In your response, ask your classmates’ questions regarding their beliefs about play and/or clarifying questions about their cultural experiences. You are encouraged to be culturally sensitive in your responses, as this discussion is an opportunity to show that you value and respect diversity and are sensitive to cultural differences. 5 sentences or more.
Week 3 Discussion 1
The differences I see in the classroom between American children and children who speak Spanish, which means they are either from Spain or Mexico has some comparisons. American children can be from many cultures, their families came here to start a new life in the home of the free and the brave. Children who come from a family that speaks a different language can learn just like English speakers through play.
During play educators who are sensitive to children from other cultures need to add items to the classroom that share their customs. Pictures, dress up clothes, dishes, plastic food, and a person who can speak their language as an itinerant teacher helps these children feel safe and comfortable in their learning environment. We have an Itinerant Teacher who speaks Spanish, she contacts our families, shares information, goes on the home visits with the Teacher and Family Advocate to help build the relationship with school. There are several myths concerning children with second languages, they actually learn very well when they are young with several languages, and learning two languages is easiest when children are preschool age.
As educators get used to being around a child who speaks a different language they start to learn more about the child and his needs. They will use pictures to help their cognitive development to communicate and to show children where their toys go. The daily schedule will have pictures and by using a marker to show where in the school routine they are helps these children to understand what is coming up next. Children begin to acquire English associated with specific content knowledge while they continue to develop social language (Dodge, D. T., Colker, L. J., & Heroman, C. (2002).
My beliefs are that children who speak different languages need to keep their home language, but also learn English to be able to communicate in English speaking schools. It’s important to support children’s continued learning in their primary language while, at the same time, fostering their ability to learn to speak English (Dodge, D. T., Colker, L. J., & Heroman, C. (2002). Reading the resources from this week’s content I have learned that we must not isolate children who speak another language, we should learn all we can about their culture so that we can understand what they believe. I also enjoy the videos in this course, I’m a visual learner and watching the videos really helps me understand play and diversity.
References
Dodge, D. T., Colker, L. J., & Heroman, C. (2002). The creative curriculum for preschool. Washington, DC: Teaching Strategies.