Sharing Web Resources Week 4

One thing I found particularly interesting on this website is all the research they do. There is a section called Projects and in this area I found an article called Proof into Policy: Pre-K milestones and here they have data about how much funding has increased in the past 7 years. I am happy to say Oklahoma is one that is on the higher end of funding. When I look at Texas, this really makes me happy! They are wayyy higher than everyone else. What a great state! I've heard a lot of good things about Texas schools, but I didn't know they were the highest funded state. There were 10 states that do not have state pre-k programs. Wow! I couldn't imagine our school without a pre-k program. State funding for pre-k more than doubled nationwide from 2002-2010. 27% of all 4 year olds are in state funded pre-k programs. It is obvious that this trend in early childhood will continue to rise as it has doubled in the past 8 years. People are finally realizing how important early childhood programs are for children. Once again, even in these articles I found that we are striving for preparing children for the future. Although I feel this program has nothing to do with being against play, but I feel they are focusing on the future and not the "now." I think children or adults shouldn't even worry about the future until the children are at least in mid or high school. We must do our jobs as teachers to teach the children what they need to know and expect every other teacher between now and high school to do the same. As long as we do that, I think the child will be alright.
This website is very informative, but I have a hard time finding stuff I am looking for. And I'm really confused about what I'm actually reading. I guess there are several different things they are looking at and not just early childhood. When I finally find the early childhood section of it, there are some very interesting things to see and research being done. This is a great website with quite a bit of information but just a little bit too much information for me.

Getting to know your international contacts - ALTERNATIVE

None of my contacts have responded, therefore I'm researching the http://www.childhoodpoverty.org/ website instead! I chose to research china. I discovered that china is e most populated country in the world! They have done a grea job of getting out of poverty! They went from 250 million in poverty to just 35 million! That's still a very huge number!  Out of 1.2 billion, 250 million were in poverty in 2001! 4.2 million of children are in absolute poverty and 8.7 million are in disadvantage conditions. This is very sad. But on the bright side I found that 80% of western chinas children complete primary school! From these statistics I have found, I am very thankful to have a home and a family and food to eat! There are many people out there in poverty! Crazy amounts of children and families!! I feel I need to be more thankful for what I have, after reading these statistics! I've always wanted to adopt or help a child in need... I think this has motivated me to push more toward helping them, these are very sad statistics!!

I also listened to the world forum foundation radio...
The first person I listened to was susan lyon she started by talking about a little boy who inspired her by his words and actions. She advocates for children by listening and using environments which is connected to the Reggio Emilia approach. She brought the 100 languages exhibit to a large city. http://ccie-media.s3.amazonaws.com/podcasts/WFR_10_SusanLyon.mp3

Sharing Web Resources

The name of the organization I chose is Pre K Now - The Pew Charitable Trusts: http://www.pewstates.org/projects/pre-k-now-328067\
This website is organized to campaign for high quality pre-k programs. They want to take the current K-12 system and change it to Pre-K-12. "The Pew Charitable Trusts is driven by the power of knowledge to solve today’s most challenging problems. Pew applies a rigorous, analytical approach to improve public policy, inform the public and stimulate civic life."
This caught my attention because I am a Pre-K teacher. We are not mandated in our state and I think it would be awesome if we were mandated!!! That's the reason I chose to research this website. I just recently signed up for the newsletter, so when I get it I will be sure to update my blog!

Establishing Early Childhood Contacts and Expanding Resources

Im going to admit when I read the beginning of our Blog Assignment, I turned the music down and looked at my aide and said "THIS IS CRAZY!!! We have to contact an early childhood profession in another country!!!" I was thinking we had to call them. Then I continued to read and I said "oh, we just have to email them." HAHA! I was scared because I hate talking on the phone. I was thinking what if I can't understand them. Anyways then I started thinking oh wow this is going to be so cool to contact someone from another country!
I must say I am really in love with Australia, so I chose to find someone from Australia. I contacted the UNICEF in australia for the first profession.
The next I chose was from Jordan! I cannot wait to hear back from them!!! I will update as soon as I get a response!
The website I chose to explore and report on is the: Pre[K]Now: A Campaign of the Pew Center on the Stateshttp://www.pewcenteronthestates.org/initiatives_detail.aspx?initiativeID=31672(Newsletter: http://www.preknow.org/signupform.cfm )
I chose this because Pre-K is the grade I teach and it has a section called why pre-k matters and I felt that this would be very meaningful to my job!