Final Blog Assignment

The blog assignments in this course helped me gain new information about the international early childhood field.  The discussions with my colleagues (in Saudi Arabia and Jordan) allowed me to reflect on ways to advocate or volunteer in the early childhood field.  Another consequence of learning about the international early childhood field was realizing that issues were present globally; education in the early childhood field is still growing and many countries are still working hard to provide a better quality education to children.  The third consequence of learning about the international early childhood field was learning more about the situation in public schools.  Because I have always worked in private schools, I was not really aware of the situation of children living in poverty.

These blog assignments have inspired me to keep interacting with other international early childhood educators in order to exchange ideas and therefore try to provide a better education to all our children. 

Getting to Know Your International Contacts—Part 3

 Saudi Arabia, most early childhood professionals are not qualified; they mostly have bachelor degrees but not in the early childhood field.   This is due to the culture; most women prefer to work in the morning and get home early; that is why most women find themselves working in schools.  Fortunately, many schools offer workshops and trainings for new teachers; actually in the school I work in, we are implementing the common core standards curriculum, and so we are doing a lot of training.  

My colleague shared her professional goals, which are learning new skills and offering a high-quality education to her students.  We work together in a private school so she explained that her professional hopes were that all children, even in public schools, would have access to high-quality education.  Actually, Saudi Arabia is not her native country so her dream was to go back home some day and offer a quality education to children.  

Sharing Web Resources

The website of the early childhood organization I chose is Zerotothree.org.  There are links on the website leading to an online bookstore; other links lead to the Early Head Start website and the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services.

            The area I chose to research is the behavior and development tab; in this section, there are several tips and tools for addressing behavior problems, mental health, play and sleep. 

            The last newsletter I received was about home violence; it promoted a handbook that provides advice for dealing with children with mental and behavioral problems due to violence. 

            On the Zero To Three website, a search tab is available to get articles about equity and excellence in early care and education.  There is also a Public Policy tab where you can find articles about state and community policy.   

            The Zero To Three website helped me learn about ways to treat children with behavioral problems cause by trauma or maltreatment.  I have also read many articles about promoting school readiness for preschoolers. 

References

Zero To Three; National Center for Infants, Toddlers, and Families. Retrieved from www.zerotothree.org.

Getting to Know Your International Contacts—Part 2

According to my colleague in Jordan, early childhood education started developing during the last ten years.  Private schools offer a better quality education; however, public schools are still struggling to provide a quality preschool education.   This is due to poverty and poor teacher education.  Queen Rania has implemented several non-profit organizations to improve the quality of education in Jordan, such as the Jordan Education Initiative and the Madrasati initiative.  These are long-term projects that are starting to make a difference in early childhood education in Jordan.

            Here in Saudi Arabia, the situation is similar; actually, private preschools offer high quality programs and some of them even implement the Common Core Standards.  However, public schools do not offer quality early childhood programs because they are not considered as an important level in education.  Moreover, very few teachers are qualified to teach young children and very few children attend preschools.  This widens the gap between rich and poor families.