When I think of Research...

Some of the insights that I have gained from taking this course is that research can be quantitative, qualitative, or both.  Quantitative deals more with facts and data whereas qualitative is based more on proving a point, and mixed method research deals with both (Mac Naughton, Rolfe, & Siraj-Blatchford, 2010).  I really enjoyed learning about the nature of research.  Before learning how to truly read a research article, I would waste precious time searching for information in an article by reading information that I did not understand.  Now I know how to read an article appropriately to locate the information that I need.

Planning, designing, and conducting research in the early childhood field takes a lot of work.  It is important to interview the right people and to remain ethical which can easily become a problem in this field because it is difficult to interview children therefore deception in research in a common thing (Mac Naughton et al., 2010).

Some of the challenges that I encountered during my research was understanding certain methodologies, trying to break down my research topic, and forming a proper hypothesis.  I took the advice of Dr. Dartt each week and began to understand the research process better.  As a result of this course, my perceptions of an early childhood professional have remained the same.  I have always admired and appreciated anyone who takes care of other people's children all day.

                                                                     Reference

Mac Naughton, G., Rolfe, S. A., & Siraj-Blatchford, I. (2010). Doing early childhood research: 

     International perspectives on theory & practice (2nd ed.). New York, NY: McGraw-Hill.

Adjournment Stage of Team Development

The adjournment stage of team development is always a sad one in my opinion.  Of all the groups that I have been a part of, even the ones that were not so great, a bond and mutual respect is always formed.  The hardest group for me to leave was my group from Phoenix University.  After a while, I had a set group of five and we traveled throughout our undergrad journey together.  We were truly like a family although we had never met face to face because everything was online.  Occasionally, we would call or text if we had a question, but that was the extent of it.  We all said our final goodbyes and good lucks with a sadness, yet happiness because we had reached our goal of completion.  This was a high-performing group which made it all the more difficult to leave, but in my experience; the low performing groups were also a little hard to leave because there was still a bond that was formed with some of the group members.

We are a military family and transfer every 18 months or so. We usually have a ritual of gathering together and cooking out and we have a "hale and farewell" party.  Those are always sad, even if it is a location that we are ready to leave (such as this one...July 30th, but whose counting)!  I wish there was a way that my group from Phoenix could have made plans to meet somewhere that was central to each of our locations and meet face to face and celebrate our victory.

 In my master's degree program, it will be difficult for me to think of the adjournment process because I've recently began doubling up on courses because I want to be finished before my next transfer in about five months, therefore, my classmates are beginning to change and I'm the "new girl" now.  However, adjourning is an essential stage in teamwork because it allows you to move on and to capture the best moments of the group as well as evaluate what went wrong if the experience was bad (Abudi, 2010).  Everyone has to move on in order to grow.  Change is one of those necessary parts of life.

Recent Conflicts

This topic was more difficult than I thought it would be because I have not worked since the year of 2009.  My family and I transferred (military) to Hawaii while I was pregnant.  I decided to take advantage of those times and I earned my BS in Psychology; got pregnant again and decided that I wanted my masters in ECE.  Therefore, I will discuss a conflict that I had with my last employer in Virginia.  I used to be a massage therapist and was very good at my job.  However, this became a blessing and a curse.  I was in high demand and had a greedy employer.  I discussed that my absolute maximum could be six hours of massage because it is very taxing on the body especially if I have a couple of extremely obese clients.  After a while, she completely ignored me and worked me to death.  On top of that she would always print my paycheck wrong.  For three straight weeks I went to her and explained that she miscalculated my hours and my paycheck was short by about $250-300.  She would say something to the effect of, "I'm so sorry, would you like me to write a personal check or could you wait until I speak with my accountant?"  Of course, I would say, I can wait!  She followed through, but after working so hard, you can understand my frustration with expecting a huge paycheck because of all the hours she made me work.

A couple of conflict management strategies that would have been more effective would have been:
     to use the win win approach which simply states that I want to win and I want you to win too (Conflict Resolution Network, n. d.).  I could have approached her by explaining how grateful I am for the work and that I have so many loyal clients, but in order for us both to win, could you not schedule so many on one day because I am beginning to have back problems.
     also by actively listening to her regarding my paychecks I would have seen the clear picture through her body language which would have told me that she was in trouble financially.

A couple of months after these incidents (there were other employees who experienced the same problem), she informed us that she was going out of business because the were raising the rent prices too high on her building and she could no longer afford to run the business.  I found another job shortly thereafter at a higher end spa and was grateful for the learning experience because she took a chance on someone that was fresh out of massage school.

Reference:
Conflict Resolution Network. (n. d.). CR kit. Retrieved from: http://www.cmhg.org/pages.php?

Research Around the World

I chose Early Childhood Australia (ECA) because their website is very similar to the NAEYC in which I am a member and love what the organization stands for.  Some of the ECA's topics are school readiness and children's transitions and belonging, being, and becoming.  This two topics stood out to me because I have read about these topics in the Young Children's Magazine (YC) which is a journal that I receive through the NAEYC.  This shows me that people in other countries have the same concerns as we do about the children.

I did appreciate how becoming a member of the ECA teaches them how to be a voice for young children, and keeps them abreast of the latest early childhood news and happenings.  It is also a great source for networking with other professionals in the field which is important.  The site also provides several articles and resources that are readily available.  I thoroughly enjoyed going through this webpage and I feel that the organization is phenomenal and reaches out to everyone, not just early childhood professionals.  Some of journals are for grandparents and parents as well.

Reference:

Early Childhood Australia (n. d.). Retrieved from: http://www.earlychildhoodaustralia.org.au/

Communication Evaluation

The communication assignment this week was quite interesting.  All of the scores from myself, husband, and two girlfriends were within four to five points of one another.  However, the consistencies were not the results that I expected!  My verbal aggressiveness scale scored me very high and significant in that with little provocation, I could attack a person verbally which can be hurtful to those listening to me and the test revealed that I often resort to character attacks and ridicule those who do not share my viewpoints.  The shocking part of these results were that they came from everyone who took the test including myself.  I have always thought of myself as quiet and respectful of others.  Yes, I can become defensive when I am attacked, but that is rare.  This week I have learned to not be so defensive without listening effectively and I have learned that I have a severe case of communication anxiety.  I realize that I need to work on myself more (self-concept) to overcome this fear.  I want to do many things in life that will more than likely lead me to speaking in public a lot; therefore, I have to work on building my confidence so that I can be an effective communicator.

Research that Benefits Children and Families--Uplifting Stories

I chose to share a positive example of research regarding the children of military families.  Many people feel bad for children who experience being away from a parent for long periods of time because of deployments to Afghanistan, other middle eastern countries, and going out to sea.  This particular article highlighted the positives of children who have to endure parents who return from war with PTSD, injuries, and simply trying to adjust back to family life after being away from them for nearly a year.  The children are actually very well-rounded because they have support groups surrounding them.  The military is really good at having monthly family readiness group (FRG) meetings that informs the family of what is going on with their loved ones.  They also become involved in projects such as sending out shoe boxes of necessities for the military personnel, designing posters and anything that also helps to keep up the moral of the Sailors and so forth.  There still needs to be more research articles to help enforce more policies and programs that aid in the positive development of the children, but this article is a great start (Cozza & Lerner, 2013).  This was a great article because as a prior military member who went on deployments away from my ex-husband and now on the opposite end of the spectrum as a military spouse with three children, I can relate.  It is difficult to adjust to family life after being away on deployments for so long although you're very happy to be back home, the military lifestyle is totally different.  As a spouse, I can relate to my husband because I have been there.  The children are happy when their father returns home, but they do suffer a bit while he is away.  This also makes them stronger and become "the men of the house" while their father is away.  I have to adjust also because when my husband is away on deployment, I go into schedule mode because I am doing everything alone.  When my husband returns, he is the fun guy and kind of throws thing of balance, but I really don't care because I am so happy that he's back and in his right mind.

Reference:
Cozza, S. J., & Lerner, R. M. (2012, Fall). Military Children and Families (23)2. Retrieved from: http://futureofchildren.org/publications/journals/article/index.xml?journalid=80&articleid=587

Communication Skills

Do I find myself communicating differently with people from different groups and cultures?
If yes, in what ways do I communicate differently?

I would say that overall I communicate the same regardless of whom I am speaking.  I feel that I am approachable and have a down-to-earth personality.  My philosophy is to always be myself and be respectful of others and you can pretty much draw anyone in.  However, depending on who I am speaking to and in what context it may be in, I communicate differently.  For example, when I was in the military, I spoke more professionally with my commanding officer or any senior officer than I did with my colleagues.  When I am speaking to my close friends, I am a little more relaxed in my speech and more comfortable.  I always enunciate and use the correct grammar with my children because they follow our example.  If I am speaking with a stranger or someone of a different race I also enunciate and speak very clearly, while being myself.  My first tour in the military was in Italy.  I noticed that I would always sound like an Italian when I would speak to them or if I'm talking to someone from China or Mexico, I tend to pick up that dialect.  I don't know why I do it, but I know that it has to be annoying to them.

I think I'm an effective communicator because I tend to adapt my style of communication according to how I feel the other person wishes to be treated also known as the Platinum Rule (Beebe et al, 2011).  I base this on observing their body language and their comfort level.  I also listen for things that I may have in common with someone and go from there.

Beebe, S. A., Beebe, S. J., & Redmond, M. V. (2011). Interpersonal communication: Relating to others (6th ed.). Boston, MA: Allyn & Bacon.

Communications Assignment- The Brady Bunch

I chose to observe the Brandy Bunch which is a show that I've only watched a few times throughout my lifetime.  I was pretty proud of myself because my nonverbal observation of the show was pretty close to the verbal or non-muted version.

Muted version
When I watched the muted version, which was a very weird experience, but interesting....my attention was captured immediately and I remained glued to the television because I was afraid that I would miss something significant.  The show began with what I presumed to be two sisters in the mirror.  One of them had a fancy hairdo and was modeling, so I assumed  that she was preparing for a date.  The younger sister was mimicking her actions.  Then she walked into another room where he oldest sister was on the phone speaking with what I assumed was a boy about a date.  The younger sister appeared to be taking mental notes on the conversation.  The plot of this show appeared to be a younger sister wanting to be like her two older sisters.  One of the brothers overheard the conversation and appeared to take on the role of a secret admirer by sending his sister random gifts.

Non-muted version
I was right in my presumptions for the most part.  At the beginning of the show the two sisters, Jan and Cindy were in the mirror.  Jan the older sister was modeling her hairdo and asking Cindy if she looked dreamy.  Cindy tried to mimic her and Jan said, "you're just a baby."  When she went to her oldest sister Marsha's room, she was on the phone with a boy.  The boy was asking if he could buy her a soda on the following day.  Cindy mentioned that she wanted boys to buy her a soda sometimes because she gets thirsty too.  Cindy said, "you're just a baby" and your time will come soon enough.  All of this "baby" talk made Cindy upset.  Her youngest brother decided to become her secret admirer and began sending her gifts which I was correct about in my non verbal observation of the show.  He was caught in his actions while trying to hide the next gift.  However, in the end, he bribed this young boy at his school with .50 to come over and pretend to be Cindy's secret admirer.  They ended up being great play dates and the boy (Tommy) gave the youngest brother his .50 back and told him that he did not need money to play with Cindy because she was great.

I feel that I have always been a good observer because I was such a quiet child.  Therefore, even if this were a show that I was familiar with, I think my observational experience would have been similar in nature.

My Personal Research Journey

The topic that I have chosen to research is the achievement gap and possible ways to remedy this problem in the preschool years.  My subtopic for this week was attempting to figure out why there is such a huge achievement gap between the races.  I almost gave up on this topic because I now realize how broad of a topic it is.  One subtopic led to another and kept going on and on!  This topic has become so interesting to me and once I began to research my topic of interest, I find another one that I'm interested in......I have about twenty subtopics that I will have to narrow down by the time I reach my final paper.
This is also the first time that I have conducted research from the school library which was a process in and of itself.  If you were researching this topic, what would you as an educator, director, or future educator want to know?

Competent Communicator in my Life

I have chosen a previous pastor where I used to attend church in Jacksonville, FL.  My husband and I were there for only three years because of military obligations.  He was a competent communicator within the context of his church.  As a younger person at that time, attending that church changed my life.  His messages resonated with me throughout the week (not just on Sundays) and made me want to be a better person.  Whenever I was faced with difficult situations with people at work or while I was out and about, I would speak to them with respect even when "going off" on them would have been warranted.  I have become an honest person, good wife and mother, and someone with great character who genuinely cares about well being of everyone around me.  Of course I still have things to work through, but he is one of the people who definitely helped to shape me into the person I am today.
I would say that he is an effective communicator because his messages stay with you longer than one day.  When a person has the ability to really make you look into yourself and become constantly aware of your behaviors, I would say they are effective.  I would love to model some of my communication behaviors after him because that would make me an effective early childhood educator.  If I can have a positive impact on at least half of the children that comes into my path, I will be a happy person.