My time with the kids.

My time at the daycare so far, has been really great. I am only used to dealing with young kids in my family so I can treat them way differently then I treat these kids. It has taught me to interact with children in a brand-new, more positive way. I really like the idea of reading to the same kid or kids every week, this way I can form a relationship with my reading buddy. I noticed already having the same kid 2 weeks in a row that he became a lot more comfortable and talkative the second time around. Another thing about having the same child is that I can learn what he like, strengths, weaknesses and in my case communicate more effectively because my buddy has a limited vocabulary and it’s very hard to understand him. If I continue to have him as my buddy then I will learn to better understand what he wants and interact more while we are reading. I think that by reading to this particular kid that I can help with his speaking skills, I ask him to repeat words and pronounce my words very clearly so he can pick up on this.

This week was a very neat experience, I was able to have a lot of fun with the kids when I was reading to them. I find that because of the ages these kids have a very, VERY short attention span so, rather then just reading the whole time I tried to play with the two kids. Then I noticed other kids around us were looking, I could tell that they wanted to join in because my buddies were having such a good time. One kid actually did come to join me and my two buddies and I got some satisfaction out of this... I felt wanted haha. Seeing little kids laughing and enjoying books is really fulfilling, before doing this I never would have thought that I would get much out of it but I really am. When we leave the daycare you can just see that everyone in our class is in a pleasant mood, smiling and talking about what happened that day, theses kids have the power to 180 your mood and I like that about them.

* Funniest thing *
On Thursday, I had two boys that were fidgeting and completely uninterested with anything I had to say, when I noticed this I looked in my bag for something that would interest them. The only thing I found was sunglasses, little did I know they loved them. They were so amused at the way everything looked when they had them on and it was so funny when they started putting them on each other... upside down. Ashley and I could not stop laughing, it was so cute. That brings me to another reason I like reading to the younger kids because they are just learning the “norms” that people tend to live by and so they don’t get embarrassed by little things and they speak their minds completely. I guess I like that they are so pure in their thoughts and intentions because they really no nothing different.

Overall I’m happy I took this course. Its such a different approach to learning, I never thought if I taught that I would learn. That is exactly what is happening though, every time we read to the kids, I learn something new and Im sure the kid does too. It is teaching me to be more patient and teaching me new ways of communicating with not only young kids but people in general. Not to mention the kids are so cute and I just like looking at them.

ECE reflection

ECE daily jobs.
- Teacher
- Care giver
- First Aid
- Guidance
- Artist
- Maid(for lack of a better word)
- Give opinions to parents
- Build self-esteem

During the presentation we learned that the jobs of an ECE are endless. Not only are you teaching the kids but, you must also be a "mother" like figure, someone that the child can be comfortable talking to and opening up with. The children that would be taken care of by an ECE are as young as 2 months and as old as 12. The ECE’s are individually responsible for coming up with lessons some of the things that the guest speakers told us they did are:

- Theme based curriculum
- Weekly themes incorporate other aspects of reading.
- Divided age groups
- Jolly phonics (books)
- Relating classroom life to real life.
- Learning threw play (letter, rhyming and word games)
- Rewards for reading
- Target individual needs and learning styles.

Reflection
The guest speakers from the day care taught us a lot about what being an ECE is really about because to be honest I more or less thought of them as a babysitter rather than a teacher. My opinion has changed since the presentation, ECE’s are like a mom on crack. They have more kids and more responsibility because parents have such high expectations. I learned a lot of things that I can use when reading to young children such as, matching letters with a picture a sound and relating it to life. The most useful thing I think I learned was not to force reading but to teach kids threw play and make there first reading experience a positive one. Over all I think that the presentation was very good and I learned a lot that will help me as a reading buddy and even may help me later on in life.