Professional Hopes and Goals

          For children and families that have diverse backgrounds, I hope that they will get the justice and support that they deserve.  I hope that they are treated equally one day.  All families no matter their background, they deserve to be treated just as other families are treated.  One goal I would like to set for the early childhood field is that all early childhood programs would train their staff to be educated on diversity, equity, and social justice.  All early childhood professionals need to be educated on these matters because every child is different and in order to provide the care that the child needs, their teacher needs to know how to respect the diversity of each child and their family. 
          I would like to express my thanks and appreciation to all of my colleagues for helping me through this past eight weeks.  I have enjoyed learning with and from all of you.  I wish you all well as you continue on your journey at Walden and then beyond.  I hope maybe to have you in some future classes!! :)

Welcoming Families

         For this week's assignment, for the family in my scenario, I chose for them to be from Aruba.  In order to culturally responsive towards this family, I would first do research on the country.  I would learn everything that I possibly could about Aruba.  I would learn what the currency, how the government is run,  and everything about the culture.  The second thing I would do would be to learn about family culture and the roles of family members in Aruba.  I try to understand how the family and the household is run.  The third thing I would do is to learn some of the major phrases that are used in Aruba in the native language.  I would make myself accustomed to these certain phrases so that the family does not feel isolated because they do not speak English.  The fourth thing that I would do is to begin learning everything about the individual family that I could before meeting them.  I would look at their family tree, and research their family so that I am able to know them a bit better.  The final thing that I would do would be to make a packet about the U.S. and where they are living.  The packet would include information on the schools, the religious systems, the activities that they will see, how families do things here, and many different things.  However, the packet will be in the families native language. 
          I hope that these preparations will allow the families' transition to go smoothly so that they do not feel like they are being overwhelmed.  I want them to know that they are welcome here, and that they are accepted.  For myself, I hope that I able to understand more about the people from Aruba, so that the next time I have a family from Aruba, I am prepared. 

The Personal Side of Bias, Prejudice, and Oppression

          A memory that I have of experiencing prejudice and bias happened about a month ago.  Late one night around 11:30 or 12:00, my husband and I were watching television.  We were watching the old show, "The Jeffersons."  In the show, Mr. George Jefferson was answering the door.  He was letting Mrs. Louise Jeffersons' uncle in (all African Americans).  Apparently, her uncle was a butler and George thought that it was lowly of him to be a butler.  When the uncle came in, he turned to the doorman(Caucasian) of the apartment, who was helping him with his bags, and said thank you sir, and was about to give him a tip.  George tipped the man instead, and the doorman said, "Thank you sir."  The three men went back and forth saying "thank you sir."  The doorman left, George shut the door, and turned to the uncle and said, "Look! You don't have to say sir to my doorman, just because he's a honky."  When I heard this statement, I turned to my husband and said, "Did you hear that?!"  I could not believe what I had heard.  Now I know that during our class, everything we have learned about prejudices, and racism has had to do with being against all other races besides white people.  However, I feel that this statement was a prejudice/racist statement against white people.  The term, honky is a racial slur towards white people, it diminshes equity between the races because it labels white people. 
          The feelings that I felt when I heard this statement was shock and disbelief that it was ever aired on national television.  Nowadays, if any kind of racial slur towards any group of people is used a protest and big fight breaks out.  At times, the whole situation turns to chaos.  In order to turn this incident into an opportunity for greater equity, instead of George using the racial slur to refer to the doorman, he could have turned to the uncle and simply said, "Just because my doorman is white, does not mean you have to call him sir."  In my opinion, this would be better because this statement is referring to the color of a man's skin, instead of giving him a label because of his color.