Entry one

When I think about people, places, things and events, I think about what can affect children’s lives.  The different people that come and go in a children lift can cause a lot of distress and lack of understanding causing children to blame themselves or blame others around them.  As a young child I never understood why my dad was sent away until I was much older in my teenager years.  With my situation now with my husband and I splitting; I watch my children go through this spilt with lack of understanding on what is happening and blaming me for everything they are going through.  As I know it’s just a feeling for them explaining to them over and over again that’s its no-ones fault they seem to be making better adjustments but don’t like me leaving or going anywhere overnight as this starts setting off a feeling I won’t be back.  This can affect children’s behaviour according to Bronfenbrenner’s (Berk, 2003) microsystem on the ecological system.

Places can have an impact on children, new places can scare or worry children along with things; I class things as items that don’t move items you can’t see like a pregnant mum (the unborn child).  At the moment we have a child who developed a fear of others coming into the centre he used to be fine.  A few months later mum told us she was five months pregnant and we started to understand he was getting those feelings, something was different and started to cling to mum not wanting to let her go, he will cry most of the day by the door wanting his mum and his days at centre have since been cut.

I believe myself events whether good or bad have a huge impact on children, as growing up I had a bad experience in childhood which held onto me for years and still does, it’s the reason I became an early childhood educator, but in saying that it taught me I’m strong and I can get through anything that is thrown at me.  “A child’s mind at birth is like blank slate and it is shaped by forces of nurture and experiences faced after birth” (Talay-Ongan, 2005, p.2), this to me gives me the understanding of no matter the experience, negative or positive it shapes who you are, of course you can change that with learning more things and understanding the world.

Popular culture now is about technology the devices like tablets, I-pad, phones, and computers.  Children now days know how to work these items faster than an adult learning about this world where as children now days are brought into this world with devices all around them.  Technology has creative a new way of communication for children and this gives them a different type of play, they have their play off devices and then adult world which is on devices, children seem to know more than adults when on these devices (Fleer & Jane, 2011).  I believe devices can be a good education tool as for my son who races BMX loves going onto youtube to watch other BMX riders so he can learn more about his bike and how he can get a better racing stance.

References

Berk, L. (2003). Development through the lifespan (3^rd ed). Boston, New York: Pearson

Fleer, M., & Jane, B. (2011). Design and technology for children. Frenchs Forest, Australia: Pearson                Australia. 

Talay-Ongan, A., & Ap, E. A. (Eds.). (2005). Child development and teaching young children. Southbank, Australia: Thomson Social Science Press.  

Entry Two

My centre is a Reggio Emilia centre where more natural colours and items are being used each day.  I don’t know much about the planning that happens for the children in the under twos area as I am not part of the planning part of the week.  But when I am sitting down with the children they are learning so much with lots of different skills, as they are under two they are learning new skills at a very fast rate.

I support children’s learning in the area of social sciences by teaching them that there are different cultures in our community by using different languages around the children with the English word as-well so they learn that there is more languages out there in the world not just English and Te Reo since we are a multi-cultural centre.  While out in the garden we learn that pulling all the plants out isn’t good for the environment but if we water them enough for them to grow and with the sunshine we will end up with yummy vegetables for lunches, we have a few children in our area that love the hose and to fill that love with the hose we let them water the plants, not only do they feel accomplished that they got the hose but they are also helping the environment and feeding the plants (Ministry of Education, 2007) “Working together helps children develop confidence in their ability to develop relationships with others” (Ministry of Education, 2006, p. 94).

In our centre we encourage children to be a part of different culture celebrations; we celebrate Matariki for Māori week with art work, and words of the week teaching staff, parents and the children simple words each week.  They participate in the cultural settings that we are doing such as lights of festival, when we bring in holi power and paint each other’s faces “children are helped to participate in social and cultural settings, demonstrating consideration for others through qualities such as caring, fairness, tolerance, and generosity” (Ministry of Education, 2006, p. 95) the children learn to also take turns when we are doing painting of faces.


With learning alongside the children and using Te Reo in the centre we have a board up for a word a week which can last a couple of weeks, this word is changed when the children start saying it and understanding what it is they are saying.  This started with the word pātara which is bottle and an important word for toddlers when asking for their bottles.  Nāpu for nappy which we have noticed children saying nāpu and tapping the back of their nappies which tells us they understand the word we are using this gives them another way to communicate with staff “as children’s abilities to communicate develop, they are able to form good relationships with others and participate constructively in a range of social and cultural settings” (Ministry of Education, 2006, p. 97).

References

Ministry of Education. (1996). Te Whāriki: He whāriki mātauranga mō ngā mokopuna o Aotearoa: Early childhood curriculum. Wellington, New Zealand: Learning Media. 

Ministry of Education. (2007). The New Zealand curriculum. Wellington, New Zealand: Learning                Media