Time Well Spent - Final Thoughts and Farewell

Reflecting on my journey for these past two years I must say that my love, passion and understanding of early childhood development and education has grown tremendously.  Through this program I have learnt some valuable lessons.  Among all the lessons learnt some which really resonated with me are as follow;

1.      Early childhood education is a diverse field which is ever growing and changing and it relies on interconnected disciplines to foster the healthy growth and development of children, the families and the early childhood community.  As Dwayne Crompton cited in Scott (2005) so eloquently put it “early education and care is a complex human development project requiring a keen understanding of sociology, science, management, community, politics, economics, finance, psychology, and a range of other interconnected disciplines…(An educator need to be well-grounded in these areas and understand that these disciplines intersect at families and children”(p.20)

2.      Building relationships and partnerships is critical in early childhood education.  These partnerships should not merely be among children and their teachers, but likewise there should be partnerships among families, colleagues, professional organizations, community organizations, agencies and the local community. The wider and stronger your network of relationships and partnerships, the more support you have for yourself, the children and families as children develop best in the context of relationships.

3.      Since the early childhood field is continually evolving there will always be issues and trends which surface.  Hence there is always room for growth.  As early childhood educators we need to remain abreast with research that is being done in the field.  We need to keep learning and growing so that we can provide the best opportunities for children to grow to their optimal.  As Julie Olson Edwards remarked “we never know enough.  In this arena there’s always more to learn…This is a lifetime of work.”

4.      Self-awareness and self-reflection are powerful tools in this field as we are able to self-examine and look at our biases, stereotypes, misconceptions and prejudices.  This gives us the opportunity to better understand ourselves and plan on ways to dispel these biases and stereotypes so that we can adequate serve our children and families.

5.      Being the best educator I could be is not enough. To impact positive social change and truly support children and their families, we as educators need to advocate on their behalf so that there will be equitable services provided for all children.

One of ultimate long-term goals is to be an agent of social change in my country by ensuring that every child has access to high quality early childhood education.  Another goal I have for myself is to be employed with the NAEYC. It would be my absolute dream to be employed by this organization as they do so much good for children and families by touching on almost every topic imaginable in the early childhood field.

I would like to thank my professors at Walden University for this wonderful learning experience.  Thanks to my colleagues for your support and encouragement through the two years.  Yours insights, perspectives and feedback on the discussion and blog post were truly appreciated.  I wish you all the best in your future endeavours!  Congratulations to you all! I know that you will make some great impacts on the lives of children and their families.

I leave you with these final thoughts

         

     

References

Laureate Education, Inc. (Executive Producer). (2012). Practical application in the early childhood field [Webcast]. Being mindful of outcomes and consequences. Retrieved from https://class.waldenu.edu/webapps/portal/frameset.jsp?tab_tab_group_id=_2_1&url=%2Fwebapps%2Fblackboard%2Fexecute%2Flauncher%3Ftype%3DCourse%26id%3D_5572037_1%26url%3D

Scott, D. (2005). Leaders on leadership: How do you envision leadership in early care and education in 2015? YC: Young Children, 60(1), 20-22.