Expanding Horizons & Resources Pt. 2: Changing Demographics & Diversity

As I stated last week, I've decided to explore the ZERO TO THREE website. I chose this site because my new position is at a Navy Child Development Center and I feel I may be a little rusty on working with children birth to three. Obviously, I hold the knowledge that's necessary, however, I feel like sometimes, we need a little refresher on the information we hold in regards to a subject that hasn't been at the forefront of our field experience.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

ZERO TO THREE consists of over 160 members from several human services fields such as child development, mental health, social science research, medicine, and community leadership. Together, this group of professionals works together to provide the most up-to-date information, research, and advocacy in regards to ensuring "all babies and toddlers have a strong start in life."
You can explore their site yourself here -->: https://www.zerotothree.org/ or you can go about your daily life and let me do the dirty work of exploring their sites and breaking down all it has to offer- just check back here every week or so!

I signed up for the ZERO TO THREE newsletters last week, but have yet to receive one. So I'm going to use an article I found in their journal (which Walden has access too- just go to the Library and look up ZERO TO THREE and a majority of their journals will be at your fingertips!). After exploring their resources, the article titled Parenting Practices in Cultural Context: An Ecological Perspective by Zoherh Zarnegar stood out to me in light of the issue/trend we are focusing on this week.

With regards to the effects of culture and diversity on children and families, this article supports the notion that educators, health care professionals, and researchers alike should focus on an "ecological cross-cultural, integrated perspective (Zarnegar, 2015, p.49)" to the developmental needs of children. The article suggests that a key factor in achieving this is to collaborate with " the child, the parent, the family, and the institutions in a given community, while keeping parental well-being in mind (p.49)." With a focus on providing extra social supports and being respectful of the families cultural child-rearing practices, values, and beliefs, early childhood educators and human service professionals can aid in a smoother transition into the families adopted "host country" and ensure the healthy development of the children.

An interesting part of the article focused on a comparison of the child-rearing practices in the U.S. and in Iran and mentioned a topic I've brought up in previous course. In regards to family dynamic, there's individualism and collectivism and they differ immensely. Individualism, common in the U.S. emphasizes a sense of independence among family members, even children. Whereas collectivism, common in Iran, promotes interdependence and strong family ties. This finding is very interesting because among all the research throughout my time in the field this has been a common occurrence that most other cultures emphasize a collectivistic family dynamic.


Reference

Zarnegar, Z. (2015). Parenting practicing in cultural context: An ecological perspective. Zero to Three. 35(4) pp. 44-52.