Fany Tierrablanca is a teacher who lives in the city and
works in a public kindergarten in a community that is not considered rural, but
has the same necessities as a rural program. There are 62 4-5 year-old children
enrolled in the program and 2 teachers, being one of them the one that acts
like the director and teacher too. Fany told me that there is power in the
3-room building, but there are no electrical appliances, if the teacher wants to
play music she needs to bring her own, which is not an easy task when you have
to ride the bus. In this kindergarten there is a 100 pesos registration fee,
about 7.52 dollars, that all families had paid, but only the 5% of all families
afforded to pay the monthly fee of 30 pesos, 2.26 dollars. The teachers ask
those families who could not cover their fee to volunteer in the school, doing
maintenance work such as plumbing, masonry, and landscaping or cleaning the rooms
after classes, they had good participation this school year. Despite the
poverty in which these families live, and the children’s malnutrition, their
attitudes were not challenging or negative; some of them participated in the parenting
and cooking classes that teachers offered over the school year, as well as in
classroom activities they were invited to.
Fany has been working in this community since 3 years ago
and wants to be transferred to a school in her city, nearest her house in order
to take better care of her baby daughter. After talking to her and imaging some
of the situations these families and teachers have been through, the lecture of
“The myth of the culture of poverty” (Gorski, 2008) came to my mind, because these
families work in whatever they need and can and still have not gotten better opportunities
to thrive in their life, I think this is what poverty does.
After talking to Fany, I am just more thankful for all the
good opportunities my program offers to families and staff, I am more aware of
the effects that poverty can have on children and families, but also the way I can
support families in this situation, like planning opportunities where families
feel important and included in the program through classes and classroom
activities.
Reference
Gorski, P. (2008). The myth of the "culture of
poverty". Educational Leadership, 65(7), 32–36
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ReplyDeleteHi Caty
ReplyDeleteI think you have a wonderful contact in Mexico and her dedication to her work is evident. It was good to see that they offered families an alternative way of paying there tuition by bartering their services instead, however I am sure the shortage of actual money reduces the amount of resources that they have available for programming. I also found it interesting how large the class size was. In Canada, publicly funded education starts at 3-4 years old in junior kindergarten and we would have no more then 22 in a kindergarten class of 4-5 year olds, with one teacher and one early childhood educator in each classroom.
Carolyn
Hi Carolyn,
DeleteWhen I moved to USA, I was amazed to see two teachers, at least, in a classroom with less or around 20 students, because in Mexico the teacher-student ratios are usually 1 to 30 in public and some private schools.
Is the education for the 3 year olds mandatory in Canada?
In Mexico, since about 10 years ago, it is mandatory for the 4 year olds, but not all schools offer classes for this age, because of the lack of room. Actually, when the SEP decided it to be mandatory, a lot of teachers and their Union raised their voice because the buildings were not ready for this increase in their population.
Hi Caty,
ReplyDeleteHow powerful it is to have a first hand account of situtions in other countries. I think you hit on a key point when she reported the families were happy to receive the cooking and practical classes as well as willingly participated in helping at the school. I thought back to the video of the family who now lived in the states, but the mom really longed for the family and culture of her homeland. The wealth of love and joy her family shared seemed to overshadow the lack of material things. On the other hand, the teacher/director's frustrations reflect the reality of limited resources. You can only imagine how much more everyone would benefit if funding was available for more staff and resources. Thank you for sharing that realistic glimpse of the early childhood experience in Mexico.
Hi Suzanne,
DeleteSadly the lack of materials is a common situation in some kindergartens, especially when those are not located in a city, but teachers have found the way do adapt whatever things they have in order to create their own materials for working with children, which is a way to also show families how they can create their own too.
It is also very common that teachers spend a good percentage of their own money in buying things for their classroom, even though their wages are not high enough.
Caty,
ReplyDeleteDid you go to school in Mexico? If so what were your experiences like? Similar or different then the one you described. Fany sounds like a dedicated teacher. I enjoyed hearing about her and her dual role as a teacher and a director. I often believe that individuals are resourceful and do the best with what they have. I have been in classrooms where the resources are plentiful and others who's classroom have much less. But educators of young children are smart and are creative, and I am sure Fany too does the best she can given the circumstances.
Thank-you, for sharing your story. This past March I had the opportunity to visit Mexico. My friend and I took a cab, to a village not to far from where we were staying. We saw children and families living in extreme poverty. It saddened me.
Of course I was there on vacation so I was staying in a nice/ area hotel. But, I can tell you, I was so impressed with the kindness and generosity of so many of the people, many of the people we encountered were so warm. When we were sitting on the beach, there was a group of men, that were hired to carry the seaweed up that had washed up on shore. Those men were all hard workers, they did there job thoroughly and with pride. It opened my eyes to a world I had never experienced, and with a culture of dedicated hard workers.
Millie
Hi Millie,
DeleteI got my bachelor’s degree while I was still living in Mexico. I also worked there for two years, but in the same town where I am from, and there we were very lucky to have a well-equipped building. Despite some parents who could not afford to pay the 25 pesos monthly fees, we always had good feedback from parents, not only with the economics, but also when we invited them to participate in classroom or site activities, especially when we had our Christmas celebration, workshops, and/or parenting classes. I remember when I planned a piñata workshop I thought only few parents would join us, but we had such great attendance that instead of working inside the classroom we had to use the roofed patio.
Even though I had to invest some of my own money to buy classroom materials or to create them, I learned so much from those experiences. When I started working in USA I was amazed of seeing all the materials we could order from catalogs, I also could not understand why some teachers complained that the site did not have enough materials, sincerely I thought they should visit centers with less materials but with a better way of working with families.
Most of the time I still wish all early childhood classrooms in Mexico could be equipped with at least the minimum materials or as good as the ones I have been working at here in USA.
Thanks Millie for your interest in my experiences in Mexico! You made me remember such great times.
Caty,
ReplyDeleteYou are doing a great job. It sounds like you have established a personal and professional relationship with your contact. Based on what you have learned, do you think that the contact can provide you with information on programs that have been effective in her country? Furthermore, I like the fact that the schools allow parents to work off the lunch fees.
Hi Tammy,
DeleteYou are right Tammy; I have established good communication with Fany, and when we get in touch again I will ask her more about the effectiveness of early childhood programs.