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When I think about how I communicate with different people based on their culture, race, religion, sexual orientation, and so on I can honestly say that I do communicate differently. The reason why I communicate differently is because some people whose children I teach sometimes don't understand some words I use so I have to talk on their level and make things as simple as possible. I also have co-workers who don't quite understand and they will say what does that mean, I live in the city and most of my co-workers live in a rural/country town. Since I know the things I say they don't understand I explain to them what they mean and now I use words that are direct yet simple. It doesn't matter to me about someone's religion, sexual orientation, background, culture or any of these things because I just communicate with people how I want them to communicate with me. I talk with respect and never raise my voice unless I'm provoked; but that doesn't happen. I make it a point to make sure people I'm communicating with understand whatever it is I'm talking about. I don't ever want someone to leave me standing alone because I'm talking over their head. This week we discussed the golden rule, the rule is simple do unto others as you would have others do unto you. Treat people how you want them to treat you is a must for me and has always been.

Television Show With No Sound

          The show I chose to watch was called "Mama June From Not to Hot, " in the show they showed a before picture of her and then a after picture. Two girls came in a room where she was then a man came over. Once the man came over he started looking at a dvd player taking it apart with a puzzled look on his face and picked it up and down. The girls and Mama June started laughing and so did the man. He hugged her and she had the biggest smile on her face, she twirled around as if she was showing off her outfit to them. The younger girl rolled her eyes and snapped her fingers at then. Another lady came over and they left and went to a doctor office, Mama June with a frown on her face pulled her shirt up and started pulling on her stomach which was hanging then she felt some plastic breast implants. The doctor looked concerned and kept touching the extra skin. The doctor handed her two plastic breast shaped bags. She put them in her shirt and her breast seemed to be larger, she smiled, laughed and played with them. The lady who went with her was pointing, looking sad, angry and not too friendly while talking to Mama June. They picked the two girls up. When they got to a ice cream shop this man in line kept looking at her breast, his eyes got big and never looked away. He threw his finger up to motion for the cashier then while they sat eating ice cream the older girl wrote something on a piece of paper and gave it to him. The ladies and girls sat tolling their eyes, touching June's hair and face. The older lady who went to the doctor with her touched the plastic things in her bra. she smiled and laughed while patting her friends back. The man smiled with a big grin on his face. He waved at them as they left, the next day she met him somewhere and he kept looking at her chest which was flat because she had taken the implants plastic things off. Her eyes started rolling as she talked to the man, she stood up placed her hands on her hip; hit the table and started walking away and threw a finger sign to the man. She looked angry while walking away.
          I re-watched the show with the sound on and Mama June had gastric bypass surgery. She went to the doctor to talk about removing the extra skin she has and that's why she pulled on the skin. Her friend kept asking was she sure about that. When they all went to eat ice cream the man waved at the cashier so he could pay for everyone's ice cream, he stared at her breast constantly, his eyes got big while looking. Her daughter took her number to the man so they could go out on a date. The next day when they went out the man asked her why did she look different and it seems like she lost weight on top since yesterday. Mama June stood up and told him it's men like him that make women go out and get surgery because they don't feel good about their bodies and want to look better. She hit the table, cursed while she was walking away and threw a finger sign at him.
          We all make some type of facial expressions while we communicate. I know I make al sorts o faces, although I try really hard not to, it still happens. This family hugged, smiled and laughed a lot because they genuinely love each other. Their non-verbal communication told me most of what was going on with them. Most of my assumptions  were correct. My aha moment was when she became angry on the date and when I watched it with sound I saw why she was so angry. I mean she was angry enough to hit the table and point finger sign at the man. This was a very interesting assignment this week that I really enjoyed doing.

Competent Communicator

When I think of a competent communicator one person I know come to my mind and that's an old supervisor I once had. He had a very strong firm voice, that made people want to hear more of whatever it was he was saying.  This man could enter the room with his voice alone before his body entered the room. Certain behaviors I noticed whenever he spoke was his arms placed firmly in his pockets, or at rest on his side. He looked directly in the eyes of the person he was speaking to and he gave his undivided attention when someone spoke to him; these behaviors made him a effective communicator in my opinion. I don't need to model my behavior after this man because I have always looked directly in the persons eyes I'm speaking to. Most importantly I know that I could improve on some things because although I am a great communicator some things can improve like my voice tone. I consider myself to be a very great communicator but I don't have to firm voice. Communication is a very important part of life and in order to get a clear understanding we must communicate, ask questions as well as answer questions. Body language and facial expressions is a form of communication as well. Growing up I was always told by my dad to never look down when your speaking to someone to always hold your head up high and be confident. I can truly say I speak with confidence and I love to communicate with people. 

Professional Hopes and Goals

One hope that I have working with children and families who come from diverse backgrounds is to be remembered  as the teacher who treated them fair, with respect, took time to get to know them and did all she can to help them. One goal I would set for the early childhood field related to issues of diversity, equity, and social justice is to stay educated about all of these issues. I have to be a role model for children in order to motivate them I must be educated on diversity and social justice. Things that I don’t know I have to be willing to ask questions to those who may know the information. My goal is to continue to help children and their families in every capacity that I can regardless of their diverse background. I will always be open, have a positive attitude and make sure I incorporate different cultures throughout the classroom; I will do this to make all families feel welcomed in the class. The goal that I have professionally is to complete graduate school and start teaching at a community college.  

I can’t believe this class is over already, this past 8 weeks has been informative and I would like to say thank you to all of my colleagues who have shared post on their blogs and discussion boards. I have enjoyed and learned so much from all of the classes I’ve been enrolled in at Walden University. I look forward to sharing more discussions and blogs in the coming weeks and months. I don’t know when any of my colleagues graduate but I believe I have 4 classes left. I wish each and every one of you the best of luck on this journey to complete graduate school.

 

Welcoming Families Around the World

The country I chose is Haiti for my family’s country of origin. Some ways I will prepare to be culturally responsive towards the family is to get to know them by asking questions about their country and child. One important thing is also make sure I know the proper pronunciation of the child’s name. I would incorporate things they tell me to include in the classroom setting so their child can feel welcomed in the class. Material about and from their home and things from their country would be placed throughout the class so not only I can learn things about Haiti but children in the classroom can also learn as well. Include pictures about diversity on walls in class will be helpful because the child will feel the sense of belonging. Always put something on my lesson plan that the child will be familiar with and that others can learn from. I would ask the family to bring some items from home that I could put in class and I would put books about Haiti and other countries around the class in different centers. These preparations would benefit not only me as the teacher but the child from Haiti and other students because we all can learn more diversity by seeing and talking about items included in class, lessons, and material.

The Personal Side of Bias, Prejudice, and Oppression

I can recall a time I was online under a friends face book page. I was tagged in a post about all the killings happening where the police has killed black unarmed men. I was asked by this person to watch the video in which I told him, I couldn’t watch another video of a black man let alone any man being murdered by the police. So of course people started making comments not toward me just about how sad it was. I then told this person I’m praying for his family but watching those videos make me cry. Then this woman who I didn’t know at all said I was a  coward and need to be more black and stay woke. I never responded; she went on to say I’m a house “N-word”  because of my lighter complexion. I told her to have a blessed day, then she said people like me always look the other way in spite of things happening around me. Now this was another black woman making all these harsh comments, she was a darker complexion woman. For the life of me I always wondered why in the black community do some people compare skin complexions and think the lighter skinned people are better and darker complexion is less than. I read the last comment she wrote and I completely logged off. She said black sista you need to read slavery books right now because we’re headed that way because of black life people like you, people who look the other way when a injustice happen to yet another black man; it’s people like you that disgust me in every aspect of the black community, you will forever be on the side of the pig police who are killing our black men. I felt bad at first then I thought this lady is crazy for real, all this because I chose not to watch a video of someone being murdered. This same race prejudice brought up memories of when I was young and I had some cousins who were lighter skinned and some darker. I was in between which didn’t never make me a target of such harsh words. The cousins who were lighter always called the darker skinned cousins ugly and black when they got mad at one another.

I did inform that woman to have a blessed life and she need to pray to God she doesn’t continue to have that kind of attitude especially toward someone she doesn’t know at all, I told her I have the right to watch whatever I wanted to watch, it’s my choice if I want to watch a video of someone being killed. I told her there was no way I was going to watch someone lose their life and she could write that down in her black folks diary. I said you stay woke on more issues just not this particular issue.

Practicing Awareness of Microaggressions

  

 

One evening our entire staff went to a local restaurant for dinner. I had already spoken to the Manager of the restaurant in advance so that we could reserve a table for 15 people. This manager was so nice, once we got there she was nice in person. It was a large group and we all had food and ordered drinks as well. A few of us ordered a desert to take with us. This restaurant was not a cheap place to eat either. No one in our group paid less than $25 plus gratuity was added since the group was over 8 people. We ate and enjoyed each others company for close to 2 hours it was an added bonus that the waitress was nice and sweet. We all noticed how every time we laughed and talked other people and waitress/waiters stared at us. I did notice along with others how cold it was and we asked several times for the heat to be turned on, the manger came and tried to fix it; they never tried to make us comfortable. It was in December and it was cold outside. The point of this whole story is that once  we left I received a phone call because I had given the manager my name and place where we worked when I called to make reservations. I was out shopping and was surprised she was calling me since we had just left. She told me that some people in the group hadn't paid their bills. I immediately was outraged because I had witnessed everyone pay for their food plus gratuity plus extra tips. I assured her that no one skipped out on a meal and she said yes, the waitress is missing a few of the tickets because they hadn't been paid. I told the manager to double/triple check  I would call to check and how stupid that would be since she had my number and place of employment for all of us. She said she understands but the tickets need to be paid. At this point I was furious, I told her to double check with the waitress and call me back as soon as possible. Then after speaking with her I called a co-worker to let her know what had just happened, she was upset too. My co-worker said that doesn't make any sense because they know where we work and have your name and number. It was taking so long for the manager to call me back so I called her back and she said "I'm sorry, we found the tickets they were stuck to other tickets." I then said so were you going to call me back to tell me this because I'm vey offended. The manager finally apologized and said she would mail me some coupons for 15 people, she asked for my address; needless to say I never received those coupons. Some months passed I went back with a co-worker and I asked for the manager and told her who I was and what happened; she said she had mailed those coupons already. While I was there she ended up giving me some coupons for free appetizers and of course when I went back to use them months later the restaurant was closed for good. This was a bad situation and I felt horrible to know someone thought me and some of my co-workers would skip out on a bill. The way this manager spoke to me I knew what it was all about, we were the wrong color. It happens every single day and it's sad.