with others?

How?    

 “While you collect data you send a clear and powerful message to Lauren that she is interesting, likeable, strong and capable, showing her that she is good.”

These observations and documents are especially useful for the child themselves.  They deserve to know of themselves.  When they see themselves being documented and then being able to learn of what they are capable of, the child is seen as important, they see themselves, and they notice what they themselves are capable of.     

Children are important.  They may not be seen as important.  The views of a child is seen as childish, foolish, babyish, silly, as playful, which often associates with mischievous, rascally, spirited, not serious.  But as you change your view of children hopefully “THE CHILD” maybe seen more seriously.    

Excerpt From: Clemens & Gleim. “Seeing Young Children With New Eyes.” iBooks. https://itun.es/us/6f7k2.l

By:  Jadelynn Davis

How do we communicate?

What is the purpose of our work in the end of all things?
Why are we doing what we are doing?

These questions all lead to the idea of communication for me.  In the end it is getting the word out to the people of children.

To get the children's voices heard

To get the understanding of children out

To get people to know children

To get people not to underestimate them

To get the word out that children are capable

Two examples of communication from Making Learning Visible and Seeing Children With New Eyes are:

Daily Sheets

Long Distance Communication

Daily sheets on the one hand communicates with parents directly, the ideas and the explanation of teachers and their ways of teaching.  Through the stories that the teacher describes each day explains to parents what the children are doing and in that why it was important, that there was teaching within the playing.  

Long distance communication is a bit more complex since it takes cooperation from two parties to communicate.  But in doing this children are exposed, different parts of the world is exposed, children are seen, support from parents and the whole school is added in the mix, and learning is exercised.  There is so much to learn from long distance communication and so much can be done.  Pictures, phone calls, mailing, faxing, and nowadays there is video chats, which are all ways of communication, which ideas and teachings can be used.  The expansion of "the child" is expressed in the child, the parents and families, school, and it opens the doors for the community, even people across the world.  

What will you do to communicate? 

Why is communication important to you?

Why will you use communication?

What are other ways to communicate?

What do you use for communication? 

What do you say when you communicate?

Is getting the word out about "the child" ever the focus?

By:  Jadelynn Davis

   

How do we help children?

As teachers, how do we help children see themselves as able bodies, physically, mentally, socially, and emotionally?  How do we help children help and notice each other?  

As teachers we have become keen to observing and documenting the children.  And as we all should know that documenting helps us as teachers grow and it helps us help the children.  But how do we help the children help one another?  How do we help children see one another?  And hear one another?  How can we help children understand each other?

“Young children don’t yet understand that others have different ideas and perspectives and that talking with each other is the way to explore and possibly bridge those differences. If children come to our programs sometimes seeing other people as objects, we can help them become more adept at relating to others as people who are in some ways like them and in other ways different.”

Knowing the capabilities of children and understanding their milestones, gives us, the teachers, an explanation of what we should be doing.  So how do we do with this knowledge? 

We build the child!  

We build the child through play

We create activities of interaction 

We build our own vocabulary to express to children 

We plan intentionally!!

We listen to the children 

We are the children's role model 

We consider the children's thoughts and perspectives and ideas 

We allow children to guide their own learning 

We build relationships with everyone we come in to contact with 

We have an unbiased view

And in addition, we document!!

"The effect of documentation (documents, notes, slides, and recordings) is not limited to making visible that which is, but on the contrary, by making an experience visible, documentation enables the experience to exist and thus makes it shareable and open to the "possibles" (possible interpretations, multiple dialogues among children and adults)," (Project Zero, 150).

So how do we use the children to our advantage?  How do we use our documents to our advantage?  How do we help build relationships?

Excerpt From: Sydney Gurewitz Clemens & Leslie Gleim. “Seeing Young Children With New Eyes.” Leslie Gleim, 2014-01-28. iBooks. 

This material may be protected by copyright.

Check out this book on the iBooks Store: https://itun.es/us/6f7k2.l

Project Zero & Reggio Children (2001). Making learning visible. Reggio Emilia, Italy: Reggio Children. 

Documents?

As an early childhood educator all I know is play.  All I know is to focus on the children and to build the child as a whole.  So why do we need documents?  What are these documents?  Who are the documents for?  What do you document?  Clemens and Gleim ask "Is it something we do or is it something we make?"  

When I think of the word documents, what comes to my mind is...

Paper work 

Piles of forms

Rules

Writing

Information 

Records

Facts 

Official use

Objectives

Files 

None of these definitions of documents have anything to do with children.  So why is it important?  Why do we need rules and forms?  Why document?  

Well I'm glad to say that documents and documentation have an important use in the early childhood field.

-Clemens and Gleim indicates “We collect data, we think about what we’ve collected, we consider it with our friends and colleagues and we produce something to share with the children, their parents, the school community, and the wider community.”

-Documentation according to an early childhood educator, from my perspective, is a record developed by teachers of instances and experiences from straight from children, whether verbally, through play, through interactions, etc.

-Documentation is the true examples of children's capabilities.  And through documentations parents can become aware, the community can become aware, founders and the government can become aware of all the wonders that children have in stored.  And most importantly the children can visually see their abilities when documentations are shared on the children's level.  

-Documentation is not only for the use of capturing the child's abilities, but it's also used for the teachers.  To reflect on their teaching and handling of the classroom.  To discuss daily activities, what's working? what's not? what are the children interested in? Are the children understanding?  Or is the information not being grasped?  

Do will you document?  And if so how are you using these documents to its fullest capacity?

Excerpt From: Sydney Gurewitz Clemens & Leslie Gleim. “Seeing Young Children With New Eyes.” Leslie Gleim, 2014-01-28. iBooks. 

Who will be the change?

I often hear phrases such as...

-It doesn't take much to "WATCH" a kid

-Watching children is so easy

-You watch children for a living?

-All you gotta do is set the kid in front of the TV and thats all

-Being a teacher is terrible pay

-A monkey can watch a kid

-All you gotta do is discipline them then they will listen

-That's what you do is play all day with children?

These phrases just boggles my mind, as I try to understand where are these people getting their information from?  Do people honestly not know what it takes to be a teacher of children?  Yes, the preschool age group may be easier then elementary, high school, and college aged students, but seriously, you honestly think its that easy?


"Since 2002, when the No Child Left Behind law was passed, American teachers have been mandated to follow scripts found in teacher’s manuals that accompany textbooks, and to test children with standardized tests several times each year. Practically, this means teaching only the “official” text without veering from what is prescribed."

I would like to add, that if all you're doing is following a scripted lesson plan, then yes, this sounds easy peasy!!! I mean, who wouldn't want to be a teacher?  The planning is done for.  All you need to do is the grading, which is probably easy as well since it's all prescribed anyways.

But on the contrary...

"People in early childhood education (ECE) who teach in preschool programs are affected by the change in expectations of children about to enter Kindergarten, and people in ECE who teach kindergarten, first, or second grade are swept up in the mania for testing and pulled away from the real job, helping young children to grow and learn in ways that interest them and serve the community, to focus on “their creative capacities and their socio-emotional and physical development.”

Yes, that's a mouthful!!! but in short, this "NO CHILD LEFT BEHIND" is bull crap on the part of the children.  Yes the thought is there to not allow children to be left behind, but in doing so, this law is leaving the child as a WHOLE out = which means it's leaving...

the adventurous child out

the athletic child out

the imaginative child out 

the creative child out

the wild child out

the artsy child out
the loving child out

the squirmy child out

the celebratory child out

the loud child out

the quiet child out

the shy child out

the cheerful child out

All these aspect of a child is being left out from this one bill that only focuses on the academic.  As an early childhood educator you look at the the child as a whole.  In order for the CHILD as an individual TO GROW teaching according to the now is a MUST.


But this can change, this law can change.

“It will take lots of love and courage and political wit to induce our politicians to change these policies which utterly fail to acknowledge the uniqueness of each child. Our ability to effect this change will come as a result of looking with open hearts at children, parents and teachers, listening to them, and exchanging learning. Then we must find a way to convey changes that are needed to those who make policy. Action based on what our heightened consciousness and close observation show us will result in changes that benefit children and schools.”

BE THE CHANGE!!!

Focus on the child

Not what the adults want

Not what the statistics need

Not what tomorrow wants

FOCUS ON THE CHILD NOW!!!

Be the change for your child today!!

“Through observing closely and being open to new possibilities, by taking time to reflect on what we’re doing, we increase our own competence. We must abandon the idea that we already know what is here. What we know is influenced, bounded and constrained by our past experiences, and today’s new experiences give us fresh data to process, and what we see this afternoon may challenge what we believed this morning. Thinking all the time takes work, but it sharpens and develops insight — something every good teacher needs.”

The children need us.  It's not so easy to raise children in a developmentally appropriate way.  It takes hard work, commitment, time, energy, and most of all CARE!! in order to be an effective teacher of children from zero to eight.

Early childhood is needed, so who will be the change?  What will you do?  When will you do it?



Excerpt From: Clemens & Gleim. “Seeing Young Children With New Eyes.” iBooks. https://itun.es/us/6f7k2.l

how do you become THAT teacher?

Teachers come in all shapes and forms.  

There are teachers that know children

There are teachers who follow the books

There are teachers that teach in front of a black board

There are teachers that teach through motions

There are teachers afraid of mess

There are teachers that have taught for 20+ years

There are up and coming new teachers 

There are teachers who follow instructions
There are teachers who are instinctual 

There are teachers who teaches instinctually 

There are teachers that teach for money

There are teachers that love children 

But what distinguishes a teacher of worth? of quality? of nurture? of character? 

What distinguishes THAT teacher, from all the rest?  are they truly better?

--Some of the richest countries have the poorest systems.--> Go figure, as you can see in our own country we can have all the wealth but that doesn't necessarily mean that we have the best preschool systems.  And to add the richest countries don't always spend their money, particularly, on the children.


"The quality and effectiveness of programs do not depend entirely on wealth."

You can have a classroom filled with all the wonderful stimulating toys, blocks, colors, aesthetics, books, and so on, but it takes a person, a teacher who understands children, to make learning effective--to have children learn, and love learning.  

--“research shows that didactic classrooms do not support effectively the holistic development of young children, in particular their creative capacities, and their socio-emotional and physical development.”

The entire child is of importance.  To add, the child TODAY is of importance then the child tomorrow, the child next week, the child next month, the child next year, the child 5 years from now, and so on.  The child TODAY is what matters.  

Teaching according to a book, teaching according to tests, teaching according to a teachers preference --> Has no importance to THE CHILD, THE HOLISTIC CHILD, THE CHILD TODAY, the child that is supposed to be taught.  The most meaningful learning is the learning done today, the learning that is connected to the interest of the children, the learning that makes sense to the child.    

Why doesn't our society see children as a whole?  

Why does our society teach according to books?

Why does our society teach with chairs and desks facing the front and teachers teaching at the front on a chalk board?

Why doesn't the rest of the school system, in our society, teach like early childhood educators? 

“experience needs to be present for new information to connect and hold”



--“Teachers often make the mistake of teaching lessons on subjects some children haven’t experienced.”

In recent discussions with colleagues, about elementary tests, we talked about children being tested on animals like squirrels, beavers, skunks, and so on.  These animals are unfamiliar to children.  I would even add dinosaurs to this discussion.  As an example, these animals, are of no interest to children, yet it will in their later schooling years.  So should we still be teaching children about these particular animals?

To add, my husband just took his CDL permit test, but failed on questions about train track crossings, and snow.  This just goes to show that yes he has not experienced these circumstances, yet he needed the knowledge of it.  So if children need to know certain aspects of unknown experiences, what do we do as educators?

Do we present the material to them?  Or no?

--“We learn from the children, from our colleagues and friends and from our whole community as we explore collaboratively, thinking about what the children’s behavior might be telling us. We try many things, hoping that what we try will move us in the direction of helping the children with their intentions, and we will sometimes succeed. We will learn from our errors, and search, not for new certainties, but for new ways of exploring and understanding, leading to new ways of assisting capable, rich, thoughtful children’s explorations.”

I find myself making mistakes as THAT "new teacher."  But i've found that being THAT "new teacher doesn't make me un-knowledgable about children, it doesn't make me a teacher that goes according to the books, it doesn't make a teacher that is not useful, as if children are not learning.

I can say that going through the mistakes, I have definitely grown, and I have a more wider view of teaching in more instances.  So can I be THAT teacher?  rather then be THAT "new teacher?"    

By:  Jadelynn Davis

Excerpt From: Clemens & Gleim. “Seeing Young Children With New Eyes.” iBooks. https://itun.es/us/6f7k2.l