What Is The Philosophy Of Head Start Programs

Home. BCMW Head Start. BCMW Head Start is a federally funded, comprehensive child development program which strives to promote a rich, nurturing, learning environment for families of Bond, Clinton, Marion, Washington and Franklin Counties, offering exciting opportunities and ensuring the highest level of services. We are committed to continuing the proud heritage of serving children and families that has been our trademark since 1. BCMW Head Start has a long tradition of delivering comprehensive and high quality services designed to foster development in low income children. We are funded for 4. We provide a range of individualized services in the areas of Education Early Childhood Development Medical, Dental Mental Health Nutrition and Parent Engagement. In addition, the entire range of Head Start services is responsive and appropriate to each child and familys developmental, ethnic, cultural and linguistic heritage and experiences. Our program must adhere to specific Head Start Program Performance Standards, Regulations Head Start Act and DCFS Standards. These requirements define the services that we are to provide to the children and families we serve. They constitute the expectations and requirements that our program must meet. The standards are designed to ensure that goals and objectives are implemented successfully, that the Head Start philosophy continues to thrive, and that we maintain the highest possible quality in the provision of Head Start services. PARENT ENGAGEMENT COMMUNITY PARTNERSHIPSBCMW Head Start program is family centered and designed to support parents as the most important influence in their childs life. The program strives to meet the needs and interest of the families enrolled through a variety of activities, trainings and educational opportunities. What Is The Philosophy Of Head Start Programs' title='What Is The Philosophy Of Head Start Programs' />Three Stages of Writing 1. Early Stages The early stages of writing a philosophy paper include everything you do before you sit down and write your first draft. The University of St. Thomas named after philosopher and theologian St. Thomas Aquinas may eliminate philosophy programs, a signal of financial strain and a. Head Starts comprehensive approach to services is achieved through partnering with area social services agencies, local businesses, clubs, colleges, Pre K programs, health service providers, community volunteers and public schools. These organizations and agencies have agreements andor memorandums of understanding with our program. CHILD OUTCOMES SCHOOL READINESSBCMW Head Start implements the Creative Curriculum, a research based curriculum for preschool children based on five components how children develop and learn the learning environment what children learn the teachers role and the familys role. The Head Start Child Development and Early Learning Framework is utilized to promote positive outcomes for all children 3 5 years old. It represents the foundation of the Head Start Approach to School Readiness. It aligns with and builds from the five essential domains of school readiness identified by the National Education Goals Panel and lays out essential areas of learning and development. The Framework is used to guide curriculum implementation and assessment to plan teaching and learning experiences that align to school readiness goals and track childrens progress across developmental domains. School Readiness Goals are developed with input from parents, Head Start teachers, kindergarten teachers and LEAs. The goals are as follows Domain. Goals. Social Emotional Development. Children will develop positive relationships with children adults are able to function as a part of a group. Children will demonstrate ability to regulate their emotions behavior. Physical Development Health. Children will demonstrate ability to take care of their personal needs practice basic health safety rules. Children will demonstrate ability to move with balance, coordination control. Children will demonstrate increased eye hand coordination use of fine motor skills. Cognition General Knowledge. Children will demonstrate beginning understanding recognition of numbers, shapes, patterns number concepts for use in every day routines. Children will show beginning understanding of family community characteristics jobs. Children will show ability to plan, observe, explore natural resources, living things, simple tools equipment. Language Literacy. Children will demonstrate ability to understand express increasing varied complex language. Children who are dual language learners will demonstrate proficiency in their home language progress in acquiring receptive expressive English. Children will demonstrate a beginning awareness of the printed word develop book appreciation. Children will demonstrate letter recognition phonological awareness. Children will understand purposes of writing demonstrate beginning use of writing tools to convey meaning through written representations, symbols letters. Approaches to Learning. Children will exhibit interest participate in a variety of creative experiences. Children will exhibit curiosity, demonstrate the desire to learn persistence in completing tasks. BCMW Head Start implemented the usage of i. Start. Smart mobile HATCH Tablets in August 2. Each classroom and Home Base is equipped with the preschool learning tablet that uses technology to build school readiness skills and improve outcomes. Pre loaded with research based early learning software and apps hand picked by experts, it monitors child progress as they play, showing adults exactly what each child knows Unique reporting tools allow administrators to see faster child learning results allowing for personalized learning and refocused instruction. BCMW Head Start implemented Teaching Strategies GOLD TSGold to complement its curriculum several years ago. The Teaching staff and Education team have been trained in the technology to provide a seamless system for assessing children from birth through kindergarten. Extensive field tests have shown it to be both valid and reliable. The 3. 8 objectives at the heart of TSGOLD guide teachers through the assessment cycle. The objectives cover 1. Many of the objectives also include dimensions that guide teachers thinking about various aspects of a given objective and help clarify the behavior it addresses. Literacy. 2.   Mathematics. Science Technology. Social Studies. 5. The Arts. English Language Acquisition. Social Emotional. Language. 10.   Cognitive. BCMW Head Start, in partnership with the local communities, holds Book Drives throughout January and February to collect new and slightly used books. Events are planned during Dr. Seuss week to distribute the books to children and their family in an effort to promote literacy. Book walks, Bingo, Ring around the Rosie and Minute to Win It, are just a few of the parentchild activities planned allowing the children an opportunity to win numerous books. BCMW Head Start has formed a male involvement program titled, Heroes United. This group was created to encourage positive male role model in the lives of our children. Male figures and their children are united throughout the program year for special activities and events to foster and promote positive mentoring for the next generation. Guidelines on Writing a Philosophy Paper. Philosophical writing is different from the writing youll be asked to do in other courses. Most of the strategies described below will also serve you well when writing for other courses, but dont automatically assume that they all will. Nor should you assume that every writing guideline youve been given by other teachers is important when youre writing a philosophy paper. Some of those guidelines are routinely violated in good philosophical prose e. Contents. What Does One Do in a Philosophy Paper A philosophy paper consists of the reasoned defense of some claim. Your paper must offer an argument. It cant consist in the mere report of your opinions, nor in a mere report of the opinions of the philosophers we discuss. You have to defend the claims you make. You have to offer reasons to believe them. So you cant just say. My view is that P. You must say something like. My view is that P. I believe this because. I find that the following considerations. P. Similarly, dont just say. Descartes says that Q. Instead, say something like. Descartes says that Q however, the following thought experiment will show that Q is not true. Descartes says that Q. I find this claim plausible, for the following reasons. There are a variety of things a philosophy paper can aim to accomplish. It usually begins by putting some thesis or argument on the table for consideration. Then it goes on to do one or two of the following. Criticize that argument or show that certain arguments for the thesis are no good. Defend the argument or thesis against someone elses criticism. Offer reasons to believe the thesis. Offer counter examples to the thesis. Graphik Font Free. Contrast the strengths and weaknesses of two opposing views about the thesis. Give examples which help explain the thesis, or which help to make the thesis more plausible. Argue that certain philosophers are committed to the thesis by their other views, though they do not come out and explicitly endorse the thesis. Discuss what consequences the thesis would have, if it were true. Revise the thesis, in the light of some objection. No matter which of these aims you set for yourself, you have to explicitly present reasons for the claims you make. Students often feel that since its clear to them that some claim is true, it does not need much argument. But its very easy to overestimate the strength of your own position. After all, you already accept it. You should assume that your audience does not already accept your position and you should treat your paper as an attempt to persuade such an audience. Hence, dont start with assumptions which your opponents are sure to reject. If youre to have any chance of persuading people, you have to start from common assumptions you all agree to. A good philosophy paper is modest and makes a small point but it makes that point clearly and straightforwardly, and it offers good reasons in support of it. People very often attempt to accomplish too much in a philosophy paper. The usual result of this is a paper thats hard to read, and which is full of inadequately defended and poorly explained claims. So dont be over ambitious. Dont try to establish any earth shattering conclusions in your 5 6 page paper. Done properly, philosophy moves at a slow pace. The aim of these papers is for you to show that you understand the material and that youre able to think critically about it. To do this, your paper does have to show some independent thinking. That doesnt mean you have to come up with your own theory, or that you have to make a completely original contribution to human thought. There will be plenty of time for that later on. An ideal paper will be clear and straightforward see below, will be accurate when it attributes views to other philosophers see below, and will contain thoughtful critical responses to the texts we read. It need not always break completely new ground. But you should try to come up with your own arguments, or your own way of elaborating or criticizing or defending some argument we looked at in class. Merely summarizing what others have said wont be enough. Three Stages of Writing. Early Stages. The early stages of writing a philosophy paper include everything you do before you sit down and write your first draft. These early stages will involve writing, but you wont yet be trying to write a complete paper. You should instead be taking notes on the readings, sketching out your ideas, trying to explain the main argument you want to advance, and composing an outline. Discuss the issues with others. As I said above, your papers are supposed to demonstrate that you understand and can think critically about the material we discuss in class. One of the best ways to check how well you understand that material is to try to explain it to someone who isnt already familiar with it. Ive discovered time and again while teaching philosophy that I couldnt really explain properly some article or argument I thought I understood. This was because it was really more problematic or complicated than I had realized. You will have this same experience. So its good to discuss the issues we raise in class with each other, and with friends who arent taking the class. This will help you understand the issues better, and it will make you recognize what things you still dont fully understand. Its even more valuable to talk to each other about what you want to argue in your paper. When you have your ideas worked out well enough that you can explain them to someone else, verbally, then youre ready to sit down and start making an outline. Make an outline. Before you begin writing any drafts, you need to think about the questions In what order should you explain the various terms and positions youll be discussingAt what point should you present your opponents position or argument In what order should you offer your criticisms of your opponent Do any of the points youre making presuppose that youve already discussed some other point, first And so on. The overall clarity of your paper will greatly depend on its structure. That is why it is important to think about these questions before you begin to write. I strongly recommend that you make an outline of your paper, and of the arguments youll be presenting, before you begin to write. This lets you organize the points you want to make in your paper and get a sense for how they are going to fit together. It also helps ensure that youre in a position to say what your main argument or criticism is, before you sit down to write a full draft of your paper. When students get stuck writing, its often because they havent yet figured out what theyre trying to say. Give your outline your full attention. It should be fairly detailed. For a 5 page paper, a suitable outline might take up a full page or even more. I find that making an outline is at least 8. If you have a good outline, the rest of the writing process will go much more smoothly. Start Work Early. Philosophical problems and philosophical writing require careful and extended reflection. Dont wait until two or three nights before the paper is due to begin. That is very stupid. Writing a good philosophy paper takes a great deal of preparation. You need to leave yourself enough time to think about the topic and write a detailed outline. Only then should you sit down to write a complete draft. Once you have a complete draft, you should set it aside for a day or two. Then you should come back to it and rewrite it.