Keeping Up Internationally:Key is Professionalism

I find that there are three consequences of learning about the international early childhood field.  First, there is the consequence of realizing accountability that you have as a professional in the Early Childhood field to keep up with current programs and practices that are being used internationally.  By doing so, the professional can bring new and fresh ideas that are relevant to the field in his or her field.  Next, I find another consequence in learning about the early childhood field internationally is realizing the responsibility we have as professionals to the issues like poverty, quality in child care, and diversity.  When we can take into account the different backgrounds, the lack of money parents are working for to provide for his or her children and the type of educational programming that is being taught an early childcare center.   Finally, there is idea of what it means to be a professional.  Being a professional means learning to grow through knowledge, flexibility, and collaboration with other professional.  If I can promote one goal for the Early Childhood field would be professional development implemented in Early Childhood programs to collaborate with coworkers.  This way, professionals can grow and learn new ideas to teach children.

The HECDI and Unifying Goals for Early Childhood

                The United Nations Educational, Scientific, and Cultural Organization in conjunction with Bernard van Leer Foundation, Un Kilo de Ayuda (Mexico), Save the Children, UNICEF, the WFP, the WHO and the World Bank have come up with the Holistic Early Childhood Developmental Index (HECDI).   HECDI was created in December 2010, and wants to promote a more cohesive approach to monitoring children from prenatal development to the age of eight.  The goals of the HECDI are to measure the aspects of ECCE policy and programming at a national and subnational level, legal protection of children, social protection and child welfare, social-emotional and cognitive development, access and quality of early childhood care and education, and health/nutrition.

These are all important factors for the educator in me to see being measured because it will allow us to provide a more standard form of policy and programming. For me that is one of the biggest problems I see in the EC field right now.  For instance, certain centers are trying to follow standards while other are not.  This provides a problem for children who are not going to be prepared for Kindergarten.  I would like to see area centers get on the same page as to what is being taught to Pre-K children so children could be more on the same page before entering Kindergarten.  I also feel it is important to have Pre-K programs also screen for learning disabilities for children that way Kindergarten teachers are able to provide interventions the moment the child comes into his or her classroom.

Resource 

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

"National Pyjama Day" in Ireland

The links on the Early Childhood Ireland website take me to several places.  One leads me to the really awesome day of service for Early Childhood is known as Pajama Day, except in Ireland it is spelled “Pyjama Day”.  On Friday, March 23, 2012, children in Early Childhood centers around Ireland wear “pyjamas” to help raise money for the specific charity of their choice.  To further expand on this day the website has a link to the Irish Hospice Foundation, which provides children with a terminal illness a chance to live out his or her final days at home.  Children who helped sponsor the Irish Hospice Foundation, which has only been involved with “Pyjama Day” for two years, raised  €224,337.47 ($289978.61).  The link provided the amount of total Euros that “’Pyjama Day” has raised in its nine years of existence, which was 1.5 million in Euros.  The website also stated that, “In Ireland today it is estimated that 1,400 children are living with life-limiting illness in Ireland. There are about 350 child deaths every year – the majority in the first year of life.” (Early Childhood Ireland, 2012)   As a result of the IHF and “Pyjama Day” the IHF has been able to 5 out of 8 outreach nurses that are needed to provide support for the families and children suffering with a terminal illness.  Donations are still accepted for “Pyjama Day” six months after the actual service day.  For more information on “Pyjama Day” go to http://www.tv3.ie/3player/show/184/46659/1/  for coverage of “National Pyjama Day”.

  

Global Children's Initiative

I reviewed the website about Harvard’s Global Children’s Initiative.  Three big goals of the Global Children’s Initiative are as follows:

1.      Reframe the discourse around child health and development.

2.      Support innovative, multi-disciplinary research and demonstration projects. 

3.      Build leadership capacity in child development research and policy.

Through the three main focuses of early childhood development, child mental health, and children in crisis and conflict situation, The Global Health Initiative wants to reframe health care and development by, “educating high-level decision-makers about the underlying science of learning, behavior, and health, beginning in the earliest years of life.” Next, supporting research and demonstration projects require, “to expand global understanding of how healthy development happens, how it can be derailed, and how to get it back on track.”  Finally, there is the need for leadership in child development and research and policy by, “focused on both individuals and institutions—in low- and middle-income countries to increase the number and influence of diverse voices and perspectives that are contributing to the growing global movement on behalf of young children.”

These needs are great, especially for children in third-world country, because there is no standard form of early child development and education.  This article gives reports of the contributions of the Zambian Early Childhood Development and the Mother Child Initiative from the Turkey Early Childhood Development.  The site also features spotlights on faculty promoting early childhood policy and counties like Brazil trying to implement new policy on early childhood.

Resource:

(http://developingchild.harvard.edu/initiatives/global_initiative/

ECCE and It's Importance

The international website that I have been researching and gathering resources from is www.earlychildhoodireland.com .  The website has given me perspective on the belief that no matter where children are from they need learning that is specific to his or her individual needs. I found that reading the section about involving fathers was particularly relevant to my current professional development because where I teach there are extremely many more single parent house-holds that are run by the mother.  The section of the website showed the importance of having both parents involved in her child’s life. 
There is an interesting program that has been designed in Ireland to have children between the ages of 3 years, 3 months to 4 years, 4 months where children receive free, quality Pre-K education.  It is called ECCE Year, which stands for Early Childhood and Care Year.  The importance of finding out that more and more countries in Europe are providing this education for early childhood, but it shows a greater need for me to see children in the United States need this year.  This information is very pivotal to the relevance to the three fields of economists, neuroscientists, and politicians because the idea of having quality early childcare and education before primary school is important because research from each of these fields have shown important impacts that early childhood education makes on a child’s life.   
Another big insight that was made to me through the website is that it is so important how having a child placed in a early childhood educational setting provides the child readiness in  primary school, which makes for an easier transition for  the child socially, academically, and emotionally.  This also takes stress off of parents when their child is able to know what to expect when he or she begins school.

China and Poverty

            China is the most populated country in the world.  According to the 2001 census China has 1.27 billion people According to UNICEF, “90 million children go hungry in South Asia.”  However, in recent years China has been working on reducing the poverty rate in the country because 250 million people were in poverty in China in 1978 and dropped to 35 million in 2000. 

            The biggest factor to the poverty dropping is China making a shift from a centralized market economy to a more globalized economy.  However, in recent years much of the factors for 35 million still in poverty deals with the fact that 1.)  Western China has had slower economic growth and was 3 times more likely to be poor than a person in Eastern China.  Eastern China is definitely benefiting from controlled liberalization and carefully planned foreign investment, and China joined the World Trade Organization in 2001 has help with employment and job opportunities. 

            4.2 million Chinese children live in poverty and 8.7 million Chinese children live in disadvantage situation. Urban Social Security Reform has helped provide families in China with anti-poverty initiatives, although small due to China being a Communist country, which is big step.

"A Journey Through Early Childhood Education in Ireland"

I have decided to follow the website of Early Childhood Ireland.  It has an interesting program regarding quality education and curriculum in Early Childhood called Aistear.  Aistear is the national curriculum framework that all Early Childhood organizations work toward and use to produce quality education for children from birth to six in Ireland.

            The word “Aistear” means journey in the Celtic language.  The program can be used by parents, teachers, and early childhood practitioners to provide challenging, enriching, and engaging learning opportunities for young children.  The framework of Aistear believes that, “education is a lifelong journey that can take many different routes.”  Therefore, the framework does not prescribe to one specific curriculum to use to teach young children, but give shared principles or themes that a teacher, practitioner, or parent must cover to teach the child. 

            As an educator, believe that this concept is very important because it allows the educator to personalize and fit their teaching around his or her students needs. To learn more about Aistear visit the website,  http://www.earlychildhoodireland.ie/quality-in-childcare-practice-of-childcare/aistear-and-curriculum/ .