Communication evaluation

      The one thing that surprised me the most was the fact that both my sister and my friend Eric think I do a nice job speaking in public. Public speaking is a huge no no for me. I get nervous and try to avoid it at all costs. I do very well in small groups, so maybe they see some confidence there and think that it transfers over to large groups.

     One insight that I have learned this week is; I love interacting with people and feel that I am pretty good at communication and taking the 3 “tests” this week has showed me that I am pretty decent at it. Knowing that I actually have effective communication skills makes me feel better about interacting with people. 

       Another insight that I have gained is that I need to work on being less argumentative when communicating with people. I do listen to what they have to say but I like to argue. I need to work on this:)

      These insights will help me communicate better both personally and professionally so that I don’t argue with parents or colleuages, or even my sisters. I also know that I need to work more on public speaking to large groups for things that I would like to do in this career field. 

Communincation

At my school we don’t have a big cultural gap. We have a few male teachers, we have a few Mormon teachers and some catholics, lutherans, and mostly while female teachers. That makes up the diversity of my colleagues at my school. I do visit and get along with them all. I love my staff and feel that we have a good relationship in our school. There is a sense of community. I don’t really think I communicate any differently, we are very open with each other and I might use different vocabulary, and ask different questions but essentially they are my work family and I love that. We go to others family functions like, weddings and graduations.I would say there is mutual trust and respect amongst us. 

Three strategies that I could use to help me be a more effective communicator would be to first look at things from their perspective. In order to understand where the person is coming from you need to be open to what they are saying. 

The second thing is to not make assumptions. You have no idea where people come from or what people are thinking or feeling. Listen to what they have to say. If you don’t listen, you could be judging them with out any idea what they were talking about. 

The third thing is become consciously aware of peoples nonverbal communication and what there actions are saying instead of just their words. Nonverbal actions sometimes so way more then what people are saying. 

Communication through nonverbal clues

I have been spending a lot of time at the lake so I didn’t have any way to record a show but, I borrowed a season of One Tree Hill from my sister to watch. I have seen the show a few times when she watched it, but not enough to know what is going on. I watched an episode where a wedding was taking place. Everyone seemed to be very close friends or family. There was lots of hugging and smiling. You can tell the bride and maid of honor are best friends with how many smiles and hugs they share. The bride is pregnant and looks so happy and emotional that she starts to cry. They looks to be a lot of couples because there is a lot of kissing and embracing. 

As I said they all seem to care a lot about each other. There is laughing, kissing, hugging, smiling, and all around general happiness, after all it is a wedding. At the end of the show the bride and groom went to their house and, the bride starts to have labor pain and starts bleeding, when the groom goes to the garage. He comes back to find her in a pile of blood on the floor, so then there is lots of scared panic it look like on his face and it ends there.

When I watched the show with the sound on, I was pretty correct with the part that they are close friends and family. They all had a connection to each other and were sharing happy memories. There were some characters that had a feud at the beginning of the show but they were still smiling and laughing at each other that I couldn’t tell they were being sarcastic and had a mean tone of voice. However these same characters by the end of the show made up and were really happy with each other. 

I suppose my assumptions would have been different if I had watched a show, were I already know the characters, and even if I would have picked a different episode of this show. I watched one close to the end of the season she had and it was a good episode. It makes me realize that with out the sound and with out knowing these characters, I couldn’t tell that some of them were not getting along. Their nonverbal clues showed that they were smiling and laughing. I think that it is important to know both aspects of communication the verbal and nonverbal so that I can be more effective in communication. 

What Is Communication?

As I continue on my journey through this course I am excited and thrilled with what I have learned so far and will continue to learn. In this course we are learning about effective communication and need pick someone that shows effective communication skills.
 As soon as I read this assignment the first person that came to mind was a colleague of mine. Her name is Amy and she has been a Kindergarten teacher for 17 years. She is my mentor at school and I don't know if I would have survived my first year with out her. She has built such a rapport with her students, colleagues, parents and administrators. She is a true leader. She follows the Love and Logic model in her classroom and in her life and it looks like is comes so naturally to her. She takes on many roles in the education system, and helps anyone who needs it. She is loyal, honest, has an amazing work ethic, is supportive, and firm all at the same time.
I do try to model my communication skills after Amy and have even taken Love and Logic classes. I feel that I have pretty good communication skills, but the way she is with everyone is inspiring. I also know that I have only been teaching for 5 years and hopefully with the help of this class and more experience I will get to the level of communication that Amy has with people.

Professional Hopes and Goals

One hope that I have for families and children that I work with, that come from diverse backgrounds is that they feel valued, and welcomed. I want them to know that they matter to me, and that I value who they are and where they came from. I want them to feel welcomed in the classroom and comfortable to be there. That is my first hope when dealing with families and children. 

One goal that I have would like to set for the early childhood field related to issues of diversity, equity, and social justice is to set up diversity classes for my parents, co-workers and community. Classes so that everyone is kept up to date on the issues and so that they can have knowledge on those topics and be aware of those topics. After all knowledge is power and with power comes a voice. A voice so that the people who attend these classes can stand up for themselves or someone else. 

Finally I want to thank all of you for the great comments and the different outlook on the topics that we discussed through out the 8 weeks in this course. You all have been wonderful to work with and I wish all of you the best of luck in the future. 

Welcoming Families Around the World

The country I picked was Somalia, because a teacher at my school had a student in her class from there. We are becoming more and more diverse at my school and if I knew I was going to have a student in my classroom from a country that I knew nothing about, I would need ways to research it. 

The first thing I would do is a lot of research on the internet. I know that will give me mostly surface culture information but it is a start. It will help me get the basics of where this student is coming from. The next thing I would do is to reach out another teacher from that country. Whether it is through a blog or via phone or through the NAEYCE website. This professional will be able to give me first hand information about what education is like in their country and how I might proceed to help this student. A third thing I would do would be to look up some vocabulary that I would be able to write on index cards to label things so that I can help build a connection in the classroom with words that he/she will recognize. A fourth thing I would do since I have warning that I am getting this student is to maybe set up an appointment with the student and his/her family. This way I can hopefully build a connection with the family and ask what they are wanting for their child in school. The final thing I would do is to visit with our school ELL teacher to help me get ready for our new arrival. Things like if we have a translator or something set up so that his/her transition into my classroom will be as smooth as possible. 

When I get these things accomplished before my new students comes it will make the transition easier for both the child and his/her family. I will have trust and respect built up that will make them all feel comfortable coming into a new environment. I will be able to help this child to the best of my ability. 

Perspectives on Diversity and Culture

Renee - Fellow co-worker, mother, Canadian, Mormon, white female, 55 years old.

Culture is the way a group of people live their lives. Whats important to them are their traditions, holidays and their family structure.  

Diversity is the differences in language, in culture, in race, in religion, in their socio economic way of life. 

Amber- My friend a surgical tech, lutheran, American, white female, 28 years old.

Cultures is peoples beliefs and the knowledge that they learn from their family and friends. 

Diversity is being well rounded. Willing to learn about other cultures but still have your own beliefs. 

Kenzie- Sister, doctor, lutheran, American, white female, 23 years old.

Culture is a group of people’s way of life. Its the beliefs, values, customs, attitudes, religion and possessions that is acquired over the course of generations and passed down through imitations and communications. Culture can distinguish one group or category from one group of people to the next. 

Diversity is understanding, accepting and respecting the fact the each individual is different and unique. These differences could include gender, race, religion, sexual orientations, economic status, political beliefs and other ideologies. The concept of diversity means to embrace the differences and to enjoy the uniqueness of the world. 

These are the three people that I interviewed. There are some answers that are similar to what I have learned in class and some are different. Some examples of similarity are that Kenzie and Renee talked about culture being a persons way of life. Kenzie and Amber talked about how culture is passed down through family. Kenzie and Renee talk about diversity being about race, religion, and so on, and Amber adds being well rounded. I feel that those are things that I have learned about in class, but those are all surface culture things. 

Some things that have been omitted is the deep culture understanding. Kenzie brief talked about attitude, and that is a part of deep culture, but they left out how their raise their children or how they talk, how they interact with other people. Those are some of the things they left out. They are all important to culture and to diversity. 

When I listened to their definitions on culture and diversity I feel that, We all have an understanding of each of them, but it just touches the surface. Like them before this class those would have been my definitions. I know now that there is more to both of them and as a person and an educator I feel that it is my responsibility to know more and have a better understanding of culture and diversity.