Amanda, my Chinese colleague and friend, she believed that culture is where a person comes from and what religious belief that person holds. She thought diversity means the mix of different cultures, and as a teacher, diversity means to use various strategies to meet children’s various interests and needs.
Chris, my husband, he told me that culture means the daily practice of people, and what has happened in a country’s history. His point of view about diversity is that diversity is happening everywhere around us. Race and language are the only two basic diversity that we can tell, but diversity means that anything makes a person different from others.
Grace, my childhood friend. She thought about it for a while and said that culture is about the festivals, food, and dress-up. It is also about the ways that how people feel comfortable to live. The answer of diversity was that diversity is why people are different from each other, and the different social identities that each person carries with them.
Reading through the answers, I found out that the talked about the surface culture differences like festivals, history, language, and races, social identities like where they come from, religious beliefs, and daily practices, and early childhood educators responsibilities for diversity at school, such as how to meet various interests and needs of children from different cultures.
The aspects that I have learned from the course, but not included in the answers are deep cultures about culture diversity, culture discontinuity and continuity about culture diversity. They did not include the equity in their definitions either. When they were giving me the answers, they did not think any further than surface culture diversity that we can see. At the same time, they were talking about diversity, but they did not think of the consequences of culture discontinuity, and actually culture discontinuity happens quite often in nowadays.
The answers that they gave makes me realize how I thought about culture and diversity before I learned this course. I probably only saw surface culture as well, and I did not realize the culture discontinuity happening around me either. The definitions influenced me on having a deeper thinking and better recognition of diversity. I also realize that I should avoid some bias and assumptions that I would have before, when I am facing or working with children from various culture differences. Children are all different and we should treat them as the experts in their own world. What’s more, no matter where children come from, they should be treated equally.
Sissi,
ReplyDeleteI enjoyed reading your blog this week. Like you, the people that I interviewed were only thinking about surface culture when I asked them to define culture (Derman-Sparks,L. & Edwards, J.O., 2010, p.56). I also agree with you about the importance of knowing our own biases and having conversations with those with whom we come in contact about culture and diversity. It is essential that we understand these two words because of the global society in which we live and work. I, too, have a deeper understanding now of culture and will strive to learn the deep culture of the children and families we serve in my Head Start program in Williamsburg. I love the statement you made about children being the experts in their world. How true that is!
Thank you again for your insights.
I really liked your friend Amanda's definition of diversity as it pertains to our students. She has a good point.
ReplyDelete"Diversity means to use various strategies to meet children’s various interests and needs" -Amanda
I think that we have to remember to be diverse in the classroom. We have to meet all of the needs of our students. I think this is a great way to define diversity for education.