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Feature Article
Expectations – What is Best?
By Roxie Nestlerode, Early Learning Specialist
It may seem that families want something different for their children than your program offers, but do they? A child’s family and caregivers want the “best” for each child – for all children to grow and learn, to be ready for school, and to be safe. Through national surveys and focus groups, NACCRRA (National Association of Child Care Resource and Referral Agencies) has found that top considerations for families when choosing child care were positive caregiver-child interactions, a safe environment, and a learning environment and activities that help children learn new things and socialize. These features mirror the goals of early care and education standards for best practices for programs.
So, if overall expectations of families for child care are the same as those of practitioners, why does it sometimes seem that you are on different pages? It may be that your program goals do meet families’ expectations, but that they believe different skills and attributes are needed to meet those goals. It’s not the “what”; it’s the “how”.
Developmentally Appropriate Expectations
In developmentally appropriate practice (DAP), three knowledge areas should inform your practice:
To establish realistic expectations and goals, consider the child’s own culture, overall child development, and individual development in respect to all aspects of the learning program. Of the three knowledge areas, it is generally easier to get information on child development and individual appropriateness than social and cultural appropriateness.
Knowledge Areas for informing DAP
Child Development Appropriateness –
Child development follows general, sequential patterns and is interrelated across domains (cognitive, physical, social and emotional). Know and understand milestones and sequences of development in all domains.
Individual Appropriateness –
Each child is an individual and develops in her own, unique way. Know each child's strengths, abilities, needs, challenges, interests, temperament, and approaches to learning. Know their individual skills, ideas and joys.
Social and Cultural Appropriateness –
All children are of culture. Know each child's cultural and family background - his unique family, values, expectations, language, lifestyles, and beliefs. Ensure that the experiences you provide respect these and are meaningful for each child/family.
To determine developmental appropriateness, there are formal tools that practitioners can use to assess practices and approaches for some elements. Today almost all states have developed or are developing early learning guidelines that are based on child development theory and practice. Many states are also using environment assessment tools (ex. the Environmental Rating Scales) as part of their Quality Rating and Improvement System (QRIS) initiatives, such as Keystone STARS, to evaluate learning environments and activities. Using these tools assures that child development milestones and best practices are steering activity planning, material selection, and room design so that activities and approaches have child development appropriateness.
Observing and assessing children’s growth and learning using reliable, standardized assessment tools (ex. Work Sampling, the Ounce Scale, Creative Curriculum, Ages & Stages) allows you to get to know each child – strengths, abilities, interests, and needs – plus gives you individualized information for each child so that activities and approaches have individual appropriateness.
For social and cultural appropriateness, many providers rely on informal ways of getting information. Information on a child’s social groups and culture may be gathered from brief conversations with families, chatting with children, information shared by others, information from past families, the media, and personal inquiry. When using informal methods, the amount and detail of social and cultural information that you collect on families will vary. Some programs may use formal methods for getting information to be sure that the same information is collected for all families. Families complete family background questionnaires or are interviewed by teachers as part of the enrollment process. Practitioners do home visits to learn about a child’s culture and social community.
Culture and Expectations
Culture is more than just the family’s country of origin. To fully understand a child’s culture, there are many contexts to consider. In addition to a child’s ethnicity, consider the family’s religious practices, socio-economic status, education, family system, and life situations.
Although ethnic groups and religions have general characteristics and common practices, the strength of cultural influence will vary. There may be regional or sect variations in customs. If a child’s family has recently immigrated, is only living temporarily in the country, or is living in an extended family with three or four generations, their family customs will probably be stronger than for nuclear families who have been living outside of their ancestral country for three or more generations. Talk with all families about cultural customs and expectations to understand individual families.
The communities that a family lives in and the systems that a family interacts with vary by socio-economic status. The life skills, knowledge, and social roles that a child will need to be successful within their world are different for all socio-economic levels and may be different from the skills and knowledge needed to be successful within your child care program. The educational background of the child’s family may also determine what they expect for early learning as they may base goals on what they experienced in school. The family system and life situations create expectations for the child’s role and interactions within their family. Family size, support systems, stresses, risk factors, and consistency will affect what the family can provide for the child, the child’s role, and family rules.
When determining social and cultural appropriateness, consider how activities prepare the child for the various cultural situations that the child has to navigate. Independence could be valued by the single parent, but in a multi-generational family, cooperation could help the child relate to other members. Directness is a trait associated with Western cultures, but is not widespread in Eastern cultures. Developmental steps, such as toilet learning, can be handled very differently between home and program. Child rearing practices are influenced by cultural traditions. Following or not following traditional procedures can affect bonds with the family’s and child’s cultural community. Learning goals will reflect educational opportunities that a child’s family believes their child will have. Some families will not see college as an option for their child, others may consider nothing else for their child, and others will want their child to follow the same career path as they did.
Creating Common Expectations
Get to know families’ dreams, goals, and expectations for their children through open and direct dialogue with families. Talk with families about expectations for planning at formal meetings, such as enrollment meetings or progress conferences, and informally throughout the year. Ask families about themselves through daily conversations. Giving families questionnaires is another way to get information about expectations. Using surveys can give families more time to think about expectations and be in a more relaxed setting, making it easier to express thoughts, questions, and concerns. Gather information through intake questionnaires and conference planning forms.
Along with identifying what families want, reflect on both your own and your program’s philosophy, mission, and vision for children’s growth and learning and for supporting families. Knowing your own beliefs is essential to establishing an open dialogue with families and knowing what expectations can truly be mutually supported and carried out within your program. Identify program resources, staff abilities, and community supports that can be used to meet family expectations. As early care and education professionals, we want to be able to help all children and families in our programs, but realistically that may not be possible. You may not have all supports needed or can not access outside supports for families and children.
Working closely with families to review program expectations for children, explore family expectations, and working to create common expectations will take time and effort, but will help you truly provide the “best” for the child and create a full partnership with families.
References are available at the end of the e-newsletter