Example of Real Communication

Two granddaughters, sisters sharing secrets

Observing Communication

Provide an account of your observation.  The setting is the 2-year-old classroom; the time is 5:40 p.m., purpose: mother is picking up her daughter.  The little girl is putting a puzzle together on the table, insists she put the puzzle together again after mom has arrived.  Mom allows the child to regulate the situation and time.  She and mom play peek-a-boo over and under the table several times.  The mother tells her it is time to go; daddy is waiting so they can go to dinner.  Again, the child decides to dump the puzzle again.  Mom says to come and the child says no.  Mom stands there while she puts the puzzle together.  Then she says that she is ready so mom goes to her cubby and gets her jacket.  The child goes running across the room and insists mom come over there to put on her jacket, then the child proceeds to look in her bag for her little bear.  She finds it, comes over to me and wants me to kiss her bear good night before she leaves.  I kiss the bear, Mom says lets go and the child cuddles up to me and kiss me on the cheek.  Mom thinks this is so cute. 

This is a regular occurrence when either parent arrives.  The child holds the reins and the parents follow her guidance. I noticed that mom is frustrated but does not know how to get control of the situation.  With the questions, that mom has asked me about discipline: the couple is not on the same track: therefore, they do nothing. 

Make connections between what you observed and the effective communication strategies presented in this week’s learning resources. What could have been done to make the communication more affirming and effective?  

Lisa Kolbeck says that we need to leave ourselves open to surprised; because children have so many surprises inside, we can learn about if we are quite enough to see their imagination.  She says that we can tell by children’s body language (Laureate Media, 2010). I think that next week when the parents are picking up, I will try to listen more carefully to the language between the two.  As Alison Stephenson talks about, I need to “step back” (Stephenson, A, 20009).

Share your thoughts with regard to how the communication interactions you observed may have affected the child's feelings and/or any influences it may have had on the child's sense of self-worth.

The child laughs and runs from her mother or father, I think that she is playing and wants them to play with her.  If the father would run after her, or walk fast she would probably come to him readily without having to be coached.  This next week I will try to look at it from her perspective and analyze why she becomes excited and acts silly. 

Offer insights on how the adult-child communication you observed this week compares to the ways in which you communicate with the children. What have you learned about yourself this week with respect to how well you talk with and listen to young children? In what ways could you improve?

I think that when the parents come to pick her up, they are not taking time to communicate with her.  Their business and desires come first and she is determined that she get the attention she desires.  The father is a high-ranking officer in the Army, a helicopter pilot and mom is a veterinarian.   They have committed and busy lives, the child fits in their lives.  I will encourage them to listen more carefully to what their child is saying. 

            References:

            "Communicating with Young Children", (2010), Laureate Media

           Stephenson, A. (2009). Conversations with a 2-year-old. YC: Young Children, 64(2), 90-95. Retrieved     from the Walden Library using the Education Research Complete database. http://ezp.waldenulibrary.org     /login?url=http://search.ebscohost.com/login.aspx?direct=true&db=ehh&AN=37131016&site=ehost-live&scope=site

Creating Affirming Environments

An anti-bias environment is also culturally consistent for the children and families it currently serves.  Children also need materials that honor diversity both within and beyond their own identity groups.

Louise Derman-Sparks, 2010, Anti-Bias Education for Yong Children and Ourselves

 

   I would set up a school that recognizes all cultures that enrolls.  My desire would be for children from any country to feel safe and welcome in my classroom.  I want the parents feel comfortable with their child’s surroundings and caregivers. 

Books from diverse cultures such as disabilities, African-American, Asian, Asian-American, Native Americans, Islanders, White, Hispanic, so many others will be in my library.  Music will be from as many cultures I can find, such as the DVD, I have from the Navajo Nation

There would be pictures on the wall of children from a variety of nations in many differencing situations. Pictures of me with twins from the Apache Nation, pictures from West Africa, Australia, and Manhattan, Kansas are a part of the pictures on the walls.

Toys will include persona dolls, vehicles of transportation different from those used in the USA.  Other toys might include blocks, tangrams, and animals from domestic to extinct, to dinosaurs, and dress-up with articles from some of the parents that have had children in the class. 

     Art would include free-easel, table painting, pasting, cutting, sugar-chalk coloring, free coloring, printed pictures, are only some of the activities. 

     In the preschool, I taught in two years ago, I did what the book calls Tourism but I did it as Tourist.  We had passports, and little packed suitcases.  We traveled to the countries that I had visited while I was doing mission work.  I had clothes, recipes for meals, pictures and maps showing the children where we were going and how long we would be gone.  We, also, traveled to the countries three of our children were from: China, Bangladesh, and South Africa. 

     I would have numbers one to ten in three languages: English, Spanish, and French on the wall.  I would use other numbers as I learned from the children and parents. 

 A little story:  I had a three-year-old Chinese girl who came to my class that could only say, “Hi” and “Thank you”.  After 6 months, she was speaking English and surprising her parents.  One day her father brought her to class, I asked her if she had told her daddy that she could count in French.  He said, “No she does not know French.”  I asked her to count for him.  She counted to ten in French and her father laughed.  “You, an English White woman teaching my little Chinese daughter to speak French. How funny but thank you.” He left the room laughing. 

Toileting and diapering is done on a changing table that the children can climb on themselves.  This is a time of privacy, but when questions are asked, they are answered clearly with correct wording in the appropriate development language. 

References:

Derman-Sparks, L., & Olsen Edwards, J. (2010). Anti-bias education for young children and ourselves.     Washington, D.C.: National Association for the Education of Young Children (NAEYC).