GHegstetter.Commentary#1 by Grace Hegstetter

Grace Hegstetter

gehegstetter — 2024-05-22 02:14:19 UTC

Hello everyone! I am in the MS in Early Childhood/Childhood Education program. I am an International Teacher.

Student Teaching in Ghana

gehegstetter — 2024-05-22 02:18:15 UTC

I graduated from SUNY Geneseo with a bachelors degree in Early Childhood Education. I student taught for a preschool class in Kumasi Ghana for 3 months. I did my second placement in Rochester, NY for second grade.

My first job post college!

gehegstetter — 2024-05-22 02:27:40 UTC

I was hired in 2018 to work in Myanmar at an international school as a pre-K teacher but COVID and a Military Coup changed everything. I ended up teaching two years online!! A very usual teaching experience which I am sure some of you can relate to in some way.

Currently living and working in Colombia

gehegstetter — 2024-05-22 02:30:34 UTC

I currently live in a small city in Colombia as a first grade teacher. I have been here for 8 months and love my job! I work entirely with ESL learners. Balancing my first year in person teaching, learning Spanish, and taking classes at UAlbany has been crazy!

Yoga and Art

gehegstetter — 2024-05-22 02:33:41 UTC

When I lived in the US, I taught yoga! I also love to paint and draw. This is a drawing I did of myself on my ipad.

gehegstetter — 2024-05-22 02:35:52 UTC

South East

gehegstetter — 2024-05-22 02:40:06 UTC

-Looking at the big picture

-Feelings first! We can learn if we are not mentally and physically ready and secure

-Examine the possibilities

gehegstetter — 2024-05-22 02:40:18 UTC

Play Based Learning

gehegstetter — 2024-05-23 01:21:10 UTC

I have always loved working with young children. When I was 17 I babysat for a 4 year old who was in a play-based pre school. This was my first introduction to alternative types of education and it started my interest in becoming a teacher.

Personal Narrative

gehegstetter — 2024-05-23 01:40:16 UTC

Here is a personal narrative I wrote for another class awhile back. It tells an important story in my life learning learning about my privilege and biases. It directly relates with ideas related to the position statement.

Biases and Inequalities

gehegstetter — 2024-05-23 02:22:18 UTC

I did one of my student teaching placements in a low income school in Rochester, NY. I was horrified and deeply saddened to learn/experience how unequal education is within the US, especially for schools with high populations of black and brown children. All the children in my student teaching class were black and the resources were greatly lacking; not only in the school but also the community surrounding it. Children there were faced with unimaginable losses and struggles at such young ages. The school tried to do what they could, but from a big picture, it was a failure of the system. The experience at the school was so upsetting that I questioned my profession and the whole system I was working under. Do I struggle with limited resources, difficult behaviours, less pay to try and support these struggling schools? Or do I work in an environment with greater support, better funding, less behaviours, and more pay? In the end, I felt like I was picking what economic status and race to work with. There are so many biases and inequalities within the system of education it is devastating.

I am glad to be a part of a generation that is working more to acknowledge this bias and inequality within the system. Growing up in a predominately white environment with a lot of privilege, I was not exposed to different cultures until much later in my life. I enjoyed learning about the idea of “cultural construction zones” as a way to disrupt ideologies and comfort zones from Souto-Manning’s (2017, p. 86-87) article. The more we question our own environments and explicit biases the better we can support others. Now working as a teacher, I see more than ever the importance in breaking down my own biases and personal assumptions to best support and meet learners where they are at. Especially now being at an International school its important that I stay open minded to differences in mindsets and cultures.

Data Analysis

gehegstetter — 2024-05-23 02:28:25 UTC

My school currently uses writing samples, F&P exams that follow a running record, DIBELS, and informal/ formal assessments to collect data. I am looking forward to learning about more ways to utalize and collect data in an early childhood environment.