Welcoming Families from Around the World

 

As an educator, it is important to make your students feel safe and comfortable. In this post, I am discussing ways to make a newly immigrated child and their family feel welcome. The family is from New Guinea. In preparation of their arrival, I want to make myself culturally responsive by:

1.      Validate the cultural identities of students and encourage them to learn more about each other’s cultural identities.

2.      Assist in fostering a positive relationship among the new students, the community, and their families.

3.      Acknowledge students’ differences as well as their similarities.

4.      Educate myself and my students about diversity and the world around them.

5.      Model respect, openness, and equality amongst current students and all cultures.

It is my hope that doing the five items listed above will help not only prepare myself for the arrival of the newly transplanted family but also help prepare my current students and our social/ learning community. I want to prepare my students and our S/L community to develop a personal investment in the care and wellbeing of the new student(s) and their family.

Experiencing bias

As a minority, specifically an African American, you are prepared as a child for racism and biasness. We deal with them on a regular bases so it is important to develop a thick skin. I have experienced several incidents of biasness, oppression, and racism in my life. One incident really stands out to me because I was not prepared for it at all.

 

The first incident took place shortly after the death of my father. I was 18 and my father had died from a massive heart attack. I was not coping well. I was an emotional mess. My father had named the benefactor for his life insurance so I went to the bank to deposit the check from the life insurance company into my bank account. I endorsed the check at the bank, filled out a deposit slip, walked up to the counter and handed the check and deposit slip to the teller who was a older White woman.

 

The teller, looked at the check and asked me why I had a check for such a large amount of money. I ignored the question and calmly asked her to complete my transaction and give me a receipt for the deposit. The teller replied " how does someone like you get this amount of money?" I told her that it was none of her business and the teller responded by calling over security and telling him that she was afraid that I was committing fraud. 

 

I began crying, overwhelmed by my Dad's death/ the unexpected racism/ the rudeness,  and asked to see the bank manager. The security guard refused to call the bank manager and escorted me out of the bank. I went home and told my Mom and step-father what happened. They immediately called the bank and asked to speak to the branch manager. When this request was refused, they called our family lawyer who promptly advised me to write an official account of what happened.

 

Via our lawyer, we requested an official apology from the bank, diversity training for its employees, and an appropriate reprimand for the teller and the security guard. After an investigation by the Bank of America, we did receive all requests and both involved employees did apologize to me in person (which was something that I requested).

 

This event was traumatizing to me. It made me sad, nausea, and angry. At that time and throughout the years since I have wondered how many people experienced a similar situation but did not have the support of a lawyer available to them.

 

 

Perspectives of Culture and Diversity

A few weeks ago, I began a new course entitled Perspectives of Diversity and Equality. This week, my professor asked our class to gain a definition of the term culture from three friends or acquaintances that had a differing cultural background than ourselves. 

 

Here are the responses that I received from my three friends:

Culture:

• The ability to see, feel, and touch how people other than yourself live.
• A way of life for a certain group of people
• The traditions of individuals or groups of people.

Diversity:

• The exposure of multiple avenues of multiple groups to each other.
• The differences in culture amongst people.
• The uniqueness of individuals, groups, and races.

Throughout this course, we have studied several aspects of culture and diversity. In our main course text culture is referred to as " how particular groups of people live" (Derman-Sparks & Edwards, 2010). I believe that this is a similar yet simpler definition of those that I received from my friends.  I would also make the same statement regarding how the course has referred to the term diversity, which is also very similar to the definition of diversity provided by my friends.

 

I do not feel that the definitions provided by my friends omitted any information or aspects to the defining of the terms culture and diversity that differed from the ways that the terms have been utilized throughout my current course. Additionally, I must admit that I was not surprised by this fact not was I surprised that my friend's had very similar definitions to those of myself. Despite a differing of culture, I believe that we as humans inherently seek out those that have similar mind sets to our own so the discovery that I shared a similar perspective.

 

Reference

 

Derman-Sparks, L., & Edwards, J. O. (2010). Anti-bias education

for young children and ourselves. Washington, DC: National

Association for the Education of Young Children (NAEYC).

 

My Supports

        For some reason I find it very hard to list factors that are supportive to me throughout in my daily environment. Perhaps cause some factors are not quite as obvious as others. I live by myself, in a different state than my closest friends and family so familial support did not immediately come to mind. However, I do communicate on a regular basis with my family through electronic means. This thought made realize that the Internet is the most supportive factor in my daily life.

        The Internet provides me with social support by providing a means of communication between family/ friends and myself. In fact, this form of communication in so strong that it is often my only form of communication for days. The Internet is also my primarily means of communication with all of my work colleagues. Additionally, the Internet provides me with access to knowledge both old and new).

         It is clear that I could not survive even hours without the intricate support provided by this electronic means of communication. I am completely wired for better or for worst and my life runs smoothly because of it.


 

My Connections to Play

“You can discover more about a person in an hour of play than in a year of conversation.” Plato

 

My family believed in play. They encouraged my active imagination and bought it to life. I grew up as the youngest of three children. I was self-absorbed player, mainly because my older brother and sister were in high school by the time that I entered kindergarten. Without any cousins or other children close to my age, my imagination became my best friend.

 When I wanted to play dress up and pretend that I was going to a glorious ball like Cinderella, my Mom got dressed with me and did my hair so that the prince would pick me first for a dance. I imagined living above a bakery like Tootie on The Facts of Life, so my Dad and my grandparents created a diner in the basement. I remember them getting dressed up and coming to my diner to eat food, both plastic and imaginary, while leaving real tips. The tips allowed me to buy books, which I read with amazing voracity because I would entirely lose myself in the pages. I created worlds from the typed words.

 

“Don’t play what’s there, play what’s not there”. Miles Davis

        My play was birthed from imagination and bought to life by creativity. As a teenager, I fell in love with art and dancing because it allowed me to be creative. As an adult, I became a teacher because it allows for nonstop creativity and a passion for play.

 

            Unfortunately, my students are not very involved in play. Their imagination rarely flows outside the confines of the latest video game or reality show. Perhaps, they know too much…they have nothing left to discover because they are bombarded by too much reality. Perhaps they never learn how to enjoy play; so many are pushed into maturity prematurely by irresponsible adults and nonexistent parents. It is truly shameful, how society has forgotten play. But, I remember it and I do it daily. I love to play.

 

 

 

Relationship Builder

I am a teacher, a sculptor of young minds, and a relationship builder. I became a relationship builder after my father died when I was a sophomore in college. He was the single most important person in my life at that time and I felt completely lost when I lost him. The relationships that I had with my sister and my boyfriend helped keep me sane then and the development of relationship became my new hobby.

I rebuilt a once strained relationship with my mother in the months following my father's death. I reconnected with my best friend from middle school and gained three more best friends in doing so. I developed close ties with work colleagues and got to know my boyfriend's family better, which resulted in a glorious relationship with his cousin who soon became my closest confidant.

 By the time I graduated from college, I had wonderful relationships with my mother, sister, and four best friends. These relationship were fostered by mutually respect, love, and a willingness to care a little more about everyone else and a little less about oneself.

With that success of those relationship firmly under my belt, I built even more relationships. I gained a family in every country where I resided. I learned to be ok with my own vulnerability and I learned to ask for help. I also learned to give freely of myself, my time, and my belongings.

My relationships carried me through two heartbreaking break-ups, a career change, four year stint traveling the world, and an even more challenging move back to the United States.

I am a great teacher and a good leader because I am a relationship builder. You cannot teach without the ability to learn and you cannot learn without opening your mind. A good relationship allows you to feel safe in opening mind to new experiences and knowledge.

 

 

A Reflection on Learning Theories and Instruction

        This blog entry outlines my personal thoughts regarding learning theories and instruction as I reflect on the material that has been discussed throughout the course, Learning Theories and Instruction (EDUC 6115).

Foreword

Having taken another course on topic of learning theories and instruction approximately three years ago, I did not discover any new information that I found to be shocking or striking in this subject matter. I did, however, develop a clearer picture on the practical application of learning theories in today’s instructional environment.

Clarifying Aspects of my own Learning and Instruction

I considered myself to be a visual and auditory learner prior to the start of this course. This opinion has not changed. I also fervently defended constructivism, believing that this learning theory was the best for my specific style of learning (Conner, 1993). Throughout the past eight weeks, my single-minded perspective regarding the practical application of learning theories has become more open-minded. I now realize that several learning theories work well with visual and auditory learners. Additionally, I have realized that as an instructor there are several factors that I must consider, in addition to the learning styles of my students, when choosing a learning theory.

Making Connections

           The primary job of instructional designer is to seamlessly integrate motivational factors, learning theories, and learning styles with technology. These areas of learning are strongly connected can impact one another positively and negatively (Millar, 2003). Therefore, it is essential to understand how they are connected.  The creation of the a table that outlined how various learning theories (behaviorism, cognitivism, constructivism, social learning, and connectivism) answer definitive instructional questions such as “How does transfer occur?” and “What types of learning are best explained by this theory?” helped me to clarify the connections between learning theories, learning styles, and technology (Ormrod, Schunk, and Gredler, 2009) . Similarly, the creation of a table outlining my plan on how to overcome some common motivational factors that impact the learning process (achievement, anxiety, choice, relatedness) using Keller’s ARCS model (Keller, 2003) allowed me to gain a deeper understanding of how the use of a specific learning theories or type of technology could greatly impact motivational factors of my students.

Summary

             This course is essential to an aspiring Instructional Designer. Throughout this course I have developed a clearer picture on the practical application of learning theories in today’s instructional environment. I also gained an appreciation for the intricate connections between motivational factors, learning theories, learning styles and technology. The tools that I have created throughout with course (the aforementioned tables) will be invaluable as a quick, easily updateable reference in future courses and in my career as an instructional designer.

 References

Conner, M.L. (1993). What’s Your Learning Style? Retrieved August 29, 2008 from            http://agelesslearner.com/assess/learningstyle.html

Keller, J. M. (1999). Using the ARCS motivational process in computer-based instruction and distance education. New Directions for Teaching and Learning (78). Retrieved June 22, 2012 from http://web.ebscohost.com.ezp.waldenulibrary.org/ehost/detail?sid=0ab0c47a-aeb2-4f9f-a7f8-b6cbfba69082%40sessionmgr12&vid=1&hid=10&bdata=JnNpdGU9ZWhvc3QtbGl2ZSZzY29wZT1zaXRl

Millar, R., (2003). Benchmarking best practices in adult learning centres. Retrieved March 24, 2009 from http://www.oise.utoronto.ca/CASAE

Ormrod, J., Schunk, D., & Gredler, M. (2009). Learning Theories and Instruction (Laureate custom edition). New York: Pearson.