Week 8: Issues and Trends: Change, Contexts, Consequences, Constants Revisited

I have fostered and shared my professional growth by listening to podcasts and exploring websites pertaining to Early Childhood Education.  I have even gained knowledge from reading my colleagues blog links concerning Early Childhood Education in international countries.  There are several consequences of learning about the international Early Childhood field.  My personal and professional development has been enhanced by reading articles from the websites of Save the Children.  I have gained so much knowledge from the issues in Africa such as poverty, stunting, malaria, and HIV.  All of these issues have changed my personal perspective of children in Africa.  These issues have shown me that our government and our nation are in a better predicament than that of Africa.  Even though poverty exist in the United States we are far better off than in Africa. 

            The second consequence is that most of the international countries that my colleagues have shared information on in their blogs share some of the exact goals, and mission statements in the field of Early Childhood Education as that of the United States.  Some of the countries are also a little different because that put more emphasis on investing in their programs of Early Childhood Education.  They invest because they expect great returns in the future.   The last consequence of learning about the international Early Childhood Education field is that I can now bring or raise awareness to other Early Childhood Education professionals about the importance of Early Childhood Education in other countries and how we can advocate to our policy makers to bring our standards of our own Early Childhood Education programs to meet the standards of the international countries.  In other words we can advocate to receive better funding for our Early Childhood Education programs so that we can compete with the international countries around the globe.

            The one goal that I hope for is that we will all learn from each other and that we will collaborate together to advocate for better standards and more high quality programs that will improve our young children’s growth and development so that they may reach their full potential and become productive citizens no matter what part of the world they live in.

           

International Early Childhood Issues Week 7 UNESCO

The three insights that I have gained from viewing the UNESCO’s website in Week 6 is:

<!--[if !supportLists]-->·         <!--[endif]-->UNESCO’s Quality childcare programs

<!--[if !supportLists]-->·         <!--[endif]-->UNESCO and Access and Equity

<!--[if !supportLists]-->·         <!--[endif]-->UNESCO’s Education in the 21^st Century

The UNESCO’s high quality childcare programs especially for the kids in the low-income households and the families that are at various disadvantages promote cognitive and linguistic development and school readiness (http://www.unesco.org).  Active involvement from parents and communities and relevant play and learning materials ensure that early childhood services remain relevant to the needs of the children and all other stakeholders and increases sustainability (http://www.unesco.org).  This statement ties back to one of my goals which is to instill in parents the importance of parental involvement.  Parental involvement is vitally important to the development of children in childcare programs.  Building positive relationships with the students as well as the parents is very important.  UNESCO is dedicated to promoting quality childcare programs.

In dealing with Access and Equity some countries have made a commitment to expand and improve early childhood care and education.  This is especially true for low-income and disadvantaged children. The government was urged to expand equitable access to quality early childhood services underscoring the importance of instituting policy in favor of the poor (http://www.unesco.org).  Alternative services are usually promoted to the poor children with limited or no access to mainstream the early childhood services.  This often raises concerns about sustainability and quality.  In some cases the government may have limited resources so they use what is called a pro-poor policy that allow them to redistribute some of the resources by reducing the state support for the more privileged children http://www.unesco.org). According to this article the government must ensure equitable distribution of resources among the different populations especially those who are in the disadvantaged regions.  Vulnerable children need equal access.
UNESCO’S mission to educate is one of its principal activities to achieve.  They are committed to a holistic and humanistic vision of quality education worldwide.  The objectives are to support the achievement for all (EFA) to provide global and regional leadership in education, to strengthen education systems worldwide for early childhood to the adult years (http://www.unesco.org).  They focus on increasing access and equity as well as improving quality.  They work with the governments and a wide range of partners to make education systems more effective through policy change (http://www.unesco.org).

Reference

All Information retrieved from http://www.unesco.org

Sharing Web Resources Week 6

When I followed some of the outside links for Harlem Children’s Zone it lead me to the Harlem Children’s Zone College Success Office.  This office assists the students who have graduated from high school to enroll in appropriate colleges.  It not only assists them in getting in the colleges it also helps them throughout their college years (http://www.hcz.org).  Statistics from the Harlem Children’s Zone shows that over 642 of the students who attended the after school programs enrolled in college (http://www.hcz.org). 

            In my search the one area that I have admired the most is the Early Childhood programs and how they recognized the importance of the first three years of a child’s life and how critical it is to their development (http://www.hcz.org).  They have three fantastic programs for early childhood education.  The first one is the Baby College.  This program has workshops for expected parents and those that may be raising children up to age three (3) (http://www.hcz.org).  This is a way for expected parents to gain knowledge about parenting before their babies are born.  All of these services are free of charge to all communities (http://www.hcz.org). 

            The second program is the Three Year Old Journey.  This program assists parents on Saturday’s for several months.  It focuses on child development, language building skills, and parenting skills (http://www.hcz.org).  The third program is the Harlem Gems.  This program is designed to prepare pre-kindergarteners for kindergarten.  The classes teach English, Spanish, and French.  This program includes 3 sites which serve 200 children.  It seems to me that the HCZ places a lot of focus on the Early Childhood programs because they know that the returns will be worth every effort they put forth to educate the children. 

            I applied for the newsletter but I have not received any correspondence back from the HCZ.  Each time I have checked the newsletter sign-in I get a message that states that it takes 2-3 business days for the process to be completed.  I am still hopeful.  The website does contain information that adds to my understanding of equity and excellence in early care and education because it provides education, social-services, and community building programs to children and their families.  The three barriers that we have discussed in this week’s assignment Awareness, Accessibility, and Responsiveness are barriers that the HCZ are eliminating on a daily basis.

            Each time I view the Harlem Children’s Zone website I gain new knowledge as it pertains to the early childhood field.  This week I was overwhelmed when I read about Harlem’s Single Stop program.  This program brings about awareness concerning people, securing benefits, access to legal guidance, and even domestic violence.  These sessions are one-on-one sessions (http://www.hcz.org). 

Reference

http://www.hcz.org

Getting to know Your International Contacts Part 2 Week 5

I am discussing the alternative from the Center on the Developing Child from Harvard University.  The Global Children’s Initiative center draws on lessons from our work in the United States.  It seeks to advance the center’s core mission globally by implementing a compelling research, public engagement and leadership development agenda in child health and development that is grounded in Science and engages researchers, public leaders, practitioners, and students from a wide range of institutions around the world (http://developingchild.harvard.edu). 

            I have gained several insights about Early Childhood systems around the globe.  The first insight that I have gained is how the first goal of The Global Children’s Initiative is designed to reframe the discourse around child health and development in the global policy arena by educating high-level decision-makers about the underlying science of learning, behavior, and health beginning in the earliest years of life (http://developingchild.harvard.edu).  I find this very important because if the decision-makers are educated in science, behavior, and the health of children from the very beginning of life then they will make the decisions in the interest of EVERY child and no children will be left behind.

            The second insight I gained was the information pertaining to (UBC) Un Buen Comienzo “A Good Start” which is a collaborative project in Chile which is to improve the quality of education in four to six year olds in language development through teacher professional development.  It is also designed to assist with health issues that would normally keep children from attending school.  This will help by improving the children’s health which will improve their school attendance.  The (UBC) also seeks to get and keep parental involvement from their parents.

            The Third insight I gained was how this article talked about how some studies have been successful in investigating the impact of Early Childhood experiences on children’s developmental, health, and educational outcomes in developing countries.  In Zambian Africa there is little evidence available on Early Childhood development.  Because of this several organizations along with Harvard University came together collaboratively to launch a project which is called the Zambia Early Childhood Development Project.  It is designed to measure effects of Anti-Malaria on the children in Zambia.  A test called the (ZamCAT) was created which is an assessment tool to assess physical, socio-emotional, and cognitive development before and throughout the children’s schooling (http://developingchild.harvard.edu).

            The Global Children’s Initiative is preparing future and current leaders to build and leverage knowledge that will promote the healthy development of children and families and bring high returns in all of society (http://developingchild.harvard.edu).

Reference

http://developingchild.harvard.edu/initiatives/global_initiative