I was just at a family function and I decided this would be
a great time to do our observation. My aunt walked in the room and immediately
picked up my godson. She said, “Hello Emmitt!” Then turned to his mother and
started asking her questions on how Emmitt was doing. Emmitt started squirming
and saying “down.” My aunt did not listen until finally Emmitt squirmed just
enough for her to almost drop him. That is when she put him down and continued
talking.
From this whole observation, I learned that my family does
this quite a bit to the younger ones. Everyone will pick them up and say hello
but then start talking to an adult. The children then go unnoticed and most
likely feel like they are not important.
This week, we learned vital tools to interacting with
children. One main tip that I learned was “to refrain from talking about babies to
others in the baby’s presence” (Kovach & Da Ros-Voseles, 2011, p.48). For
this to happen, my aunt should have asked Emmitt how he was doing and then
later ask the mother. We also learned to “talk to babies before touching them”
(Kovach & Da Ros-Voseles, 2011, p.48). I think Emmitt would have felt more
comfortable if my aunt would have asked Emmitt if she could pick him up or say
that she was going to pick him up. Being that Emmitt is a toddler, he knows how
to express his wants and needs and this should be listened to.
While watching this encounter, I realized that I do the same
things. I don’t think about talking to the child before picking them up or
asking the child the questions. I just assume that since he can’t answer that
it doesn’t really matter. I now know that this is completely wrong! I need to
make sure that I communicate more with the younger children and explain what I
am going to do before or while I am doing it. The one thing that I do know I do
well is getting down to the child’s level to talk to them. I believe that this
really helps in the communication process because I will not look intimidating
to the child.
References:
Kovach, B., & Da Ros-Voseles, D. (2011).
Communicating with babies. YC: Young Children, 66(2), 48-50. Retrieved
from http://ezp.waldenulibrary.org/login?url=http://search.ebscohost.com/login.aspx?direct=true&db=ehh&AN=60001533&site=ehost-live&scope=site
You make an excellent point, Charlotte. Adults do many things with and to children without their permission. While sometimes this is necessary, just word of explanation can go a long way to putting the child at ease. And to err on the side of asking first would go a long way to build early self esteem.
ReplyDeleteWe have a ground rule in our nursery classroom, that you face a child and ask permission before wiping their nose, or picking them up unless they or someone they are approaching are in immediate danger. Once we set this on paper, it was interesting to each of us how often we started to not offer this fundamental respect.
I suspect if we were to go to any family gathering in many different cultures we would see the same kind of behavior that ignores that this little one is already a person with opinions and 'space'rights.
Thanks for this learning example.
Charlotte,
ReplyDeleteI totally agree with you, many adults talk about babies and not with them. Kovach and da Ros Vogeles (2011) stated that it is very important when are communicating with infants to think about their likes and dislikes. She also recommends us to stop, appreciate, and believe that our acknowledgemnt makes a difference. When we value and respect babies and be responsive to their needs, our interction with them will be more effective. Thank you for sharing.
Excellent post! When I was a teacher in an infant classroom learning to say something before picking the child up was hard for me to remember to do. Especially, when four babies are crying, two need to be feed and two need to be changed all at once. It is easy to skip that step, but like you said it is super important. Remebering to this can help the child feel important and help teach social skills as well.
ReplyDeleteHi Charlotte,
ReplyDeleteGReat observation. Most familty members tend to do that with the smaller infants and young toddlers. Communicating with Babies article states that you may be unaware of the value of talking to babies directly (Kovach & Da Ros-Voseles, 2011). It may not occur to you to use language to include the babies in communication (Kovach & Da Ros-Voseles, 2011). When you ignore babies, you tell them they are not valued(Kovach & Da Ros-Voseles, 2011). When you do not talk to babies, they are unlikely to understand what is happening with them(Kovach & Da Ros-Voseles, 2011). Since learning the correct way to communicate with children, getting to my daughters level helps her to understand what I am saying better. Even when I am disciplining her, I get to her level and explain to her why I am doing what I am doing. She now seems unafraid to come to me when she knows she has done something wrong. I use to be bad about being loud trying to correct her and it did nothing but make her cry and not understand why she was in trouble. when I see children in the daycares and school systems, I get excited to talk to them,because I am eager to put my knowledge from this course to work.
References
Kovach, B., & Da Ros-Voseles, D. (2011). Communicating with babies. YC: Young Children, 66(2), 48-50. Retrieved from the Walden Library using the Education Research Complete database. http://ezp.waldenulibrary.org/login?url=http://search.ebscohost.com/login.aspx?direct=true&db=ehh&AN=60001533&site=ehost-live&scope=site