Last blog assignment

I would like to start out by saying thank you to everyone this semester. This semester has been very difficult for me due to my dad being diagnosed with cancer. I appreciate all of your support and understanding during this time. I have really enjoyed being in this program because I feel like we are a team. I think that we have made each other grow and learn and I truly appreciate it all.

               One goal that I would like to set in relation to the issues of diversity, equity, and social justice would be ensure that you don’t judge a book by its cover. I feel that everyone is entitled to their own opinions; however, I also feel that you can’t truly know someone by just looking at them. I don’t feel that you could judge someone without getting to know them.

               One hope that I have when I think about working with children and families that come from diverse backgrounds would be: that I do my very best to make every family feel accepted and comfortable in my presence. I want families to feel free to come in the classroom freely and communicate openly. I want them to feel free to talk to me .

Blog Assignment 7

For this assignment I am preparing for a new family to join our childcare facility. The new family is from Pakistan. There are a lot of things that I need to do to prepare for this new child. First, I need to learn about the culture of people from Pakistan. Then I will learn customs, foods, language, music, and traditions. I will try to introduce these things to the rest of the class so that we will be able to know more about this culture. This way we will be able to support the child into their new setting. Our hopes are that by going through these measures that we will be able to help the child feel more comfortable in this environment. In class we will continue to do things in English and Spanish but then we will add counting numbers in their language and add a few description words in their language as well. We will work on communicating with the new child and ask the family if they have any pointers on how to help this child transition.                    

The Personal Side of Bias, Prejudice, and Oppression

1.Memory of Prejudice: I have two mixed children and have dealt my share of people showing racial comments at me and my children. When I had my daughter I was only 19. My parents were very upset because I wasn’t married and I had stepped out of my faith and race. My mom has 7 siblings and my dad has 12 siblings all of which are in there 60’s and up . My family is really huge and not one person is of another race. I walked into my family reunion almost 10 years ago today and the whole room was silent. Over 400 people were staring at me and my mixed baby girl. My dad which was about 74 at the time had to stand up and give the speech of we love Rachel and if you can’t accept our grandchild you can’t accept any of us either. This child is our family and you have the chose to accept us all or none of us at all. Needless to say it took a couple of years for the family to get used to having an African American child in it. They all love both of my children now. My parents have dealt with a lot from people their own age. One lady stopped my mom in the store and said you must have a lot of love to adopt a Niger baby. I was so upset and mom was so calm and said I didn’t adopt any child I love my grand baby and held her close. She said, “ I am going to pray for you tonight. God don’t like ugly.”  

2. How did it diminish equity:People with little understanding of diversity. 

3. What feelings did this bring up for you: Both of these situations were tough for me because this is my children we are talking about. The first situation where the whole family gave us the nasty look really hurt because how can you turn your nose up at family? I think that it has gotten better of the past ten years. My whole family accepts my children for who they are now.

4. What would have to change in order to turn this incident into an opportunity for greater equity: I feel that with time people will get more comfortable with this biracial children. I know that there are tons of children in school right now that are of multiple races. I think that the more this becomes a norm the more that people will be able to understand that people are different and we need to accept everyone as they are.