Observing and Interacting with Families of the Children in Your Setting

2/22/2013

I interviewed Sharna she is a parent. She works part time and her son attends Mary Crane Center in the 3-5 year old class. He is 3-years old. Sharna serves on several boards in the center: Parent Policy Board, Parent Policy Committee and Self- Assessment Team.  She is the Chair Person of the Lake and Pulaski Parent Policy Board.  She represents the parents from Lake and Pulaski site while in a site wide Parent Policy meeting. At the meeting all Presidents from the different sites attend to represent their site. They give reports about different things going on at the different sites.  Sharna said there are program managers on the Parent Policy board to tell more about the different programs in the agency. Sharna duties include conducting emergency meetings, reaching out to parents, finding activities for children especially free activities. She said at the Policy meetings all sites collaborate and give information about enrollment, fundraisers, laws, and finances. Since I’ve been at the site I have seen Sharna around the center and she has positive relationships with the staff. She sits with the staff during their lunch time and has some pretty interesting conversations about the state of the Agency. She comes every day and volunteers in the classroom. She comes at nap time and helps serve snack and put the cots away. She makes the attendance charts a initiative the center has to help recover poor attendance.

Question: How do you feel the program most support and influence her child’s development?

Response: Child has not gained much knowledge since he has been in the center. The teachers are constantly changing and the teachers he has now are new to teaching. She feels since he has been in the program he has actually regressed.

Q: how has he regressed?

R: he is no longer does the self-help skills he was doing before.  He no longer spells his name, or knows his telephone number and address. His behavior is really challenging now, he don’t listen to his teachers. WE moved from the suburban area and the centers were different. Parents were more involved and to get parents involved we have to offer them something like gifts. It’s like pulling teeth to get parents to involved, it’s like they don’t care.

Q: What areas does your child need Support?

R: Fine Motor like buttoning and zipping, understanding small and large, name, numbers and counting, different languages. His previous school always had a second language; they learned Spanish at his old school.

 Q: How do you feel about Early mathematics with preschoolers?

R: I believe it is important for my child to learn how to count, recognize his number, learn about sizes.

Q: what do you think we can do to help your child with early mathematics?

R: Start sending him work to do at home. I have to find things to do with my child at home. If I can piggyback what you all are teaching here that would help him in a major way.

Q: Is there anything else you would like to add about advocey?

R: All the policies aren’t fair to all the children. It seems as though the agency is giving the best things to the other sites like the children up north have I-pads. They are giving all the better stuff to the children that don’t need it the most. They need to put more money into this center and the other center on the westside, in the poor areas.  But the parents support the center and they are always at the parent meetings.  My child is doing ok because I sit down with him every day and I work with him. I noticed he is not learning anymore so I take up extra time.

While observing the children in the areas where more mathematics are expected like the water table. The children were not using much mathematics literacy. They were not talking about sizes, amount, full and empty. They talked making a pie and even with this they didn’t talk about half, more and less. While I observed them with the manipulative rock pieces they did a lot of the actions such as filling and emptying jars with rocks. When they topped off they understood how to take some off. They had the basic concrete understanding of mathematics but their vocabulary was lacking.

From my interview I realized this parent is very active in her child’s learning. She does not fully understand the importance of preschool but she does understand her role in her child’s learning.  She has some basic understanding of mathematics but not a full understanding of what her child should be doing. I will use this interview to include parental involvement with activities to do at home that are simple and concrete about mathematics. This interview has prompted me to research ways of helping parents understand the importance of early mathematics literacy.  I will also include ways of helping learn the best way to support their child’s early mathematics literacy.

My observations of the children helped me realize children in this class need to link their vocabulary and conversations with their actions. They need someone to facilitate the learning while they are playing and interacting with one another and toys. They need more talks about mathematics literacy and this should actually start at young ages.