Final Blog Assignment

For this week's blog although this is my final blog assignment for this class, I have really enjoyed the blog assignments that I had to do for the last eight weeks. I really think that my learning about the international early childhood field has deepen my understanding of issues and trends in early childhood.

The three consequences of learning that were most important are as follows:

1. Building a relationship with other educators and searching the internet is a great tool because it provides us the opportunity to connect with Early childhood educators from other countries around the world. We can build relationships with them through emails, blogs,and websites. Communication is important with other educators because it can increase our knowledge of the issues and trends that are main factors in other countries. I think that it is important that we can give support to each person by communicating with them about ideas, resources, and suggestions about issues that happen with educators around the world.

2.The issue pertaining to childhood poverty which I think no one should have to go through especially young children.I know that there are different assistance programs out there for low-income families to indulge in, but young children are suffering in their learning and not having the ability to learn.They are limited to a high quality education and they miss out on many of their educational opportunities and needs which also affect their outcomes for later development and well-being in life.

3. I need to make sure that I am learning additional information about early childhood and staying on target with current issues and trends around this society.An early childhood professional should have knowledge of what it takes to be effective. I also need to make sure I maintain focus on the well-being of children and their families that we serve daily. I learn something everyday in this field and I know by graduation my knowledge will have increase so that I can share with others how early childhood is a successful career field to pursue. Lastly, I am going to make sure that I advocate more for young children and families of the different changes that may occur in early childhood.

My goal is to maintain all the information that I receive every eight weeks from the different classes so that I am able to move forward with a new class sharing past information that I have learn weekly. I am familiar with current issues and trends from this class and I feel better knowing that I can advocate to change young children and different parents lives.

Getting to Know Your International Contacts—Part 3

After reviewing the "UNESCO'S Early Childhood Care and Education" web page, I have learned additional information on the issues of quality, equity, and access. I explored this website and came across what UNESCO'S advocates for Early Childhood Care and Education (ECCE) programmes that attend to health, nutrition, security and learning and which provide for children’s holistic development (UNESCO, 2016). They also wanted to make sure that children reach their potential to the fullest.

Access and equity

In early childhood care and education is to help vulnerable children have equal access. Countries committed themselves to “expanding and improving comprehensive early childhood care and education, especially for the most vulnerable and disadvantaged children." I think this is why the government was urge to expand equitable access to quality in favor of the poor (UNESCO, 2016).

Quality

Quality relates to my professional goals because I work at a high-quality childcare center. I am going to continue to work in a high quality childcare because we promote the same thing that it says on the website. It says that high quality childcare promotes motivation, confidence, and good cognitive,linguistic development, and school readiness(UNESCO, 2016). When parents and the community are involved the learning materials ensure and provide early childhood services which remains appropriate to the needs of children and increases sustainability(UNESCO,2016).

Investment and financing

The biggest problem that countries face in their efforts to expand and improve the quality of early childhood care and education is the mobilisation of funds/resources(UNESCO, 2016).Countries have to view early childhood as part of education so that early childhood education can get funding that they need. However, governments must use complementary financing measures to ensure equity of access for poor and disadvantaged children, as a pure market approach to increasing the level of early childhood provision has been shown to favor the privileged, who can afford the service (UNESCO, 2016). I have never explored this website before until now and I learned a lot about this organization in helping young children in early childhood education recieve all the learning skills they need to be successful.

Reference

(http://www.unesco.org/new/en/education/themes/strengthening-education-systems/early-childhood/)

Sharing Web Resources

Since I already know about UNICEF, I followed one of the outside links that I knew nothing about until this week's blog assignment. I started exploring United Nations Girls Education Initiative(UNGEI). I found several outside links with a lot of different information,but this one stood out the most to me. This website is provided through UNICEF's website. The United Nations Girls’ Education Initiative (UNGEI) is a partnership of organizations committed to narrowing the gender gap in primary and secondary education. It also seeks to ensure that, by 2015, all children complete primary schooling, with girls and boys having equal access to free, quality education. UNGEI is determined and committed to accelerating action on girls’ education and revitalizing the broad social mobilization and high-level political action that is needed to ensure that every girl, as well as every boy, goes to school. UNGEI focus on girls and boys empowered through quality education to realize their full potential.(http://www.ungei.org/). UNGEI serves as an education for girls. They have different countries such as Africa, Asia, Australia, and Oceania which all claim partnerships for girls education.

All the newsletters that I look at stress the importance of education and a new gender report produceed with UNGEI, was launched to report on global progress in achieving gender equity and equality in education since the year 2000.They also stated in the newsletter that it was time to shift the focus towards gender because girls will be band from benefiting education. This comes from report findings. I feel that we should not want anything to stand in the way of girls and boys getting a great education because they need this to be successful and reach their highest potential. Gender based violence is going on in schools especially with girls not having rights to a safe inclusive quality education.

The information that I found on this website is related to everything that we have talked about up until now. I really like that every website I explore they always talk about quality early childhood programs and a quality education for young children. Gender does affect equity and excellence in early childhood education. Educators should always make sure that young children are provided with a quality education. As teachers we have a lot to be concern about and be dedicated to committing to help young children to the best of our ability. We need to strive to serve children and support them daily because parents are their first teachers,but we fall next in providing a quality learning experience.

References

http://www.unicef.org/infobycountry/index.html

http://www.ungei.org/

Getting to Know Your International Contacts—Part 2

For this week's blog, I decided to take the alternative route and explore the Harvard University "Global Children's Initiative" website. I gain three ideas/insights about early childhood systems around the globe.I enjoyed reading research from this website. We need to protect children from significant adversity, so that we can provide them with enriched learning opportunities"(Center on the Developing Child at Harvard University, 2010). The partner organization that I looked at the most was Brazil. The collaborative Nucleo Ciencia Pela Infancia(NCPI) includes the Center on the Developing Child. This partnership has been highly successful in creating a science driven early childhood movement in Brazil(Center on the Developing Child at Harvard University, 2010). As professional educators, we should take the knowledge of what we have learned in the early childhood field and help young children reach their highest potential. I feel that we should be helping every child to the best of our ability. "Reports show that an estimate of 200 million children fail to reach their full developmental potential by age 5. Drawing on our experience in North America, the Center on the Developing Child works globally to build a broader movement to achieve breakthrough outcomes for children around the world" (Center on the Developing Child at Harvard University, 2010). I feel that this is not good news to know that some children are not doing so great that's why teachers need to come together to make sure we are ready to help young children in any way possible.

Insights from my international contacts about equity and excellence requires a lot of responsibility from resources. I think that schools around the world need qualified teachers so that children can learn professionally to better serve them to offer opportunities. High quality and qualified teachers are better for children so that they can get a high quality education. I think this will help children reach their highest potential. It is with every intent to make sure all children have the opportunity to receive excellence and be taught daily to improve their learning skills.

Reference

Center on the Developing Child at Harvard University. (2010). Global children's initiative. Retrieved from http://developingchild.harvard.edu/index.php/activities/global_initiative