CLIPS Word Template - TAFE NSW · Web viewActivity 1 Gender stereotypes Let’s have a look at what Derman-Sparks (1989) came up with: Language affects our perceptions of the world

CHCIC511A: Implement and promote inclusive policies and practices

Demonstrate inclusive practices

Contents

Ensure language used does not convey bias

Gender stereotypes

Discuss potential negative impacts of comments that are unfair or biased

Ensure own interactions respond to all children in the service

The early childhood educator’s position

Ensuring your own interactions respond to all children in the service

Explore options for children to participate in their community

The community

The family

The children

Where appropriate, if children appear to have experienced exclusion, sensitively seek to obtain information about the nature of those experiences

Provide positive experiences to support children who may have experienced exclusion

Supporting children with differing abilities

2 Diploma of Children’s Services: CHCIC511A: Reader LO 9365 © NSW DET 2010

Ensure language used does not convey bias

Activity 1

Gender stereotypesLet’s have a look at what Derman-Sparks (1989) came up with: Language affects our perceptions of the world. So, now let's have a look at stereotypes identified by Derman-Sparks (1989).

How do we portray girls?As passive, frightened, weak, gentle, giving up easily, unoriginal, silly, illogical, shrewish, nagging, confused, neat, short, inept, dependent, follower, conformer, controlling anger, emotional, playing or working indoors, concerned about appearance, as a parent nurturing children and having an innate need for marriage and children.

How do we portray boys?As active, brave, strong, rough, competitive, inventive, intelligent, logical, quiet, easygoing, decisive, problem-solving, messy, tall, mechanical, independent, leader, innovative, expressing anger, unemotional, playing or working outdoors, unconcerned about appearance, as a parent playing with children and having an innate need for adventure.

I don’t know about you—but words from both those groups suit me!

Did you notice that many of the words used for females have negative connotations (they are ‘loaded’) and are intended as a ‘put-down’.

So, as early childhood educators what are responsibilities in the use of language? Our responsibility is to ensure we use language to promote all people and treat people fairly and with respect.

Diploma of Children’s Services: CHCIC511A: Reader LO 9365 3© NSW DET 2010

You may be familiar with the concept ‘self-fulfilling prophesy’. If someone says something about you often enough, you are going to believe it as being ‘true’. For example, suppose Nina’s parents are always saying, ‘Oh Nina you are clumsy!’. This statement will have the effect of bringing about what it claims. Nina (and other people) will believe that it is ‘true’. Nina may even become more ‘clumsy’.

Beginning with yourself...‘Since language affects people’s perceptions of the world, it is important to listen carefully to what you are saying and to notice what messages you are sending to the children you teach and the parents with whom you work’. (Source: Hilgartner Schlank and Metzger 1997)

Often our word choices reflect an unconscious assumption about gender, culture or ability.

Activity 2

Guidelines on the use of inclusive language for genderPerhaps, one of the best ways to start watching your language is to consciously listen to yourself or ask a trusted colleague to monitor your language. We all use biased language, often just out of habit!

Here are a few ideas:

• Refer to people by name, not gender. It is important we speak about people in terms of their own individual characteristics. Referring to people by name (or description) rather than gender is a great place to start. For example, rather than saying, ‘See the little boy over there? He needs medicine at 2 pm’, you could say, ‘Tommy who is in the home corner at the moment needs medicine at 2pm’.

• Review the songs you commonly sing with children. Is there an overuse of masculine pronouns (he, him, his etc)? If yes, swap the pronouns to reflect both genders. For example, when you sing ‘Baa baa black sheep’ substitute the ‘yes sir’ for ‘yes ma’am’ or alternate the ‘little boy who lives down the lane’ to a ‘little girl who lives down the lane’.

• Encourage the children to understand that males and females have various professions. Invite the local police to visit, the local fire brigade or a nurse. Try to have a representation of both genders.

• When you greet children in the morning, be aware of your greeting. For example, you may say, ‘Good morning Diane, I’m glad to see you have your running shoes on today. I’ve set up the obstacle course!’ rather than ‘Good morning Diane, you’ve got your pink flower shoes on today’.


Should being a fire-fighter be gender-defined?

In time, you will quickly modify your language and then you can start actively influencing others! Modelling is an effective strategy for both children and your colleagues. Be aware as of what you write in the daily diary, posters, noticeboards and newsletters.

Activity 3


Discuss potential negative impacts of comments that are unfair or biased

Below are examples of prejudice.

• Marc, a five-year-old boy, wants to play with a fire engine that another child is already playing with. He tells her, ‘You are a girl! You can’t be a fireman!’

• ‘I don’t want to play with Danielle. She’s just like baby,’ a three year old tells her teacher. Danielle is four years old and uses a wheelchair.

• Quan, who is 2½ years old, refuses to hold the hand of a Black classmate. ‘It’s dirty,’ he insists. At home, after bathing, he tells his mother, ‘Now my hair is white because it’s clean.’

• Two five-year-old boys are playing a board game. Darren, a Korean boy, asks to join them. ‘No! You can’t play with us, you’re Chinese,’ one of them says. Then they pull their eyes into a slanted shape.

All of the children in the above examples are dealing with concepts of difference, race, gender and abilities. The children who are discriminating are feeling the effects of power in a relationship. They are learning to believe they are superior. The children who have been discriminated against are struggling with bias. Their ‘difference’ means they cannot fully participate in the experience and that they are not being accepted.

Remember that often prejudice and discrimination are not always overt—an example of covert prejudice and discrimination is ignoring or avoiding another child.


Ensure own interactions respond to all children in the service

The early childhood educator’s positionHopson (1990) reminds us that early childhood workers must act quickly when discriminatory behaviour occurs. She notes:

‘Regardless of what may have been the cause of children’s behaviour, workers must never allow a child to spurn another because of colour, ethnicity, gender or disability or to use unacceptable terms regarding a child’s identity’.

We cannot expect all children to want to be friends with each and play together. Just as you select your friends, so do children. We must respect those decisions. However, when children are ridiculed or ostracised due to difference, then staff must act. Hopson says that it should be a firm rule that no aspect of a child’s or an adult’s identity is ever an acceptable reason to tease or reject them.

Strategies for working with children to eliminate prejudiceWe need to help children learn how to think for themselves—and to be able to judge whether a comment they hear is ‘fair’ or ‘unfair’. In other words, we can help children think critically—a skill that will become increasingly very important as they grow up.

Below are a few strategies to start with:

• If appropriate, ask them ‘why….they said or think...or did?’• Encourage children to put themselves into the shoes of other children.

You might begin by saying, ‘Imagine if we all went to another planet. We cannot speak their language and they cannot speak ours. How would you feel?’ Later, talk about how they think they would feel if other children wouldn’t let them play just because of how they look, or what they wear, or how they talk.

• As adults, we can help children understand their rights, make choices and act in ways that reject bias. We can say, ‘If someone calls you a name that hurts your feelings, what can you do?’ Then when they give their answers,


comment on each one of them. ‘Yes Caylan, tell them they’re unfair and hurtful and they shouldn’t do that.’ and ‘Yes, Antonio, you can ask the teacher for her help if anyone does that to you’. ‘Now what would we do if we see someone doing that to somebody else?’

• Encourage children to see everyone as an individual. You might begin by asking them what their food preferences are. Are they the preferences the same for everyone in their family? ‘We don’t all like the same things, do we?’, you might say. Later, you could talk about other differences as well as individual ideas and choice.

• Help children understand that there are differences among people identified as belonging to a group. You might say when reading about a child who celebrates the festival of Diwali, ‘Vijendra comes from a Hindu family. Not everyone from India is Hindu though. Some are Christians. Some are Muslims. There are many more religions in India. Some may not really follow a religion.’ Later, you can even talk about differences within smaller groups.

• Encourage children to understand that we have similarities—not just differences. This is how you might begin—when reading about a child from Europe who loves music, ask the children if they enjoy music. Do they think people in other countries enjoy music? Talk about how people all over the world enjoy music. You can show them pictures of musical instruments from various countries and play them songs and music from these countries. On another day, you might talk about feelings of hurt and joy that children share universally as humans after reading a story about a child from another culture. Later, you might talk about universal sentiments and values we share with people in our community, people all over the world as well as other people who are different from their families (in lifestyle, identity, religion etc).

Here is a website that you might like to look at for further ideas. http://collections.ic.gc.ca/child/docs/00000934.htm or ‘leave it to leslie’

Expose children to music from all over the world

Below are more strategies on working with children to eliminate prejudice:

• Step in if you see or hear a child engage in discriminatory behaviour. However, while you make it clear you disapprove, do not make the child feel rejected. Explain why you disapprove.


http://collections.ic.gc.ca/child/docs/00000934.htm

• Try to find out more about the child. A young child may be rather innocently repeating something they had heard from an adult. An older child may have internalised negative feelings. In either case, make it clear that what they said or did is unacceptable.

• If you believe that an older child has internalised negative feelings, find ways to overcome these. You might need long-term strategies (eg, exposing the child to diversity, getting the child to express their feelings and them helping them understand that their attitudes and ideas are unfair and hurtful, illogical and factually incorrect).

• Support the child who was the target. Make the child feel good about themselves and feel appreciated for who they are.

Activity 4a

Activity 4b

Activity 4c

Activity 4d

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Activity 5


Ensuring your own interactions respond to all children in the service

Some food for thought…

Research has shown that teachers interact or respond to girls and boys differently. Read through the following research findings from Gordon and Browne (1996).

Teachers:

• give more attention to boys• give girls and boys different kind of attention• give boys more positive feedback• give boys more praise and attention for achievement• give boys more praise for creative behaviour• call on girls less than boys• praise girls more for conforming behaviour• spend more time disciplining boys than girls.

When responding to inappropriate behaviour:

• Aggression is tolerated more in boys than in girls• Disruptive talking is tolerated more in girls than in boys• Boys are reprimanded more than girls• Teachers use more physical means of discipline on boys than on girls• Teachers use more negative comments or disapproving gestures with girls

than with boys.

Are you surprised by the research? If somebody was to secretly observe your interactions with a group of children, how do you think you would go? Of course, we all would hope to treat all children fairly and with a deep sense of respect, regardless of gender, abilities, cultural background etc.


Boys and girls taking part in a cooking experience

Activity 6a

Activity 6b

Activity 6c

Activity 6d

As Gordon and Browne (1996) note: ‘We … know that adults who are generous, tolerant, and caring. In their interactions with children foster those same characteristics in children’.


Explore options for children to participate in their community

We can enrich the centre’s program and the children’s lives by accessing the cultures and diversity that is in our families and community. The first step is by building a partnership with the families of the children that attend the centre.

The communityThe community is both an influence on, and support network for, the families that use our services, as well as being a source on which we can draw when developing our programs. If we are to have an understanding of the community in which our families live, we need to familiarise ourselves with, and become involved in this community. We can visit the neighbourhoods, shop locally, familiarise ourselves with the music enjoyed by the community, attend celebrations and get to know the locals. We can also identify resources in the community which can be tapped into, to transport the diversity within the community into the classroom—for example local musicians and storytellers, Aboriginal Elders, art and craft products, celebrations, food and places such as ethnic shops to visit.

The familyWhen we develop our anti-bias program we need to respect the cultural background of the family and develop a partnership with the family that will create a link between the service and the home. We need to take into consideration both the influence the family has on the child, and how families can be involved in our services. Parents, staff and children benefit from parent involvement. Perhaps the most obvious benefit is the link that parent involvement forges between home and the centre. This link is even more vital for families and children from other cultural backgrounds. And remember that Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander extended families have very important roles and responsibilities in the up-bringing of the children, so need to be considered as well.


The childrenWe need to closely observe children and be involved with their interests. If we are open to what excites them and arouses their curiosity we can be led to a wide, stimulating array of ideas and projects. We can open their minds to experiences in the community that link to their interests and backgrounds. Be adventurous!

You could start by taking them for a walk around their community and see what they can find. What examples of diversity and richness of culture are in their own neighbourhood? Help them to explore and find out more. This can lead to finding out more about the wider community and many and varied topics and projects.

You will find more ideas in the rest of the unit.


Where appropriate, if children appear to have experienced exclusion, sensitively seek to obtain information about the nature of those experiences

Firstly you need to be aware of when exclusion may be occurring by:

• observations of children• having a good relationship with the child so you may notice when

something is not right and that they may feel secure enough to tell you• having a good relationship and rapport with the family so they may also

feel supported if they need to tell you about an exclusion issue• be aware of cultural practices and lifestyles of the families etc so you

would be sensitive to issues• don’t be afraid to ask a family if there is an issue• acknowledge the effects of dispossession and ‘the stolen generation’ on

Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander families• respect the family and maintain dignity, confidentiality and privacy.

It’s important to be sensitive when seeking information from a child who you think may be experiencing exclusion. Often as a result of experiencing exclusion the child may have a low self esteem and feel they don’t have the right to complain or speak out. They may have accepted that this is their lot in life as they are different from others. But this thinking is exactly what we are trying to avoid.

Techniques to obtain information:

• listen reflectively• use dramatic play to initiate conversations about possible exclusion• spend time with the child so you can build a rapport with the child and ask

questions if needed. Give reassurance and confirmation about the exclusion issue if disclosed.


Provide positive experiences to support children who may have experienced exclusion

Let’s revisit some scenarios:

Kerrie, four and a half years old, will not be going on the tram museum excursion. She never goes on any excursions. Her mother, Thao, usually has a reason — this time she says that Kerrie does not like trams and trains. The real reason is that Kerrie's mother is a struggling financially and cannot afford excursions. On the day after the tram museum excursion, the carer and the children spent time excitedly discussing what they had seen. Kerrie sat quietly at the back of the group.

Mandy, five years old, always wears clothes that cover her arms and legs (usually a shirt or jumper with long sleeves as well as long pants) as she has psoriasis. Today is a very warm day. The children have been painting for the past 30 minutes on easels set up on the verandah and now the carer wants to take them to the playground where they can play with water. The carer tells Mandy to remain on the verandah and continue painting. The children are wearing shorts and they have a lot of fun playing with water. Mandy feels left out.

It was Johann's fourth birthday and the children sang 'Happy Birthday' and Johann blew out the candles. Each child was given a piece of the cake, except Amir. Amir, three years old, has an allergy to nuts and the carers did not want to risk any reaction. Amir felt rejected.

Activity 7

We need to be aware of exclusion and be ready to support children through positive experiences and inclusive strategies.

Support the child who was the target. Make the child feel good about themselves and feel appreciated for who they are.


Supporting children with differing abilitiesThere is an enormous range of differing abilities amongst children and you may have the opportunity to study more about this later. Within the context of inclusive polices we need to ensure that children with differing abilities are accommodated and encouraged within the program—exactly the same as any other child.

The following tips are just a start; as usual communication with the family is essential.

Strategies Here are some things you can do to provide practical support to children with additional needs:

• Provide accessible play at a level appropriate to all areas of children's development.

• Provide honest feedback about their achievements. • Encourage effort—rather than the outcome. • Become familiar with any restrictions that the child may have as a result

of the additional need. • Allow children to explore, play and take risks. Understand the child faces

additional constraints. • Strive for a team approach with parents so that they can give you

information to help provide the best possible opportunities for their children.

• Let children be as independent as possible.

Above all, respect children’s identities and differences and inject playfulness and warmth into every part of the day’s routine.

Supporting other children• Encourage positive interactions between children. • Encourage and concern and help should be encouraged if appropriate. • Be honest and open when asked questions about disability. • Advise parents about their child's reactions so that they can support the

child with correct information.

Supporting yourself• Be flexible, realistic and creative about how you solve problems.


• Keep records of children’s progress. Remember small steps are just as important.

• Become an advocate for children with additional needs and promote positive attitudes.

• Supporting the parents of children with additional needs. • Establish an open and warm relationship, encouraging them to be a part

of a team that will work towards supporting them and their parents. • Make sure you tell the parents about their child's daily experiences.

Supporting other staff • Encourage the staff to share in the care of the children and encourage

them to interact with them. • If the child has special equipment, encourage the staff to become familiar

with its correct use and care. • Educate yourself about each child’s disability and additional need by

talking to families and doing your own research. Share your knowledge with other staff members, through informal chats. Try to invite a special education specialist to give a talk to staff or show relevant videos.

Activity 8

Activity 9

This website provides introductory information on various countries: http://www.theworldnews.com.au/Worldguide/


http://www.theworldnews.com.au/Worldguide/

Documents

CLIPS Word Template - TAFE NSW · Web viewActivity 1 Gender stereotypes Let’s have a look at what Derman-Sparks (1989) came up with: Language affects our perceptions of the world