Parent, Family, and Community Engagement

Sometimes you can hear a person share their experience about something that has happened in their life and you may not feel moved by what you have heard. Then there are stories that will absolutely make you feel wonderful and sometimes the story will just move you to tears. There were so many parental stories to choose from to listen to, I had a hard time figuring out which ones to listen too. I was able to select some stories that gave me different points of view and a better understanding about how Head Start has helped people.

From a professional standpoint, hearing Almeta Richards-Keys talk about how Head Start empowered her to be able to go to school and get both her Bachelors and Master’s degrees, or hearing about Angel Ortiz feel like he can be a good role model for his daughter, or even hearing Charlene Ishikuro talk about how she got involved in the Head Start program (Office of Head Start, Early Childhood Learning and Knowledge Center (ECLKC), n.d.) empowers me. When a professional who works in Head Start hears stories like this, it helps them want to encourage more parents to become actively involved in the Head Start program. Personally, these stories touched me emotionally. I’m not sure if it was the onions that I had cut earlier and had for lunch or it was the stories, but as I was listening to the stories I got tears in my eyes.

It is so important for children to see their parents helping out as a volunteer in a Head Start classroom because this can give them a visual way to see how to give back when they get older. It is especially important for children to see their father’s get involved, like Angel Ortiz was talking about, because all children need a father to be a positive role model for them (Office of Head Start, Early Childhood Learning and Knowledge Center (ECLKC), n.d.). It can also benefit other families because any parent that comes in to help out in the classroom, other parents when they are either dropping their child off or picking their children up, can see another child’s parent reading to a group of children. That may be the motivation they need to volunteer when they can in the classroom so that they can, perhaps, influence other parents that may not be as active, to become more active in the program.

Any early childhood educator, person in the public, policy makers and government officials like to hear stories about how Head Start has helped people like children or even parents, reach the realization that it is very helpful. Hopefully by hearing stories about how Head Start has made a positive influence in the lives of people, especially parents, policy makers and government officials can see just how important that Head Start really is. This is an important element particularly so that Head Start can continue to be funded. This can also help so that future generations of children can be able to be positively influenced as well.

I feel that parental support and involvement can go a long way in the early childhood field. By parents getting more involved in any aspect of the early childhood field, regardless of what strand it is, it shows that they want to have a partnership along with the teachers of the early childhood field. This can also help policy makers because it is the parents that can give policy makers and government officials more of an idea about what works and what changes can be made so that the children can be the most important part of the early childhood field. It is the parents and early childhood professionals that ultimately know what children need better than policy makers who do not work very closely with the children. It is the voices of parents and ECE professionals that are ultimately speaking for the children to make sure that they are all getting the support and help that they need in order to succeed in school.

Reference:

Office of Head Start, Early Childhood Learning and Knowledge Center (ECLKC). (n.d.). Parent and family stories [Web video clips]. Retrieved from http://eclkc.ohs.acf.hhs.gov/hslc/hs/about/stories/pfs

Quality Programs for All Children

I have helped out in preschools as either a substitute teacher’s aide or as a substitute teacher both in the Adventist school system as well as the public school system. When I did help out the Pre-K/Kindergarten teacher I managed to get into a conversation with her about how she became certified to teach and she told me that all she had was a certificate. She has also been teaching in that capacity for many years. She absolutely loves what she does and has been a very good resource for me as far as material that I could use in my own classroom when the time comes for that to happen.

As I have read the news and heard things on the political level from President Obama on what he wants to do with having access for preschool for all children, I have rather mixed feelings on the subject. While I feel that all families would like to have access to quality preschool programs and while this is very important, the negative thing that I have taken from it is how this has been approached. It seems like the only way that the education of young people is going to be successful is if you start at the early childhood level and work your way up rather than making sure that children in K-12 are able to compete with other countries with their education and then working on trying to get preschool available for everyone. I feel like it is more of an afterthought.

I think that there is also a lot of arguments as to whether preschoolers should be sitting down and doing more academic work instead of learning through play. I think it is more important that children do have more time to play and explore their environment rather than sitting down and having to learn how to read at the age of four years old. They are still trying to get a handle on their language skills first than learning how to read. I think that as an early childhood advocate this is where we can have the ability to encourage parents to read to their children at home that way it is not just the teacher’s job.

As far as these changes are concerned, it is up to policy makers and advocates in the early childhood field to help people understand what is going on all the while listening to what their needs are and how we, as professionals can meet their needs. I think by listening to the needs of the parents who have young children or who may be thinking of starting families so that we may be better able to advocate for the early childhood field. We need to keep these young children and their families in mind all the while also being able to help other early childhood professionals be able to offer the high quality programs for children and families.

What Resonates With You About Early Childhood Public Policy and Advocacy?

As I look back on the path that I have taken to where I am now in the Early Childhood program here at Walden, there has been the question of why did I choose this particular area of Public Policy and Advocacy. My reasoning for it has been really hard to explain really, but it basically boils down to this: I want to be able to make some sort of difference. Why did I choose this particular specialization? I just did. It sounds a little bit trite to say this but I am not going to leave it there. I think that it somewhat hit me when I did my student teaching back in September-December of 2010. One particular reason comes to mind is that I can make a difference in the lives of young children.

This realization hit me on a particular day when a first grade boy who was really struggling in class with his behavior due to the fact that his home life was messed up. The two of us were a little slow heading outside to recess, but while we were making our way out of the classroom, he said that he wanted to be a teacher just like me. There was also an incidence that occurred just before the Christmas break when the other first and second grade teacher started to collect food for the children who did not have nearly as much to eat as some of the other children in the school, and I knew this somewhat after being told that a brother and sister who were in the same classroom at the school that I was student teaching at were among the children that may not have had as much food as the rest of the students in the classroom. It is because of the children that I have just written about is the reason that I decided to go into Public Policy and Advocacy.

I think in order to be a successful advocate, there has to be a passion there to begin with. At the same time, I think that having something of a personal experience when you see it first hand, really can make just as big of a difference. While it is one thing to say that you want to be able to help children that are in need, it is another thing to actually have the skills or the knowledge about certain situations, to be able to actually do something about it, to make the difference in the life of a child and their family. Sometimes you can also learn from moments that come up unexpectedly so that you can be an advocate. Another quick example would be helpful in illustrating this last point that I made. As we know from the news, Washington State, which is where I reside, can legally sell Marijuana. For awhile there had been quite a discussion as to where to set up a shop that was not near the schools in the town that I live in. Well I got an opportunity to go to the town hall meeting that settled this issue once and for all. I got up front and addressed the council and stated what the negatives effects could be on young children. I may not have been as knowledgeable as some of the other people that spoke on the issue but that was my way of advocating for the children. As a result it was voted unanimously to not have any kind of shop built in town as we have too many schools that are pretty close together.

When it comes to goals that I have as far as what I hope to learn about public policy and advocacy are the following. First, I hope to learn about how to become a good advocate for children so that if other opportunities present themselves, that I will see them for what they are and be able to speak out and do something in order to advocate for young children. Second, I hope to learn about how public policy works. In other words the process that is involved so that it can be done so that it is a benefit to every young child and not just a small sampling of the population. Third and final, and I say this because I also have a BA in History, I would like to know what history teaches about public policy and how advocacy has changed and evolved over time. Not necessarily the political aspects of what makes up public policy and advocacy, although that would be just as interesting, but how history has defined it. I just hope that somehow these three goals are obtainable.