HD 412 Working with Children 1

Running Head: HD 412 Working with Children

HD 412 Working with Children and Families in a Diverse World Reflection

Nancy Muiz
Pacific Oaks College

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HD 412 Working with Children and Families in a Diverse World Reflection
This class made a huge impact on how I teach children in my classroom. In this
class I got to know a little more about myself through my persona doll paper. It taught me
culture, traditions, and social identity development.
Working with children and families in a diverse world helped me accomplish my
goals through what I learned. Professor Wilson brought different items from Lakeshore
that represented diversity. She then asked the class Do any of these items represent
you? I looked at the items and it was a picture of a Mexican mom carrying her baby on
her back. I know for a fact that this item did not represent me. She then explained how
Lakeshore cannot fully represent the diversity of our classrooms.
The best way to provide diversity to your classroom is by displaying childrens
pictures or family picture from your classroom community itself. An example of this in
my classroom is that I provide a tree out of construction paper for the child and parents to
put together at home. These family trees will be more meaningful than just posters from
Lakeshore. Children will be able to connect to each others family trees and the pictures
in their family. This activity also promotes children to engage in conversation amongst
the children and families, and they can share different experiences that they have gone
through.
A new technique that I have acquired through this class would be creating my
persona doll and writing my paper that went along with it. In this activity I was able to
create my own doll out of anything I wanted so it resembles me. I have implemented this
activity with the children in my classroom. When the children brought back their persona
doll they shared a little about their story. Through this activity I felt that I was able to

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learn a little more about myself, and where I come from. The best part was getting to
share my culture, and traditions, and my social identity through my persona doll.
The contribution that made in this class was my ability to look outside of the box
and being accepting of all races. As educators our schools need to reflectdiversity but it
does not mean that we display posters from Lakeshore. Diversity should be displayed in
all the different areas from the classroom for example in the books, dolls, block people,
counters and so on. I love the way that my classmates were engaged and shared different
ideas about what they do in their classrooms. Stella for example, shared that in her class
they do not have Thanksgiving dinner. Instead they have a multicultural potluck. This is a
great way to get parents and children involved in diversity activities.
A new concept that will continue to stimulate my thinking would be dismantling
the tourist approach. I believe that schools need to celebrate each childs culture as they
celebrate the American holidays. This way we will get parents to contribute and share
their culture with the class. This will teach the other children about other cultures and
build on the diversity of their classmates. This is my project for my classroom right now
at work.
During this reflection I learned that I actually was right about the Lakeshore
posters. There is no way that a child will connect to and identify themselves with stock
images like people in these posters. The best way to reflect diversity of your community
is by taking pictures of the very children in your classroom. This is an idea that cannot go
wrong.
This was a great class that taught me about culture, tradition, and social identity.
As an educator I always think about what materials I have in my room and ask myself

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Can a child identify themselves with the items in the classroom? We as educators need
to continually ask ourselves these questions.