Some family involvement projects we have going on in my classroom are star of the week, book bag and a weekly alphabet activity. So far we have had great response with it from our parents. I have found that these types of family involvement really get the whole family involved. It’s very beneficial for parents, like Jan, who don’t have the opportunity to step into the classroom. This way they can still be in the know of what is happening in school and feel included. We just had a boy who did his star of the week poster and when he presented it to the class, his mom sat in and watch and she told us how she made it a whole family project, where the dad printed pictures, his sister cut things out, the boy colored the poster and the mom organized the whole pictures. We have had a lot of success with these family involvement projects.

I really enjoyed reading the Exchange everyday article which questions if schools kill creativity? In the article Ken Robinson states, “The problem is to remain an artist as we grow up. I believe this passionately: that we don't grow into creativity, we grow out of it. Or rather, we get educated out if it.” I agree with him that schools do educate the creativity out of us. I think there is a possibility that it starts as early as preschool. We also think we are letting children grow and nourish at our programs but at the same time, we are getting children “school ready.” I think most times it’s an unconscious thing we are doing by telling children, that’s not the right way of doing things. For example, some art projects I see children doing, where if they don’t do it the right way it doesn’t turn out, in other words, craft projects and not open ended activities. Parents like to see finished completed projects and teachers feel pressured to produce it for the parents. I am constantly reminding myself when having conversations with children to keep an open mind about everything. I, myself, am already ridged in my way of life and theories on how things work that when a child has what seems like a total random idea, I just need to tell myself to and roll with it.

When reading the chapters and articles about environment in the classroom, I always get inspired on changing my classroom. My goal for my center is to add more organic and natural things to the setting. I strongly feel that children can learn the most from the world around them. I want my classroom to fell more homey and less like a classroom, by using natural light, reducing the use of plastic and making materials found in our environment. It’s so tempting to just buy the educational toys especially after seeing the Lakeshore, Discovery toys, and Kaplan booths at the conference. Yet I try to see what those materials are teaching the children and see how we can make it ourselves to make it even more meaningful – and a lot cheaper.

This week’s chapter discusses the important roles families play in a center. As a teacher and administrative point of view, I believe our school is lucky that we don’t provide transportation because we can build a relationship with the children and their families. Someone will always have to pick up and drop off that child, so during those times we can communicate and build relationships with the families. Families are one of the biggest parts of a center especially since the success of a school depends heavily on the partnership with families. If families don’t feel valued, they won’t stay at that center long. It’s funny how this chapter has coincided with our family conferences and we just handed out our family surveys. We provide a lot of various activities and opportunities for family involvement in our center. We have become creative with ways to get family interaction because all families are different. The biggest problem we have faced was actually getting families into the classroom. It was hard especially since most of our families work in town and when it’s time to pick up their child, they don’t want to spend more time then they have to, which is understandable since most times they just battled traffic and they just want to be home already. Some creative ways we have explored family involvement is by having families take home projects to work with their child and have the child share it the next day at school. This has also worked out because it eases the transition between home and school, and families will know what activities they are learning at school.

The book had a paragraph about teachers that are not prepared to work with families. I can relate to this when I was a first year teacher. It wasn’t as if I wasn’t prepared, I just didn’t feel comfortable. All through college, I learned the importance of families to a program and how important communication is, but I remember always being nervous. I think in the back of my mind, I didn’t want to upset the family or have families think I was telling them what to do, or how to raise their child. The more I forced myself to talk to families, the more familiar I got with the situation and how most families like to hear feedback about their child from the teachers. Now my goal as a director is to have a great relationship with each family. I know it starts with saying hello to everyone that walks in our gate. The previous director and my mentor told me that families come first and you are never too busy to say hi or bye to each person. I have noticed how appreciated people felt with the simple gesture.

The online article talks about grandparents raising grandchildren. This is happening more and more often. It is a tough situation for the grandparents and a constant struggle. It makes some good points on how tough it is for a grandparent especially those who are in what they mentioned “sandwich generation” in which they are taking care of an older generation and younger generation. When talking to grandparents I know one concern that they have about the change. Raising a child is always changing from new technology to education and knowledge. One grandparent had shared their concern that they just can’t keep up with it and how different it is to raise a child now than when she was raising her own child. I do like the suggestions that they provide in the article about sharing information with Grandparents. I think the most important thing is to make sure that the grandparents feel supported!

To answer some of the questions brought up last week, I think the biggest factor that preschools are in competition over are families. We need families because basically that’s our schools revenue. I don’t think that collaboration would hurt our business because I believe every preschool is different and there are many components to each preschool that sets it apart from the next school. Families have a checklist when it comes to sending their child to school, they could be looking for religion, location, prices and curriculum. If the schools in the community collaborate it won’t matter much because families are going to go where they want to go.

Chapter 9 discusses program curriculum. It details all the different types of curriculum and how important class size and ratio are to a program. When touring our school, a lot of families ask what are the ratios in each of the classrooms. Ratios are important but I also believe class size is equally if not more important. If you think about it if there ratio is 1:8 for 3 year olds but you have 4 staff members and 32 3 year olds that classroom, no matter the size, would be hectic. What we like to do at our center is split up the classes. We are blessed to have a covered lanai and materials that we can use outside on that lanai so we can have half of the class inside the classroom and the other half outside of the classroom. This way each staff will have the max 10 children in the class or on the lanai (for the 4 year old room). I have enjoyed the small group size and I feel that I can focus my attention on each student in my class.

The book also talked about culture as part of the curriculum. “Besides developing program philosophy influenced by the culture of the local community, all children need multicultural/anti bias education” (Decker et al., 2005). It is important to have culture represented throughout the curriculum and I know NAEYC pushes this point a lot! My center is having a hard time with this. We have been reflecting on it especially after we went to some great cultural workshops at the HAEYC conference. I think the issue we are running into is that mostly everyone on our staff is local and have been raised here. It is amazing that Hawaii has become so diverse with many different cultures but at the same time we aren’t fully knowledgeable in any particular culture. For example, I am Filipino and Lithuanian but I don’t know anything about the Philippines, I don’t even know what dialect my family spoke. I’m fluent in the local culture, which is just bits and pieces of other cultures, but it’s so integrated that I don’t know where one cultures ends and the other begins.

Our additional reading discussed the Te Whāriki, which is the first bicultural curriculum developed in New Zealand. It contains curriculum specifically for Māori immersion services in early childhood education and establishes, throughout the document as a whole, the bicultural nature of curriculum for all early childhood services (website). This reminded me of the Hawaiian emergent preschools we have here. I think it’s a great idea and I truly believe that it’s everyone’s responsibility to preserve the Hawaiian language and culture. The dichotomy in these programs is finding teachers who are knowledgeable in ECE and teachers who are knowledgeable in the culture. Many times the program will take the teacher who is knowledgeable in the culture because that is harder to find, but they aren’t aware of developmentally appropriate practices. How can we find a happy medium?

I do believe that staff hiring and turnover rate is affected by personal experiences. It is especially prevalent when working in a small center. I have noticed just working in a small school setting that if a staff member doesn’t gel with the rest of the staff, it won’t work out. The same goes with hiring, I find myself contemplating on three major points when hiring a new staff member; education background, classroom management, and personality style. What really makes a team is having everyone on the same page and everyone just clicking. For hiring and the longevity of a staff member it does come down to personality and we tend to make decisions based on personal experiences. It’s hard to break and get away from previous mindsets but I am constantly trying to remind myself in order for us to grow we have to step away from our comfort zone.

This week we are talking about advocacy and as I think about advocacy in ECE, we don’t have a strong voice. I wonder why our voice isn’t as strong especially in the political arena because many politicians have had a child and know how important ECE is on a child. Is it because we don’t have a union? I know that unions play a big role in standing up for the workers. Can preschool teachers’ have a union especially if we are all hired by different companies? Sumison’s suggest becoming closer alliance with “think tank” institutions to enable us to work jointly towards a unifying vision of the common good (Sumison, 2006). The only thing I wonder is that ECE program, as a whole isn’t united in itself. I don’t believe we have a teamed together to even have a presence against the other institutions. First and foremost, we need to come together as a group. I feel that we want what’s best for our programs but we are all individuals. For example, I work in Wahiawa and I don’t even know what the other preschools in Wahiawa looks like or even know the other directors. How can we become activities and our voices heard if we aren’t a team? I would love to team up with the other preschools and work with them just even as a community. I do understand that preschools are a business and we essentially are all competitors with each other. I think that is our problem. Majority of ECE programs are competing with each other and bottom line, it’s business. How can we be teaming up together when we are competing with each other?

I feel the biggest way I am contributing to the profession is by helping others find a place in the profession. Our book states that this is a form of advocacy because it gives me an opportunity to support incomers as they prepare for a career in ECE (Decker, 2005). Being a director, I have come across a lot of different people and some who have questioned if this is the career for them. I find myself sharing my experiences and knowledge about the situation. I have also become more knowledgeable about resources available. I look forward to becoming a mentor toward students and new teachers. I have such a strong passion for mentors because I have been blessed with amazing mentors. Since my years in college and having an amazing lead teacher during student teaching to my previous director at Rainbow School, these people have really made all my ECE experiences positive.