Things I have learned from my international resources

I have learned a lot from both my international colleagues and the international websites that I have visited. Three specific things that I have learned are:

The values that children learn when they are young, that help them to be positive contributing members of society are more important than any specific academic skill (UNESCO)

Emphasis on social emotional development continues to be best practice internationally (Gail and Estephania)

Free preschool for all four year old children is a recognized part of the education system

(Gail and Estephania)

One goal that I have related to international awareness of issues and trends and the spirit of relationship with my professional colleagues from other countries is to keep in touch. I believe that many countries are ahead of us in terms of understanding how to support social/emotional development and prepare children to be successful in school. By keeping in touch and learning from professionals in other countries I can learn from them and use their wisdom to guide my decisions in my work as a Professional Development Specialist and an advocate for children.

What I found at UNESCO

I guess both of my international colleagues are on summer vacation this week, because I didn't hear from either one of them. But I did get the chance to go onto a wonderful website-the United Nations Educational, Scientific, and Cultural Organization or UNESCO. There were several interesting tabs, but the information I want to share is from the Education Tab around early childhood.
1. The organization took a poll of Early Childhood Educators from around the world and they asked the question, "What are the three most important skills that a child should learn"? They posted responses from four educators from Sri Lanka, India, Cambodia, and Fiji. They talked a little about academics but these were the majority of the things they listed:

• Life skills
• Core values
• How to be good citizens
• Resilience
• Problem solving
• Who they are and how they relate to the world
• Culture
• Respect
• History-learning from the past to inform the future 

2. The first World Conference on Early Childhood Care and Education was held in September 2010 in Moscow. It was at that conference that they determined that early care and education is a human right.

3. At this conference, they commissioned the development of index of the five most important things to consider when developing programs for families with young children called the Holistic Early Childhood Development Index. The five things are:

• Care, education and child development
• Policy and planning
• Social protection (such as poverty)
• Legal protection (such as rights)
• Health and Nutrition 

I think these three things fall in line with my professional goals because they are all things that I believe in, are willing to share with others and advocate for a professor-they are foundational to good Preschool Systems like the one I'd like to be involved with creating in Utah-and they are great things to remember and consider as I help move the Professional Development System to the next level.  

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

What Child Care Aware has to say about inequities in the field of ECE

Today I was reading my e-newsletter from Child Care Aware and I found a link to a press release about the new proposed child care regulations for Child Care Development Grant Funding (CCDF) from the Department of Health and Human Services. They noted in their press release dated May 15, 2013, that they were pleased to see many of their recommendations for improved quality included in the language of the new rule. It was also stated that parents assume that anyone who has a child care license is prepared to adequately watch their children, but that there are large discrepancies in what happens in licensed centers from state to state. This rule change will make services for child care more equitable in terms of quality by requiring licensed programs to adhere to stricter guidelines in the areas of background checks, give pre-service training for staff, and participate in a QRIS system. It will require agencies who administer the CCDF to collaborate more closely with other entities that serve young children, and make subsidy more easily accessed. This press release was on the Newsletter tab of the website, so I decided to thoroughly search through this area. While investigating I found another link to an article from the New York Times from April that talked about the fact that costs for child care have doubled since the mid 1980’s. This shows another example of inequity in affordability. There were several additional articles from the previous all addressing the cost of care. An insight I had after looking at the titles of over 70 articles listed on the news tab of this website is that the vast majority of articles chosen were of negative things that happened in child care settings. In fact, there were only three articles that I found that really celebrated successes in the field. I think in this time of pressure and uncertainty it would be nice for Child Care Aware to find some good things that are happening to children, families, and early childhood professionals and include those in their news section.  

http://www.naccrra.org/news-room/press-releases/2013/5/child-care-aware%C2%AE-of-america-praises-us-department-of-health-and-human-services

http://www.nytimes.com/2013/04/04/us/child-care-costs-are-up-census-finds.html?_r=2&

Early Childhood in Spain and Canada

The topic of discussion for this week’s blog is what is happening in early childhood in different countries around the world. I talked to both of my friends, in Spain and in Canada, and here is what they had to say. My friend Gail said that in Calgary, in recent years, they have kept their focus on learning through play. Literacy, math, and science activities done through fun playful learning experiences are still very important, as well as teaching acceptable social behaviors such as listening, respect, sharing, turn taking, etc. She explained that school readiness is important to all public school early childhood programs because they do have a literacy focus, but they still introduce things in a fun, playful environment where center choices are important. Estephanie, from Malaga, says it depends on the age of the child. From ages zero to three, the emphasis is to keep children in places that are safe and provide social interaction. She explained that social interaction is very important for Spaniards, and they want children to behave well and appropriately when in groups and family settings. There is not a lot of academic push during this time and parents are happy if children are in safe clean and caring environments. Once they turn three, the focus change to school readiness. Children are expected to be very independent by this time; no bottles, no diapers, and basic self- help skills are expected. She said that 4 year old children are expected to be engaged in learning and getting ready for school. A lot of elementary schools host preschool classes for three year old children and preschool for four year old children is part of the mandatory education system. 

I think this information is very interesting in lieu of what seems to be the focus here in the U.S. In other parts of the world early childhood policy and practice seems to be focused on school readiness, but there is a foundational system in place that has supported social-emotional development so that children are ready to learn when they get to formal schooling.