What I Have Learned

One hope that I have when I think about working with children and families is that they all feel welcomed and comfortable around me. I hope that I can teach children to see pass stereotypes and their own biases to see a person for who they truly are.

One goal that I would want to set for the early childhood field is to make courses like these more known and available to ALL teachers. I think that teachers should have to understand the impact that their biases have on others and what they are teaching their students without knowing it.

I want to thank Dr. Ferrari and all of my colleagues for everything that you have taught me. This course was filled with so much insight and each of you helped me to understand the different aspects of it all. I would assume that I will see most of you in the next course, but if not, I wish you the best of luck with the rest of the program!

Week 7

The top row represents an Anti-Bias Education, where every child learns to love one another and their differences. The bottom row represents what children go through and how they feel when bias and discrimination enter their lives. With each experience, a child is either given the opportunity to grow and experience new things, or left behind and not being able to see the world for what it is.

The bottom left picture is my favorite because it shows how children can get trapped by the labels that are given to them.


References:

B, R. (n.d.). Bye bye prejudice! Retrieved from http://library.thinkquest.org/CR0210341/solutions/rebecca/rebecca.htm

Compasito. (n.d.). Discrimination. Retrieved from http://www.eycb.coe.int/compasito/chapter_5/3.html

Look For Diagnosis. (2009). Prejudice. Retrieved from http://www.lookfordiagnosis.com/mesh_info.php?term=Prejudice&lang=1

PBWorks. (2009). Prejudice and discrimination. Retrieved from http://kiefer.pbworks.com/w/page/6289146/Prejudice%20and%20Discrimination

Teen Health Alliance. (2007). Subject: discrimination. Retrieved from http://www.teenvillage.org/social_discrimination_prejudice.asp

Week 6

This week we are supposed to write a story about a time when a child pointed out someone else’s differences and the response that we had towards this comment. The story that sticks out most in my head happened when I was teaching preschool. One of my preschool students wanted to spend some time alone. She did quite a bit where she would get mad at the other children and just wanted some time to herself. Well, on this particular day, one of the boys would not leave her alone because he wanted to play with her.

As the child got more frustrated that the boy was bothering her, she turned and pointed to the boy and yelled, “I don’t like to play with black people!” At this point, I was completely in shock, and walked over to the children. I asked the boy if he was okay, and when he said “yes” he went and played with another group of children. At that time, I turned to the girl and said, “We shouldn’t say things like that. You just hurt his feelings. How do you think you would feel if someone said that to you?”

This is when the child got quite and said that she just wanted some alone time. We talked about the different ways to tell someone that we want to be left alone and that she should have come to me if there was a problem. Later, we informed both the children’s parents on what had happened.

Thinking back, I don’t know if I gave both children the right message. I talked about hurting someone’s feelings but I didn’t really go into detail about how we are all different. I was just so shocked by this incident, especially since they are really good friends, and I didn’t know how to handle the situation.

Learning what I have from this program, the one thing that an anti-bias educator would do is talk to both children at the same time to talk about differences. I should have talked to the other child more and made sure that he was ok, and to let him know that it was not ok with what the other child said. If I had all this information, I would have also talked to the girl more about race and how it wasn’t his skin color that made her not want to play with him. I think if this situation were to happen again, I wouldn’t be so shocked and not know how to handle it. I would be more prepared and ready to take action.