WK 3 Self Reflection

Communication is prevalant throughout my day.  I feel that I do communicate differently with different groups depending on who I am talking with.  When I am talking to my four year old daughter and her friends I communicate differently than in a professional setting.  I have to be flexible, patient and understanding with everyone I communicate with. 

The following are three different strategies that I feel will help me communicate more effectively with any group. 

1.  Treat others as you would like to be treated. 
2.  Showing respect through effective listening.
3.  Getting to know children and families to help me understanding their culture and home life. 

All three of these strategies will allow me to be a better communicator.  I want to make sure that my biases are not present when communicating. I also want to make sure that I am showing respect to everyone that I communicate with. 

Muting the TV

I decided to watch an epsiode of Blue Bloods which is a police officer drama on CBS. 

As I observed the showed with no sound I observed a lot of facial expressions.  Many of the expressions to me looked like sadness (people crying) and concern (wrinkles in the forehead appeared when talking to another person).  Talking with arms crossed and a lot of finger pointing.  I also felt that a lot of people appeared to be serious.  There was not a lot of smiling during this episode and the characters did not seem to be having a good time. 

When I rewatched the show again with the volume on it was a very serious show due to the story line.  The storyline was about a lady who lost her baby due to being punched in the face on the street.  The cops were struggling with finding a suspect. 

This assignment allowed me to really look at how people express themselves with their non verbal communication.  It was actually nice to watch a TV show where the actors could use facial expressions to communicate what they were saying without actually hearing any words.  I think that many of the assumptions I made were acurate due to being able to read those non verbal skills.  When I lived and worked in Alaska many times the population that I worked with communicated with non verbal skills.  I still remember talking on the phone to staff members at a specific location and a question was asked and they did not respond.  I actually said you gals are going to have to respond with words and not scrunch your face.  Everyone laughed but now that I think back on it I had to learn a lot about what certain facial expressions meant in the region that I worked in.  I think that a lot of us would be surprised with how much we acutally communicate with our non verbals skills. 

Competent Communication

When I think of a competent communicator i think of my friend Patrice.  She works in the Early Childhood field and I have been able to see her in action when she is advocating on behalf of young children.  When she talks people listen.  She has a voice that people listen to.  She also is able to say what she wants but is able to bring it down to the level that people understand.  She doesn't try to sugar coat her stories.  She also is able to make people laugh even when there is a serious conversation happening.  Patrice also gets her facts straight and wants to have the knowledge of what she is going to speak about before she goes and does a talk.  

I admire Patrice and the way she goes about advocating for early childhood services.  I would want to model my own communication behaviors after her.  I would want to be able to gather the facts and knowledge of the topic and then be able to present it to people.  I also want to be able to make people laugh when talking to them (and making them laugh at the right times).  I feel that this is an important trait because there are too many times that there are conversations that become SO serious and heated that people need to be able to step back and loosen up.  

When I think of research...

When I think of research I feel that I struggled with the research concept over the last eight weeks. Although I struggled with this class I feel like I learned alot especially in regards to qualitative and quantative methods.   I learned alot about how to develop a research study and the steps I will need to take to develop my own research study.  To be honest I do not think that I want to do a research study after taking this class.   I enjoy reading research but actually conducting a study does not have any interest to me.  I feel that it was important for me to understand the foundations of research and through this class I was able to gain the knowledge of these foundations that pertains to early childhood research. 

Research Around the World

I decided to look at the Early Childhood Australia website at http://www.earlychildhoodaustralia.org.au/. 

It was difficult to find research topics on this website.  I found their position statement on what Australia needs to do to ensure that they have a high quality early childhood sector.  Within the ninety one page document there was a lot of research to back up their recommendations. 

I really enjoyed reading the Code of Ethics, the National Quality Standards and their newsletter.  The newsletter  was an easy read and I feel that parents could get a lot of benefit from reading the information.  They had an easy receipe that you could do at home and there was an informative article within the newsletter on the cultural aspect in Australia. 

I think that it is important to know that when articles are put on this website there is a certain criteria that must be met for every article that is accepted from this organization.  The following criteria is as follows:

• Every resource must:
• be in the best interests of children
• be evidence-based
• be appropriate for the market
• have broad application
• be culturally inclusive
• use accessible language – avoiding jargon and not patronising
• have demonstrated a balanced approach
• be related to current issues
• address the appropriate age range
• be attractively designed and presented
• clearly acknowledge any commercial interests and/or biases.

It is important to note that  some of the links did not work on the website.  This is very discouraging when navigating through a website. 

Uplifting Stories

When I think about uplifting stories in my work over the years I think to the impact Head Start program has made to the State of Alaska and especially the Bering Strait region in Alaska.

The foundation of Head Start is based on the research to help disadvantaged groups, compensating for inequality in social or economic conditions.  When I think about the work I had done in working with Head Start I think of one mother our program worked with starting 5 years ago.  When I first met G.T. she was a single mother with no high school diploma.  Her son with special needs was enrolled in our program.  She told me she wanted to work in our program.  I told her that she needed to get her GED.  We worked with her in setting her goals.  By the end of the school year she had gotten her GED and was hired as a teacher aide the following school year.  She then got her CDA and told me she wanted to get her AA degree in ECE.  She has continued to take college classes and only needs 4 more classes to complete her AA degree in ECE.  This is quite an accomplishment when 5 years ago she didn't even have a high school diploma.  She continues to work for the Head Start program but as a family advocate now.  She is now helping other parents with their goals.  Our program was able to help her accomplish her goals and she is now setting an example for her own children in showing that when you put your mind to it your goals can be accomplished. 

To find out of the history of Head Start check out this website http://www.acf.hhs.gov/programs/ohs/about/history-of-head-start 

Personal Research Journey

I have chosen to research the impacts of 2nd and 3rd hand smoke on children ages 3 and 4 years old.
I chose this topic because of my experience in Head Start.  Many of our staff are smokers.  They smoke before class and during their breaks.  The staff are also a majority of former or current parents of children enrolled in Head Start.    We have heard that that 2nd hand smoke is bad for children and more studies are coming out now about 3rd hand smoke.  How do we inform parents and staff of the research?  We are going to have to change years of thinking in regards to smoking...yes many parents now smoke outside instead of inside the house but there is still an impact of how 2nd and 3rd hand smoke impacts children. 

I think that this is going to be interesting and a struggle for me as I do not like doing research.  Do any of you struggle with this? 

Have any of you run into this problem in your programs?  We are a smoke free facility but staff go and smoke off campus.    Do you have any policies and or research that you would like to share on being a smoke free facility and why you are a smoke free facility?

I have a ton of links to resources to the right - early childhood organizations, parent resources and Head Start.