Within these two weeks i had the opportunity to interact with professionals and colleagues. I visited Ms. Kristin's classroom, she is the lead teacher in the two year old classroom. I observed her classroom from 8:30 to 10:30 A.M. I had the opportunity to see how she interacts with the families and the children when they first arrived in the classroom. I observed how the children eat breakfast. I noticed that the children served themselves with teacher's help; they served two serving spoons. The children are allowed to have seconds if they eat all the food on their plate and the fruit. Children are allowed to serve only one serving spoon the second time.
I also observed the children playing in the classroom. Ms. Kristin's classroom is child initiated. When the children ply the teachers observe them and they expand on their creativity and curiosity. When I observed Ms. Kristin's classroom I noticed a child who had a hard time playing with his peers. This particular child wanted to play with everything everyone else was playing with. When Ms. Kristin saw specific child having difficulties playing with his peers she went and added toys and water in the water table. When the child saw she added water in the table he went and took a smack; put the smack on and started to play with the water.
The special learning experience related to my topic was breakfast. I learned that teachers are aware of children's weight and they tried to monitor what children eat. When I informed Ms. Kristin about my research topic she was not surprise. She said that childhood obesity is an important topic for families, because many children are overweight and obese. Ms. Kristin informed me that the reason they monitor children when eat is because the center followed a plan to monitor children's weight. Every three moths the children are weighted and if the child is overweight or under weight the family support worker; follows up with families to see if the child has any additional needs.
The second person I had the opportunity to observed and spend time with is the family support worker. Ms. Jessica is the family support worker for the two year old classroom. I had the opportunity to observe and see how she would input children data or information in COPA. Ms. Jessica explained that physicals, dental, immunizations, TB, Hearing & Vision, ASQ, Family partnership Agreement, Family assessments, and Case Notes regarding family and child are documents that go in COPA. Ms. Jessica is also responsible for scheduling meetings with the mental health provider. Ms. Jessica has many other duties, such as Scheduling SRT meetings, weighing children every three months, and accompanying teachers when visiting families homes.
Ms. Jessica provided great information regarding my topic. She informed me that she has to develop a plan for children who are overweight every three months. Ms. Jessica also follows up with Body Max Index (BMI). This is the weight plan. If the Body Max Index (BMI) is above 18% the child is overweight and the child is at risk of diabetes. If the BMI is under 18% the child is where he/she needs to be. She is responsible for making any adjustments and encouraging family to attend family's monthly meetings. In some of these meetings she arranges meetings with the nutritionist to to discuss information about home cooked meals and the importance of teaching children to eat all type of foods, such as eating vegetables and fresh fruits.
Hi Luz Flores,
ReplyDeleteI think that you have chosen a great topic. It is good that the children's servings of food are measured. However, what if the child wants more? What does the staff do? The school that you are observing, do they serve in a classroom or cafeteria? The school I'm observing serves in the classroom. But they serve as long as there is food left. Some children do not get enough at home, so they try to feed them as much as possible.
Hi La Tonia,
ReplyDeleteIf the child wants more food they are allowed to serve seconds but if they are still hungry the staff encouraged the child to eat the vegetables or the bread on their plate. The program is a Head Start Program. The students in in the classroom. They have Breakfast, Lunch, and Snack in the classroom.