WELCOME!
Hello my name is Jennifer and I am a Junior at Easrern Washington University.
Feel free to explore my tabs at the top of my page. They are loaded with alot of cool information about me and the Children's Studies program. Also to locate my other tabs you must ckick the button at the right of the page
Barr and Tagg Article:
“From Teaching to Learning- A New Paradigm for Undergraduate Education”
The Barr and Tagg article was a great way for me to reflect on the types of way that my teachers conducted their classrooms when I was in school. From reading the article I learned that the “Learning Paradigm” consisted of producing learning that lets each student learn in the best way for them to succeed. But most schools don’t do this instead they use the practice the “Instruction Paradigm” that may not meet every students needs.
Some interesting things that I found in the Barr and Tagg article provided examples of how some of my undergraduate general education classes were ran. For example, in the Instruction Paradigm knowledge is trying to be given through lecture from the professor and in the learning paradigm tools and skills are provided for the students to explore and construct ways to obtain knowledge. As noted in the Barr and Tagg article it is not uncommon for institutions to provide lecturing style classrooms than active learning style classrooms.
I think that the Learning Paradigm should be used in all types of institutions of learning. I think that it provides students with an understanding of material better and students are able to take learning into their own hands instead of trying to figure out what’s important in a lecture and what’s not. I know that it takes more planning and constant reassessing your strategies for students to be active learners. But in the end everyone will benefit for this style of learning as opposed to the Instructional style.
Here is a link to the article: http://ilte.ius.edu/pdf/BarrTagg.pdf
Community of Learners Article Reflection:
I researched what a community of learners meant and came across a definition that made sense to me and that was easy to relate to what I am passionate about. A community of learners are students and teachers that work together to try and build a community that values each others, there abilities, interests and who the student and teacher is personally always being supportive of one another and to themselves. Since I am really passionate about helping kids that have been abused this definition would be made true for children that have been abuses and there adoptive parents or social worker.
The article I chose captures how adoptive parents should discipline their children that have been abused. This article really emphasizes how important a relationship to a child and ways to continue to create an emotional safeness between the parents and the child. Mu passion lies with children that have been abused in the past and there new parents need that support and help to raise a child that fosters a loving child that knows the correct way to receive love and give love. I think this article really builds on the importance of building that community of learners and giving you practical ways to foster that community.
I think that the community of learners is an awesome way that we can all be mindful of how we should treat each other and the importance behind doing so. You’re not only working together but your learning to be an active listener to help make and even stronger community.
Lundberg, Sandra. "Parenting: Focus On The Family." 2008. Focus On The Family. 10 January 2010 <http://www.focusonthefamily.com/parenting/adoptive_families/disciplining_adopted_children/when_children_have_been_abused.aspx>.
Education 458 was a class that I took as part of my major. I enjoyed taking it and overall I believe I put more than enough effort into this class as a whole. Classes were on Tuesdays and Thursdays and I attended all of the classes regularly and on time, by doing so I was able to take learning into my own hands by going to the classroom meetings. This also enhanced me participating in the community of learners’ aspect of the class. I participated in group work and strived to step up and be a leader when needed be. When we had group work I made every group meeting and was prepared with the material I was suppose to bring. When we had to present material I was always present and willing to present others if they had to be absent. I believe as a community I did strive to be apart of the whole classroom when it was class discussion time.
On top of coming to class I also did all of my assignments of reflections in a timely and concise manner. I made sure that I did an article reflection every week and post it on protopage. I knew the importance of not falling behind on my reflections so I was able to devote more of my time to group presentations. So as far as my assignments go I posted all ten on protopage along with our group’s final presentation.
Overall I put forth a lot of effort in this class and recognized the importance of being the holder of my own learning and knowledge that I acquire in this class and all other classes. I do believe that I could improve on making my name known in the class among my fellow peers and teachers. I think that is aspect of community is linked with wanting to connect outside with my fellow peers. I do however feel that towards the end of the quarter I felt more apart of the class than not. I think that had a lot to do with the group presentations and through the interactions of the different things we did during those presentations.
The article that I chose this week as one of my weekly reflections was very interesting. The article described a study that was conducted to see the benefits of Foster Grandparents. The study had a lot of appropriate practices that foster parents did to help the child develop naturally. The reason why I decided to research appropriate practices for children in the foster care system is because I really have a passion for children that are put into the system and feel abandoned. So I decided to see what I could find that would benefit me in learning about what appropriate actions I can take to be successful in making these children flourish like children do.
This article/study really helped me see how important grandparents can be in caring for foster children. The way the study was conducted was by intensive observations of six classrooms and communities. This was to get a better understanding of how the Foster Grandparents interacted with foster children. It was shown that grandparents are active participants in making the child feel welcomed, they listen intensively, encourage, and provide security for the children. They also help foster there decisions and teach them appropriate decision making process to try and make the best decisions possible.
Overall I found that Foster Grandparents being in classrooms help foster that emotional piece in children. And among that other developmental milestones are acquired, such as reading and writing. My heart is really in helping children; I want to help them emotionally, intellectually and physically. It is where my passion is, to help children that have been struggling in family situations.
Westat, Inc. 1998. Effective Practices of Foster Grandparents in Head Start Centers. Rockville, MD. http://www.nationalserviceresources.org/node/17094
Contextual Learning:
I was curious about learning more about contextualized education so I decided to research what contextual learning is all about and try and apply how I can use it in my future career. According to the National Conference of State Legislators who was cited in the articles I used titled, “Contextual Learning” defines it as learning that occurs through experience, allowing hands-on activities to explore to build knowledge. I think that it is important to provide contextual learning for students because it is a great opportunity for them to experience hands-on leaning during class room time.
I tried thinking of ways that I could try and incorporate contextual learning in my future career goals and came up with a number of different approaches I could use. For example, if I was working with children with disabilities in the foster care system I would provide a number of hands-on activities that would help them learn life skills that are vital to being independent. I would provide rich environments where they could easily learn naturally through experience. Another way I could use contextual learning in my career is if I have a family that I am working with and the parents needs some hands-on parenting training I would be able to provide that type of learning experience. Especially sense learning can be more easily attained through experiences.
I think that contextual learning is a good way to teach. It allows for exploration, interaction with your environment, and isn’t the normal for learning which makes it that much more exciting to learn.
Last week in class we watched the movie “Freedom Writers” it was a great movie and I enjoyed it very much. While we watched the movie we had to identify the assumptions and myths that we saw throughout the movie. Overall the movie was very powerful and inspiring; I want to be able to help children that are troubled achieve a better life. That is an amazing feeling to be able to do well in so many children’s lives. But I would also be so scared and overwhelmed especially if it is my first day at work. Lets just say I certainly felt like I was apart of the movie and had empathy towards the children.
The assumptions and myths that I discovered in the movie involved educators, the teens, parents and other people of the community. The main character of the movie Erin Gruwell had many assumptions as a first year freshman teacher. She assumes that her class will be at state standards and she will be teaching children that will want to learn. But instead she is teaching children that are in gangs and wars with one another. But she assures the director of her apartment that she will be capable. When the students meet Mrs. Gruwell they make a comment that she won’t last a week, mostly based on her appearance and her ability to not be assertive in the classroom.
Besides the teachers the community and Board of Education believe that these freshmen students won’t make it to graduation so they don’t waste the school districts money on new materials, field trips, or an up to date class room. Mrs. Gruwell soon sees that the school district has pretty much see her class as a lost hope and is out to change that. But she receives much opposition from her husband and director; that doesn’t stop her.
What I gathered form this movie was that you have to have a passion to teach and want to improve the lives of the kids that you are with each day in the classroom. If your passion isn’t their neither will your students. Mrs. Gruwell made her students feel like they were worth her time and she cared about them. That is why she was so successful as a teacher. We all assume that if we go by what we just know we can teach but we have to have the heart behind what we do too.
In an article titled “Improving the Quality of Education for All” David Hopkins and Alma Harris study how they can help improve education under certain frameworks that already exist. They say since there has been a rise on how schools are performing researchers and school officials want to try and improve schools. But as Hopkins and Harris point out it has only caused schools to redefine responsibilities and increases monitoring. This isn’t a very constructive approach all it is doing is creating stress on schools and faculty.
So Hopkins and Harris propose we take a different approach to help improve the quality of education. Hopkins and Harris believe that we should begin by looking at each school as being individual and having there own sets of strengths and weaknesses instead of generalizing improvements to each school. We need to make each improvement unique to the school.
David Hopkins and Alma Harris began by helping improve six schools with a project named Improving the Quality of Education for All (IQEA). The idea of IQEA was to strengthen schools so that they could provide quality education. Harris and Hopkins created five IQEA principles that help guide this process. Overall these principles aim to help learning of children and while doing so include parents and the community in the process. There will also be a collaborative responsibility and aim to keep others accountable.
Although this article was aimed at improving the education of England it still can be applied to out American school system as well. We should look at how we can individual methods rather than try and make every program the same. I think that’s important to education: individualized.
This week for my weekly reflection I will be reflecting on how our group in these last two presentations collaborated. The first group presentation we were to pair up and present about interdisciplinary and holistic approaches. Since there was only two in each group it made it easier to decide what we should research and different ways we could present. My second group presentation had a total of five group members. I felt a bit lost in this group and it was harder to communicate. Of these two group experiences I will reflect on how I enjoyed each one and how we could have collaborated more effectively.
Like I said before my first group only consisted of two people and it made it easier for everyone to communicate. I am however a type of person that will do most of the work because I think it won’t get done. So I found myself researching information on my own and then the next class day we shared with each other what we found and how we would present. I didn’t feel prepared for this presentation at all and I think it was because we didn’t meet up before hand. I had all of the information and my other group member had a lot of creative ideas to present our information. Even though we had time to discuss what we found and how we would organize our information I still felt not as prepared as if we would have met earlier that day. Even though collaboration outside of class can be hard to plan I think it helps prepare us better.
My next group that I was in was a five person group. I felt lost in this group and worried that things wouldn’t get done. We all exchanged e mails and phone numbers so we could contact each other over the weekend which was very smart. We decided during class that each of us would pick two characteristics of quality education and then one of the group members would compile our information in a slide show. This approach was quite creative but as a group we really didn’t collaborate except an hour before class. It is hard for everyone to make a group meeting since people are always so busy and schedules don’t match up. But in the end it didn’t leave much room for being creative and thinking of new ideas on how to present our information.
So overall I think what I want out of my next group that I will be working with is the ability to want to get together for a little bit and plan out our presentation. I think if we do this we will have an overall better presentation.
In “Mary Catherine and me: building cross-cultural relationships in ‘post-racial’ America” by Holly Elissa Bruno looks at how to build relationships with other cultures and our struggle with building those relationships. I found the article very interesting and it really made me reflect on the relationships that I build with people of different cultures. The author really says some pretty key things that I would like to reflect on. The author challenges to reflect on how authentic our relationships are with people that are different from us. I think that there is something that is of value in creating cross-cultural relationships. Not only are you recognizing differences when making relationships with people that are culturally different from you you’re learning about what other people go through that aren’t like you. I think that it is true for our older generations that the lessons that we learn as a child are carried out as adults. In order to have our children recognize differences we should be open in our relationships with culturally different people. So where should we begin in making relationships with people that are different from us? The author suggests that we should make changing in our own lives. We should listen when someone shares and make sure that race is something that cannot be experiences that are shared through cross-culturally relationships. In the end children will ultimately learn about relationships with how we respond to relationships that we make as adults.
I really realized a lot of different things in creating healthy relationships with all parts of life. The author says that we should look into the souls of each person’s eyes and that shows just how much you respect them and that means a lot in its self. I am glad that I have been given the chance to realize that culturally different relationships are important in creating a world that is more at peace.
Since the dropout rate for Spokane public schools is at its highest I thought it would be interesting to do an article on at-risk students. I found a article by Margarita Donnelly titled “At-Risk Students” this was an interesting article because it was published in the late eighties and back then the problems with drop outs was as prevalent as it is know and still much of a concern. This article includes characteristics of at-risk kids, how they can be identified, and the different programs that are beneficial in helping at-risk kids.
The first paragraph describes certain characteristics of at-risk kids, such as, low academic achievers, they may have parents that had dropped out, truancy problems, don’t participate in school programs, and exhibit behavior problems. I think that the author did a good job of describing the certain characteristics so that the teacher or parent is able to easily identify signs that their child may be at-risk. I think that the author should have at least mentioned that not all students that are at-risk have parents that exhibited the same behavior when they were younger.
The next paragraph the author suggests ways of identifying at-risk children. Before reading this article I had no idea that there are test that can identify potential drop outs. It makes me wonder if the Spokane school district implemented any of these tools, and if not why? The tests include the Dropout alert scale (DAS) and a few others that they use for particular age groups to identify at-risk kids. I think that these are great tools and should be implemented in every school district even though a lot of budgets wouldn’t allow this. I think that it is a good investment and it would probably prevent a lot of drop outs in the schools.
The article also mentions the type of programs that help at-risk students. They include separating them from other students, individualized programs, vocational training and many others. I don’t think that it is appropriate to separate the students, for one they are being stigmatized and are being set up for failure. I think that a better way to help at-risk students is to not treat them any different but still provide the best practices to help them succeed in school.
Overall I do think that we have a problem with students dropping out of school, it is only getting worse. We must be doing something wrong in our programs to not be able to reduce the drop out rates. Instead of looking at just the society I think we should look at what we as schools are trying to accomplish.
http://www.ericdigests.org/pre-928/risk.htm
In the article published in the NAYCE titled “Involving Fathers” have some interesting ideas of how to include fathers in the beginning of their children’s preschool programs. The reason I chose this article is because I don’t see very many fathers involving themselves in their children’s lives in school, it is mostly mothers that are going to after school programs and conferences. I think this article really shares practical ways to make fathers feel welcomed.
The article points out that with the increasing number of fathers becoming involves programs must keep in mind to not only try to include mothers but fathers in school programs. Some very practical ways that will help teachers get both parents involved is by introducing yourself at the beginning of the year, have both men and women equally pictured in books, posters, and on other things in the classroom and around the school. They also suggested at the beginning of the year to have a father child night that the father can get a feel of the classroom and feel more welcomed next time there is an event at the school. The final thing that I thought was good to incorporate in the classroom was having men model figures in the classroom like tutors, interns, and student teachers.
After reading this article I understand that it is important to make your fathers feel included in their child’s life. And there are many ways that this article gives you practical ways to incorporate fathers was well as mothers. The article also ends with helpful resources that can help with including fathers.
What is Children’s Studies?
The Children’s Studies program is the study of child populations with a new interdisciplinary approach, based on seven principles. These principles include: giving children the opportunity to talk about experiences, observing children in the present and in relation to their future as adults, open minded people that study children looking for new findings, childhood should be apart of and seen as part of the social structure, childhood being studies in its own right and with an intergenerational context, and children should be units of observation. From these principles, the Children’s Studies major was developed.
The major’s within the Children’s Studies program provides a sturdy holistic background in the learning and development of children (birth to pre-adolescent) in a array of social contexts. There are four options within the Children’s Studies program. They include a bachelors of arts in the research option, program development option, and early childhood option. And the Early Childhood Education option provides you with a bachelors of arts in education with an endorsement.
Outline of Class Discussions:
Week One
· Introduction to the class
· Syllabus
Week Two
· Program Options
Week Three
· Finding resources in the computer lab to build resources to find information.
Week Four
· Relationships between educators and children in a behaviorist environment.
Week Five
· Relationships between educators and children in constructive program.
Week Six
· naeyc Code of conduct and statement of commitment
Week Seven
· Discuss the United Nations Children’s Rights Articles.
Week Eight
· No Class
Week Nine
· Create questions about things that we have learned and present them to Fran.
Week Ten
· End of class discussion of what we can do with our futures and final assignments given.
Resources for children from birth to pre-adolescence:
Community Resources:
· http://www.childcarenet.org/families/family-resources
· http://www.del.wa.gov/partnerships/resource/
Professional Resources and literature:
Professional Collaboration and networking:
· http://www.wastatepta.org/resources/kids_school/index.html
· http://www.ncset.org/topics/family/faqs.asp?topic=29
· http://eclkc.ohs.acf.hhs.gov/hslc/headstartoffices
Technological Resources:
· http://www.ctworkshop.com/CTWBM/CTW_BM/
· http://www.wired.com/geekdad/2008/12/disney-survey-s/
· http://www.education-world.com/a_tech/tech/tech180.shtml
Potential Jobs:
A really good web site that I found helps a lot of looking at potential jobs is the United States Department of Labor website. They do a good job at describing what the professional is suppose to do and the potential job out look.
UNITED NATIONS CONVENTINO ON THE RIGHTS OF THE CHILD:
The article I chose out of the United Nations Convention on the Rights of the Child was article 30 and also article 29. The reason why I chose two articles was because my research article represented both of these articles very well.
The research article that I picked was one from the UNICEF articles off of there website. It was a publication that shared about education that is coming to rural villages. In parts of Malaysia, the article was titled “Education Brings Promise to parts of Malaysia’s Remote Interior.” This article not only displays articles 29 and 30 well but does a good job of shows the importance of bringing education to indigenous cultures while still respecting there values and cultures.
Article 29 is a right for an education, and article 30 is the protection of children of minorities or indigenous people so that they are able to enjoy their own culture and practice their own religion and learn their own language.
So this article was a great example of bringing education to these tribal regions. And the people of these places are so thankful that there is 100% attendance rate. But the problem that is happening is that many children that attend this school have to walk for hours just to go to class, but efforts are being made to provide more places of education made available in remote areas like Malaysia.
There is also a lot of praise for education being made available to children and as well to adults. Parents tell there children the importance of an education and the ability to get a job and to make a better life for themselves. I found from reading this publication that there is a desire to learn and make something of themselves, something that I think lacks in our society today.
Articles 29 and 30 are great examples of a chance for children to have rights to education and the ability to experience education in a setting of there own indigenous background.
Resource: http://www.unicef.org/infobycountry/malaysia_51765.html
Field Work: Professional Observation and Reflection
The professional that I decided I would like to emulate or learn more about is a child, family, school social worker. Even though I don’t know that much about social work as a career the one thing that I heard a lot was that social workers have a huge case load. So some of the questions that I came up with were, how many hours a week do you work? Do you ever have to work on the weekends to get your cases done? What are the types of things that you encounter in your work? What type of training did you receive to qualify for your job? And what are your earnings in your job?
These are the questions that I thought would be good to ask a social worker. It gives me a good understanding of what I can expect in the future career and how I can prepare my self for a job in social work. I think that this will help me try and decide how I will approach my possible future career. It is so important to do research on what you are interested in doing for the rest of your life. If you go in blind you have no idea what to expect and if it really suits you for what you want from a life long career. I want to be happy with what I want to do and make a difference in other people’s life so I think that I am a good person for this job. I have had my own experience in the social system and I think it is good to have a professional relating and helping other people that may have experienced what you did in the past. I think that is why I have decided to go this route with my education, people need passion in there jobs and being able to relate gives you a drive to make things better for other people.
I found that social workers main goal is to improve the well being of people’s lives. They are pretty much there to help people cope with certain things in there lives that may cause them problems. Child, family and school social workers try and help maximize the well being of families living situation and in turn help children perform better academically. And often work for family service agencies, schools, or local and state governments. And you can also find this category of social workers teaching classes and workshops to give certain groups the skills they may need to live a better life. Social workers are also found working in agencies, private offices, or are traveling to visit clients. So that is what I found a child, family, school social worker does.
One of the questions I decided to ask was, how many hours a week do you work? The reason why I asked this question was because I am going to be getting married soon and after getting a stable job and stable marriage I hope to have a family, so the number of hours worked was important to me needing to create a future family. The average number of hours that I found social workers work is about 40 hours a week. This is due to the amount of case loads they have and the lack of social workers available. Social workers will also do work over the weekend by visiting clients and attending meetings. So as we see here social work about eight hours a day and even then they aren’t able to get most of there work done. I think that this is manageable to have a family and will work for me.
Another question that I had was what are the types of things that you encounter at your job? I found that there was a lot of getting in contact with the people they are trying to help. They are at desks doing paper work, and follow up information as well as making sure they are getting there cases done. You have to make sure you are thorough with this job and make sure you are taking into account the real people you are working with and not just paper work.
And the final question that I had was the earnings in this field. I found that the earning are different throughout and it depends on the type of places you want to work. But the average ranges were between 29,000 and 49,000 for earnings in this field of work. I enjoyed doing this and learning more about the professional that I hope to be one day, hopefully I will do well in the rest of my schooling and will have a bright career ahead of me.
The reason I am choosing to do option B within the Children's Studies major is because of my passion for the well being of children. I hope to someday work in an adoption agency or social service of some sort. I want to be that person that can make the life of children better when they are faced with tough situations. I love the smile a child gets when he or she feels love and comfort from another individaul. I want to make a lasting impression on childrens lives.
Major: Children's Studies: Option B/ Program Development
Minors: Sociology, Social Work
| FALL 2009 | WINTER 2010 | SPRING 2010 | ||||
| EDUC 306 (1) | EDUC 458 (5) | SOCI 370 (5) | ||||
| MATH 114 (5) | SOCI 483 (5) | EDUC 452 (5) | ||||
| CEDP 313 (4) | CEDP 324 (4) | SOWK 492 (4) | ||||
| SOCI 101 (5) | ||||||
| Credits: 15 | Credits: 14 | Credits: 14 | ||||
| FALL 2010 | WINTER 2010 | SPRING 2010 | ||||
| SOCI 263 (5) | SOCI 495 (4) | |||||
| SOWK 273 (5) | SOWK 492 (5) | SOWK 470 (5) | ||||
| ITGS 400 (4) | ||||||
| Credits: 10 | Credits: 9 | Credits: 9 | ||||
Sarah Moore’s Feedback
First of all, I really like the colors on your page; they really grab the reader’s attention without distracting them. I like how you laid out your class schedule so it is easy to read. Secondly I like how you did an outline of what we have done in class so far, and how you have the ethics code on your page as well. I also like how you have categorized your resources. I do not know what you could change to your page I really enjoy it. I think you are on a great start to your page.
Kelly Jo's Feedback
I really like your page, it's quite informative and helpful in how you have planned out your coursework. It gives direction where you are going instead of mindlessly plodding along. The colors are easy on the eye, pleasant as well as cheerful.
Self Assessment:
I learned so much in this class. First of all it allowed me to know what my options are as a future Children’s Studies Major graduate. I was able to create a program plan and understand what my major is all about. I was also given more information about what classes I should take and the advisor that I should see.
Secondly, I was able to interview a professional that I would like emulate in the future. It was important for me to really know all of my future career possibilities. I am the holder of my future and I ultimately am in charge of learning more about what I need to do to get a job when I graduate. I think that this class really pushed me to think about where I am going in the future. Learning about my possibilities has really helped me know what my future could look like.
Another thing that I thought was important in this class is creating an online portfolio. It seems like a lot of employers are really going to portfolios that they are able to access from anywhere. I think that learning how to use protopage in this class will help me build a portfolio that is put together professionally. This was a great course to start off with learning how to manage a portfolio online. I think that it has really jumped start my portfolio. My portfolio contains so much stuff that I am able to have anytime I want and update it when ever I need to. My portfolio contains a resource list that I found would be helpful for researching future information in my career.
I also learned about the way classrooms are run. For example they are either run as behaviorist or constructivist framework. We learned that the behaviorist framework is structured as very demanding and expecting to follow the rules. They run the program to teach children to fit in, conform, and comply with all of the expectations that are put before them. This type of framework can lead to children that are needy, dependent, and learning in a certain way. And that it is required or there will be consequences.
In the constructivist framework you will get more out of kids and this is when they really have a voice to express how they feel about things. All of the learning is facilitated in a way that promotes active learning. They also put more emphasis on learning though doing and are seen as independent and the holders of there own future. A good example of a framework like this is having the framework of classroom rules but let the children engage in making the rules so they understand them and know why those certain things are expected of them. In this type of classroom the children is able to learn through his and her own senses, is more social, and are more open to new challenging environments.
I think this activity of learning the differences of these two types of classroom frameworks it let me know what children are more receptive of and what environment promotes the most learning. Even though I am not going into teaching specifically it is important for me to know how children are learning and the type of environments that are out there.
Another important thing that I took away from this class was seeing the United Nations Rights of the Child document. I learned so much about children’s rights and what rights they have. We had an assignment to research one of the rights and I picked an article that explained how important education was to children and how they should be given the right of an education. I also learned that we have not signed this bill yet and I think in the United States part that is a terrible thing not to do. It just shows us how arrogant and irresponsible we are because we think that we have it all right.
The things taught in this class have helped me explore more of my options and know what is out there. I have a clearer understanding of where I am heading. This class is important to take and know that there is support available to help with your education.