Welcoming Families From Around the World

For this blog assignment the following scenario was given:

You are working in an early childhood setting of your choice—a hospital, a child care center, a social service agency. You receive word that the child of a family who has recently emigrated from a country you know nothing about will join your group soon. You want to prepare yourself to welcome the child and her family. Luckily, you are enrolled in a course about diversity and have learned that in order to support families who have immigrated you need to know more than surface facts about their country of origin.

The country of origin that my hypothetical family is from Laos. For this assignment, I will take on the role of an early intervention evaluator.

Five ways in which I could prepare myself to be culturally responsive towards this family include the following:

1. I would first want to educate myself on the part of the county the family is coming from. In doing so my goal would be to learn about the general area of the world they have been living.

2. I would educate myself on the different customs which are prevalent within that area of the world so that I could have and understanding of how the family celebrates special occasions, holidays and even what their living arrangements might be.

3. Learning about what their potential communication styles will be especially important so that I don't offend them by accident or become offended by the manner in which they communicate with me.

4. Understanding the way education and special education is addressed within their country will be very important as well. Discovering whether or not is valued significantly or if having child with special needs is something which is considered disgraceful or unacceptable will help me understand the perspective from which the family is coming.

5. Reviewing the evaluation materials which will be present for the testing session is something else that I could do to ensure that the child feels represented within the books/activities. Although, most evaluation books which have pictures have a representation children with many different ethnic backgrounds, it will be important to include toys/manipulatives that the child can relate to, to help them feel comfortable.

I would hope that by making these preparations I would be better able to serve this child and their family. My ultimate goal would be to provide an environment where the child would feel safe and free to express their cultural identity. I would also strive to create a trusting relationship with the child's family, one that is built on mutual respect and understanding. My hope would be that the family would feel as though they are free to share their priorities regarding their child's education as well as know that they are a valuable member on their child's educational team.