Marion Wright Edelman
shares two things she learned from Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr.
“If you can’t fly, you
drive.
If you can’t drive, you run.
If you can’t run, you walk.
If you can’t walk, you crawl.
But you keep moving.”
“You don’t have to see the
whole stairway. Take the first step in
faith and let God take to the rest.”
Deep Space 9, "Shadow Play"
As a field we need to get beyond catchphrases and be precise in describing and justifying practices. ... Many an early childhood practitioner rejects a given practice by saying merely, "It's not developmentally appropriate." Yes, but why is it developmentally inappropriate?
Carole Copple & Sue Bredekamp in "Getting Clear about Developmentally Appropriate Practice"
The creative is the place where no one else has ever been. You have to
leave the city of your comfort and go into the wilderness of your
intuition. What you’ll discover will be wonderful. What you’ll discover
is yourself.
Developmentally appropriate practice does not mean making things easier for children. Rather, it means ensuring that goals and experiences are suited to their learning and development and challenging enough to promote their progress and interest.
Alan Alda
Developmentally appropriate practice does not mean making things easier for children. Rather, it means ensuring that goals and experiences are suited to their learning and development and challenging enough to promote their progress and interest.
Key Messages of the Position Statement (Developmentally Appropriate Practice) NAEYC
Meeting children where they are is essential, but no good teacher simply leaves them there. Keeping in mind desired goals and what is known about the children as a group and individually, the teacher plans experiences to promote children's learning and development.
NAEYC: Developmentally Appropriate Practice in Early Childhood Programs serving children from birth through age 8
Purpose of Standing for Children is "to ensure every children a healthy start, the health coverage they need to grow, thrive, become productive adults, and healthy communities that allow them to breathe clean air and walk safely to school, and to learn once more they're there, unimpaired by fear of violence or my untreated health problems. ... because it is morally wrong that the world's leader in health technology ranks 18th in the industrialized world in infant mortality rates and worst in low-birth-weight rates."
Marion Wright Edelman
My Passion has been evolving through the years. It's an ongoing process. It's like a ripple - you throw a little rock and you this center ignite and it grow.
Leticia Lara LCSW
For children to benefit fully from play,
teachers must take their own roles seriously. Early childhood educators
cannot wander around classrooms operating on the vague assumption that children
learn through play while, at the same time, lamenting the challenges to play
coming from parents and administrators. Instead, teachers must recognize
play as one of the key teaching and learning contexts in early childhood
classroom, must acquire skills themselves in research-based effective teaching
strategies such as scaffolding language to use during play, and must
incorporate play along with other more directive teaching throughout the
preschool day.
Educational Perspectives "Play
and School Readiness"
I tried to teach my child with books.
He gave me only puzzled looks.
I tried to teach my child with words.
They passed him by often unheard.
Despairingly, I turned aside.
"How shall I teach this child?" I cried.
Into my hand he put the key
"Come," he said, "play with me."
- Unknown
"I really am your gift. I am not just a little person who needs to be "raised" and taught, and taken to activities...I came to the people in my life to bring a message: slow down. Feel. Be. Over and over again. When you do, you will notice immediately, that I am not an obstacle to your work, or inconvenient to your daily life. Instead, you will come to appreciate my honesty, humor, presence and love."
Bruce Scott
“Motherhood is about raising and celebrating the child you have, not the child you thought you would have. It's about understanding that he is exactly the person he is supposed to be. And that, if you're lucky, he just might be the teacher who turns you into the person you are supposed to be.”
Joan Ryan
“Treat me exactly as you would want me to treat you - exactly. Do not punish me ever. Teach me. Hold me. Love me. Trust that I, just like you, want to do what is right. Help me understand what I don’t know. Don't call me names, or label me or compare me, or make me compete for anything. Help me cooperate and collaborate. Be the example for me.”
Bruce Scott
“A person’s a person no matter how small” – Dr. Seuss
“Whatever they grow up to be, they are still our children, and the one most important of all the things we can give to them is unconditional love. Not a love that depends on anything at all except that they are our children.”
Dickson
Children Are...
Amazing,cherish them.
Believable, trust them.
Childlike, let them.
Divine, respect them.
Energetic, nourish them.
Fallible, embrace them.
Gifts, unwrap them.
Here Now, be with them.
Innocent, delight in them.
Joyful, appreciate them.
Kindhearted, join them.
Lovable, love them.
Magical, fly with them.
Noble, esteem them.
Open-minded, hear them.
Precious, treasure them.
Questioners, encourage them.
Resourceful, support them.
Spontaneous, enjoy them.
Talented, believe in them.
Unique, affirm them.
Vulnerable, protect them.
Whole, recognize them.
Xtraspecial, celebrate them.
Yearning, notice them.
Zany, laugh with them.
© Meiji Stewart.
