My Thoughts on Research

These past eight weeks have been stressful and time consuming. I did not realize how much time actually has to go into research until this course. With that being said I do not hold back in saying THANK GOODNESS this course is coming to an end. :) I work full time, have two small children and this class has been hard on me. My challenge has been time management. I tried to "wing" it  but research is much more demanding and takes a great deal of time.

In the course I did learn that there are many ways to conduct research. I often found myself going to the internet to read more on the topics discussed in class because I am not good at research and wanted a more clear understanding on the different types of research. There is a lot of preparing and organizing that go into research which in my opinion makes it that much  more time consuming. The one thing that I take away from this course is that research is not something that is taken lightly and thrown together. It is time consuming, requires a great deal of preparing, and proper time management.

I wish each of my classmates the very best as we strive to finish the task set before us.

International Research

For this blog assignment I chose to explore the Early Childhood
= \of Australia website. (www.earlychildhoodaustralia.org/au)  As I explored this website there were many research topics available-some of the ones that stood out to me the most were learning through play, diversity, childhood obesity and childhood health and bullying  to name a few. As I read the articles on childhood obesity/health and bullying, my eyes were opened up on these issues. It seems that of here lately these two topics have been hot topics for early childhood professionals. I defiantly enjoyed the site and will be revisiting it soon.

I found an article on the Importance of Play. Play allows children to express themselves and make learning their own. Learning doesn't just have to be through a strict rigid schedule or curriculmn but learning takes place through hands on learning and play. The article that I found was titled The Vital Rold of Play in Early Childhood Education. It stated " Adults are convinced that we need to “teach” young children. It is certainly true that we need to set an example in all kinds of activities. We also need to create appropriate spaces where children can play and learn, and we need to lend a helping hand--at times intervene when things are going wrong. But mostly we need to honor the innate capacity for learning that moves and fulfills the needs of healthy children." (Alamon).


I found this article to be interesting because many times we just think of play as a form of entertainment for children when in reality it is more than just fun. Children are learning during the times of play. It is during these times that children tend to learn the most because it is free play that allows them to be creative, free, and enjoy what they are doing without the pressures of a strict curriculum.

http://www.waldorfresearchinstitute.org/pdf/BAPlayAlmon.pdf

Research topic

The topic that I have chosen for the research is lowering childhood obesity by increasing physical activities in the school system. There are a lot of articles on childhood obesity and the need for more physical activity. I have always been interested in this topic, since my cousin dealt with obesity on as a young child.


The American Heart Association recommends:

• All children age 2 and older should participate in at least 60 minutes of enjoyable, moderate-intensity physical activities every day that are developmentally appropriate and varied.
• If your child or children don't have a full 60-minute activity break each day, try to provide at least two 30-minute periods or four 15-minute periods in which they can engage in vigorous activities appropriate to their age, gender and stage of physical and emotional development

The National Coalition fo Promoting Physical Activity stated that nearly 63 percent for children are not participating in physical activities by the time they reach high school. This is a high percentage of students that could face childhood obesity among other health issues.

As I start working on my research project, I am open to any suggestions, ideas or words of advice concerning my topic.


Resources: http://www.heart.org

Http://www.ncppa.org

Final blog

I have enjoyed this class and learning from my classmates. I have found many resources that will be helpful for me once I am in my own classroom. The consequences that I have seen during this course have been rather positive ones. The first one that I see is that governments internationally are involved with in the education process. Everyone values education and has much of the same goals for the children. Governments around the world are making sure that children receive the education that they need and deserve. The second consequence that I notice is that families want their children to have success and have a better future than they have had. I also realized that families turn to Early Childhood programs so that their children can receive an "early" start on education and gain a better start than what the parent may have had.

UNESCO website

Unfortunately, I did not receive a response from my international contacts so I reviewed the UNESCO website to learn a little more about early childhood in the international realms. 

The first insight that I gained from the website is that education in most countries is considered a privilege that the rich children take part in. The children in poor families must stay home from school in order to help work the fields, or do other jobs that contribute to the basic needs of the family.

The second insight that I gained from the website is that  on literacy. It seems that I take things of this sort for granted many times but the other countries have no idea what literacy is. The numbers are shocking to me. The website said that 1 in 5 adults are not literate and 2/3 of them are women. UNESCO has tried to keep literacy at the top of their list when it comes to important topics but with 793 adults still not literate, reaching to goal of all becoming literate is a hard target to reach.

The third insight that I gained from the sight is that the governments have issues with dealing with early childhood. Education is placed in different sectors such as health and social sectors. Effective coordination must exist between the two but in many cases does not exist. The issues seen with developing and developed countries is finding a holistic approach to early childhood education.

Source -

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

Exploring Resources

While I was researching the NAEYC website, I found a link to the National Coalition for Parent Involvement in Education. (http://www.ncpie.org).  The NAEYC has a wealth of resources however, this site caught my interest since it is on parent involvement.

The mission of the NCPIE is to foster relationships between home, school, and community to enhance the education of all young people. Parents and teachers need to have an open line of communication at all times. Teachers can encourage parents to get involved in different activities through the school, get involved in projects sent home with the child, Teachers can also suggest ideas that co-inside with the lesson of the day so that the students and family can interact and learn together. Parents are their child's advocate, so it is important that they get involved in their child's education and understand what is expected of their child.

I have not yet recieved a newsletter from NAEYC but I plan to research and read more about it so that I can have resources at hand. I am new to the early childhood field, so I soak up all resources that I can.


The insights that I gained from the NCPIE website was that parents are important roles in a child's education. I also realized once again that many times parents are not sure as to what to do when it comes to getting involved. The website offered many ideas that made it easy for parents to get hands on with their child's learning. The resources provide a wealth of information to parents, caregivers, and even to educators to help provide the best learning  environment for the children.