What I Have Learned

Over the course of the last eight weeks, I have dove deeper into the topic of anti-bias education. I have been forced to evaluate myself to expose my own, personal discomforts and biases, and have made a plan to lessen those. I have progressed from Harro's Cycle of Socialization to the beginning stages of the Cycle of Liberation. I have been challenged and have learned from my peers. I have learned quite a bit about not only anti-bias education, but myself as well.

When I think about working with children from diverse backgrounds, which I do every single day, my hope is that anti-bias education will always be incorporated into their lives. I hope that they will always be exposed to differences and taught to accept and embrace others. I hope that they themselves will always feel accepted for their own unique characteristics. I hope that they will never be outcast or bullied, nor will tease others for being different. I hope that this generation of children will truly know what it means to love one another.

A goal that I have for the early childhood education field, especially in rural towns across the South, is to include anti-bias education into the every day curriculum. Having been born and raised in a small town in North Carolina, I have personally experienced education in this area. There is no diversity in these towns, as the population is strictly made up of Caucasian families. As if the lack of diversity isn't bad enough, diversity isn't talked about or taught. I did not go to school with an African American until I moved away from home and attended a university. While I didn't think anything of it, because I'm a very laid back person and don't have an issue with people until I need to have an issue, other people I know did because they were simply ignorant to the concept of diversity. While ECE does push anti-bias education, as I see it everyday in Raleigh, NC where I now live, I do think that more needs to be done in smaller towns where diversity is not such a common concept.

In closing, I would like to thank all of my peers that have assisted me in the completion of my assignments. Thank you for assisting me, challenging me, and offering your kind and encouraging words. Best of luck to all of you on your journey!

Start Seeing Diversity

This week we were asked to create a piece of art to represent what diversity means to us. I chose to create a photo collage that I feel embraces different ethnicities, races, religions, languages, cultures, and sexual orientation.

 

We Don't Say Those Words!

It is a common fact that children are very blunt little people. They don't really have a filter yet because they don't understand what is appropriate and acceptable to talk about and what is not. Children will talk openly about peeing, pooping, vaginas, penis'...really whatever is relevant and being talked about at that stage in their life. It is our jobs, as parents and educators, to teach children the appropriate time and place that things should be talked about. We don't want to scold children into thinking that anything is taboo to talk about because we want children to trust us and talk to us openly and honestly.

A few months ago, when visiting my family that lives out of town, I took my niece, Jayda, who is four years old, to the store to pick out a birthday present for her mom. As we were walking around Target Jayda noticed a significantly overweight woman and said, very loudly, "Look Cassie, that lady is not a pretty princess like you. She is just too fat!" Out of pure humiliation and panic I immediately snapped at Jayda and said "no ma'am, we do NOT say things like that! That is just ugly to say and not okay, do you understand me?" I mean, it was a pure reaming right there in the middle of Target. Looking back at the incident and reflecting on what I am learning about anti-bias education, I can see that I did not handle the situation as effectively as I should have. I think that it is important to teach anti-bias education to children so that they are familiar and comfortable with different kinds of people, thus eliminating the need to point out differences so bluntly.