Sharing Web Resources 2

The website that I chose to study for this course was the  Zero to Three website. A specific section that seemed particularly relevant to my current professional development was a new video released that talks about promoting early language and literacy development. It is a video and new policy brief illustrating how early language and literacy development contribute to a child's success throughout life. Where I work we push early language and literacy which makes this relevant to my professional development.
A statement that I found controversial was a statement about Coping with defiance in children. The web stated that it is a a toddlers job to be oppositional. I always thought that a child that was oppositional was just being disrespectful.  This article made me think and begin to change my way of thinking about this issue. I realize that all children are different some have a difficult time with change and other things that take place in life and that they can be taught how to be in control and make choices in a positive way.
This website has a special section that discusses public policy. In this section it contains how economists, neuroscientists, and politicians support early childhood. One area that I found interesting was how support is being given on the  state and community level.
A new insight I gained was from a video discussing the still face paradigm designed by Edward Tronick.  This experiment is a procedure for studying infant social and emotional development. During the experiment, an infant and a parent interact playfully before the parent suddenly stops responding and looks away. After a short period, the parent reengages with the infant. The infant’s reaction to a suddenly unresponsive parent and his or her behavior when the parent resumes interaction, have been used to study many aspects of early social and emotional development. Watching this was very interesting.

Cont..Getting to know your international contacts

My conversation partner finally e mailed me and I could not help but post what she stated about poverty:

Hi Jamie,

 In our Division and in our City there are of course issues of poverty that affect both school age and preschool age children.

In my teaching experience this has meant extra support has been required for language development, literacy development, and programs such as breakfast programs that run in some schools.

We do an Early  Development assessment (EDI) in our province that addresses needs  in areas of social development, language etc. in terms of readiness for school. This gives a broad community context and schools in demographically poorer areas have more at risk indicators. In school supports such as School Counsellors, preschool programming, family support workers and Resource are all beneficial. Students in this group also have many fewer experiences to base reading comprehension and writing on. However, in schools that I have worked in, students have been very successful. This has of course required skilled teachers, authentic learning experiences, lots of hands on experiences, strong reading writing and numeracy learning and recognition of students in many ways, or through multiple intelligences, so that they are feeling  and are successful. Interventions are a key factor, and the earlier that happens the better. Play and choice are also key components in Early Development.

Margaret

Again my partner is from Canada.

Getting to know your international contacts

One of my international contacts is Margaret Fair an Early Childhood Professional from Canada. She is the president of The Canadian association for young children. I have spoken to her once and she agreed to hang with me these 8 weeks but she is really slow in her response so I had to do our alternative this week and go on the childhood poverty website. Three insights that I gained from the website were that China has made major strides in poverty reduction in recent years.  Much of the decline was due to far-reaching processes of economic and social transition. I also learned that 4.2 million chinese children live in absolute poverty and 8.7 million live in disadvantaged conditions. These numbers have declined over the 1990's. China is the worlds most populous country with a population of 1.27 billion in 2001. There are many changes being made when it comes to declining poverty but they are fairly small.

Sharing Web Resources

The organization that I choose to focus on was the Zero to three organization. The link to this organizations website is http://www.zerotothree.org/. This organization focuses on children birth to three. They are a a national, nonprofit organization that informs, trains, and supports professionals, policymakers, and parents in their efforts to improve the lives of infants and toddlers. There mission is to promote the health and development of infants and toddlers.
I subscribed to two of their newsletters and I currently am receiving e mail newsletters from The Baby Monitor, a newsletter that focuses on zero to three policy and advocacy news. This past week I received two emails one that invited me to be a part of a webinar/web-based conference call March 31, 2011 on  professional development systems to support the infant-toddler workforce. An agenda for the conference call was also sent. The other email sent was asking me to vote no on H.R.1 and vote yes to Senate Alternative. The H.R.1 is a spending bill 61.5 billion stands to be cut if we do not vote no on H.R.1. If this bill is passed and the money is cut 300, 000 young children would lose access to opportunities through Head Start, Early Head Start, and childcare. Voting yes to a Senate alternative would ensure that young children don't lose early childhood services. This e mail jumped out at me because Head Start and Early Head Start and many private providers are Judy Center partners (where I work) these votes would affect not only our partners but also the Judy Center because we are Early Childhood Educators.
I learned from these newsletters that being an informed Early childhood educator gives you an edge!

Establishing Professional Contacts and Expanding Resources

The steps that I took this week to locate and contact two professionals was to search on the web. I looked on the web to find International Organizations for early childhood. I decided to contact The British Association for Early Childhood Education and The Canadian Association for Young Children. For the Canadian Association I was able to send an e mail to Margaret Fair (the president). I choose the British Association because I loved their website. I am a visual person and if I love what I see i am going to want to find out more about it. I chose the Canadian Association because I was able to actually e mail the president and I look forward to hearing back from her. I haven't heard anything yet but I am sure that I will. I don't think that I will have to go with an alternative assignment for Part 1. I am hoping my contacts will get back in touch with me.
The Early Childhood Organization that I chose was the Zero to Three organization. Again I loved the website and on my job we are challenged to find families with children zero to three to provide services to them. I thought that being linked to the website would help me with the services that we provide by offering me more information to give to the parents.
I felt kinda strange at first trying to reach out to someone in another country in the same profession but we will see how it goes. Do any of my colleagues have any tips on how to handle the professional contacts once we establish them?