ECP 3001: A debrief (2007)

You know, professional experience should be handled in a very "professional" manner. Much more so at a tertiary level. You would expect universities be able to handle this, and assist students in negotiating the timing of the practs to succeed, not to fail. Am I not right?

Yet at this point of time, we as students do not have much information to go by. Yes, the staff has apologized to the students (if they felt marginalized by the delay in preparing us for the pract). The fact which has occured is yes, we do feel marginalized as a group. They cant throw us out as students to pract (and further more this is our first Primary school level pract) where everything else is different from childcare or Prep level.

Yes, it will be our first pract at primary school. How can we go for any more pract meetings if we have to go for pract during the school holidays? The meeting for "presenting your professional experience folder" is ir-relevant if we have already gone for pract, without attending the relevent pre-professional experience meetings.

Further more to add to the insult, we also have other assessment components which requires a compulsory attendance to pass all aspects of the course. This is very frustrating for us students who have to negotiate with the pract. mentor, who may or may not understand our situation. Which looking at the circumstances, at default, is already putting us students at a huge dis-advantage.

I am really dis-satisfied with the way the university has handled this aspect of our practical experience on their part. It has left a very bitter taste in my mouth.

Debriefing: Reflecting on my internship.

Tomorrow I will be starting my 3rd professional experience (ECP2001) and then after, the 4th professional experience (ECP2002) at this C&K centre with a 4-5 year old pre-school group.

The last couple of weeks since I had my post-ECP1002 interview, I was reflecting on some thoughts that my lecturer, Alice was telling me about. My lecturer noted to me that I have a pretty strong personality in which, on reflection, may not be suitable for certain contexts in which, should I engage at.

As it is too recently, a previous communication with my friend, Annie, reminded me about the strengths that I have, and on reflection on that communication with Annie, reminded myself that I should take ownership of it and expand upon it.

Recently, as stated in my past entries, I have just completed in total, an 18-day "internship"(as I would define it) in a private based long day childcare centre located in the midst of town. At the same time, I was in the midst of doing my research in community based C&K centre. To which, I had attended and stayed a few hours in the morning for a couple of weeks to collect my data research. When I was there, I observed some things that was I thought was pretty uncharacteristic.

Saying that, it must be noted that this is my 2nd experience at "another" early childhood centre, and one, where the context of the environment is in total contrast to that of the first. I was pretty surprised at the way things were run there, because I had the impression that centres were to be as "structured" as the first one I attended. In fact, apart from the documentation that took place, everything else was done in a totally different manner. One which I kept on reflecting on.

The things that I had observed was that:

• the children had the flexibilty to go in and out of the shed to take the outdoor play equipment as they wished to.
• the children could paint on the pavements and run anywhere on the outdoor grounds without being reprimanded.
• the children could stay indoors in they didn't feel like going out outdoors to play (provided there was a staff supervising indoors).
• the children did not have to pack away their manipulatives and "work" just because they were going for lunch. There was no emphasis on that.
• the children did not all have to sleep "at the same time". Only those who wanted to sleep will sleep. The rest could just work with the equipment or do their own work.
• the staff did not emphasize on following routines anally, but was flexible on following the children's interests and how their play went like.

The imposition of rules & regulations reminds me of something I read in my ECE2112 (Managing Young Children) readings about following the children's interest, instead of imposing rules and regulations on them. It says that staff who follow the children's leads and interest, end up having a better time at work, because they are not always stressing out and expending too much energy in "policing" children to follow the rules and regulations of the centre all the time.

Last week, one of my lecturers, Michelle, took my Literacies course group to visit two different centres. One of which is another C&K centre in another part of town, and the other, which was a pre-school and kindergarten group in a school based setting.

There was a total difference between both the C&K setting and the school based setting in context to the ones I visited. I brought it up with one of my lecturers, Gillian during discussion about my research project today.

The characteristics of that C&K centre was:

• The C&K had a really home based "feel" to it. It's like you get the feeling like you are entering someone's "home" instead of a school.
• There was no dress code in place for the children
• As it is, one of the notable things of the C&K setting is that, the learning experiences are "individualised" to the children's interest, more flexible
• Very elaborately decorated.
• Vey much less structured!

At the school setting, it was exactly that.

• There was a dress code in place.
• Less elaborately decorated.
• More structured "feel" to the environment.
• More of a "group" rather than "individualized" planning to it.

In reflection on it, after the students brought up the differences on both the centres to our lecturer, Michelle, she said that both her children were attending two different centres. One which had individualized programming, and the other which was the school based centre we attended. She said that both of the centres had its pros and cons, but it also depended as well on the children's personality too.

Michelle said that she opted to send her children to the two different centres, as she felt that her son could cope better in an individualized program class as his personality was suited to that kind of environment, whereas, her daughter benefitted and coped better in a more structured environment.

Of which, after reflecting on my thoughts on both the centres above, it helped me put in perspective my internship experience on the centres where I had done my internship. I should say that I should not "generalize" how centres are run, but individualize the way I respond to it according to how the centre's ethos and philosophy is run.

ECP1002: Day 2 in Toddler Room

It was raining this morning. I was feeling absolutely grumpy as I wanted to catch the bus at 6.50 am, but it didn’t arrive till 7.30 am, and I was caught at the bus stand in the midst of the rain. By the time I arrived at the centre, it was already 8.30 am.

I was annoyed not so much that I arrived at 8.30, but because I had a tutorial for one of the other courses that I had to attend on Thursdays at 5pm, and I thought I was going to have to skip it today.

I was mulling over it the entire morning, thinking of what to say to the mentor, if she could allow me to get off early so that I could catch the bus and get to the university in time. My attendance for this tutorial was also taken down, so it was important that I didn’t miss any of the tutorials.

Finally, one of the other university students told me that I could negotiate the hours with the mentor, and I could replace the hours should I had not done them. Which is what I finally did.

I told the mentor that I did not want her to think that I was slacking off, or that I did not want to help out in the classroom, if that was what she thought. The mentor was supportive enough that she allowed me to get off at the same time I did last week, and she discouraged me from skipping my tutorial. She was wondering why I had a tutorial on a Thursday, when the other students didn’t, and I told her that they were all Year 1 students, whereas I was not, and was taking a combination of differe nt intake courses as a result.

Anyway, the other thing was that, I felt that the spirits of the individuals in the classroom (children, classroom assistant) was rather low this morning. I also saw the classroom assistant crying (which I could immediately discern it to be a personal issue), and I tried to cheer up, so that I would not be feeling as low as she was. Having one staff feeling low is bad enough, without the need for two other adults to be feeling just as low as well.

I was praying hard this morning after coming into the classroom, as I really did not want my emotions and worries to affect my performance at the workplace, and that the entire atmosphere would lighten up. Which, fortunately it somehow did.

I know it’s not appropriate for a staff to bring personal issues to the workplace, but I would state that it is difficult for a human to always be able to divorce their emotional state from their work place state. Somehow, being at the workplace with all the children around helps me not to ponder so much on the issues I have at home, because I have to focus on the children instead and the r esponsibility I have towards them.

I really prepared very much for the first day of professional experience, but this week, I was not as emotionally prepared, although I had my paperwork typed out and printed to show to our university liaison, Megan , who had come in to examine all the university student’s work.

I know that, as I have been having issues trying to focus my studies in the past couple of wee ks, and my emotional state has not been at it most positive. Apart from the depression I was going through, I now have other emotional issues that I have to handle, and I am really trying my very best to overcome it.

The girl who cried last week when her nappy was changed (she only comes on Thursdays), did not cry this week. I remembered most of the names of the children, but there were quite a number of them whose names I did not remember.

The mentor was very supportive today, as she gave me some verbal guidance as I read to the children, and sang the transition song to them before their lunch time.

ECP1002: Day 1

24th August: Today was my first day at the Toddler 2 class. The ages of the children range from 2 to 2.5 / 3 years. I found it a bit disorientating, as even though the classroom had routines like the other age groups, nonetheless, there were slightly different group practices due to the children’s developmental stages.

Today was so far all right. The mentor did not write much in my classroom reflective journal, as she felt that it would be “presumptuous” to expect much as it was my first day in her room.

I am trying to understand the context of where my group leader, Ann, is coming from. I would say that I do look forward to working with an older group leader this time around, as Ann has had much experience working with older staff, parents and is a very the “senior” staff in the entire childcare centre, as well as in the Australian context.

This context would differ from mine, where, I come from a Malaysian city life, and context, and the kinds of services provided are very much different. In Malaysia, childcare centres are still a rarity, and there is not much demand for it, as compared to kindergartens (which services children from ages 4 - 6 years of age). This is due to the reason that many of the parents still send their children to their grandparents, or to nannies that they personally know.

Glasser states that the individual child has 4 basic needs, represented by 4 glass jars, in the following areas which are

• Love and Belonging;
• Freedom,
• Fun
• Power.

Children strive to meet these needs in order to be in a state of equilibrium, and would use different strategies in order to meet these needs on an unconscious level.

Today, there was a young girl who cried when her nappy was being changed. Somehow, I felt that this child was feeling insecure, and I went up to her and gave her a hug, and asked if she wanted to be read a book. Almost at once, she stopped crying and quietened down as I read to her. I feel that she was perhaps feeling insecure, and I had met her need, that is to feel safe and secure. I also had prior knowledge that she was still new to the environment, which is why I thought she might have still been feeling insecure in the group.

I believe that if we give positive attention, and meet the children’s needs in a positive manner, and are able to understand where they are coming from, as educators, we would be able to provide a learning environment where the child will look forward and safe to keep returning to again.