As I thought about my video
ethnography and lesson plan I was overwhelmed.
Where was I going to start? What
was something that I can do to show who I am?
For those of you that know me this caused many sleepless nights and then
it came to me.
My principal had told me that my
school district is looking at increasing parent involvement at my school and
across the district this upcoming school year.
I have a good relationship with a lot of families at my school and she
asked that prior to school starting I meet with her to discuss ways to increase
parent/family involvement.
My school is the only neighbor
school in the entire district, this means that all of my students are within
walking distance to the school. Even
though we are close to student’s homes there is a lack of parent
involvement. We no longer have a PTO or
School Governance Council (basically a PTO that we tried a few years ago) even
after moving the meeting to drop off time in the morning. This past school year we tried “Circle of
Care”, a support and educational group for parents and caregivers. The most parents we had a meeting was
FIVE. We are a school with three hundred
children and only five parents came to these meetings. This begs the question,
“How can we get parents involved and stay involved’? Which leads me to my ethnography.
My ethnography shows how with
family and friends involvement students can receive support to help them be
successful. My ethnography is going to
be used during Kindergarten Open House.
I want to show parents that with their support at home and my support at
school this will help their children and their education. I also want to use my ethnography to show my
Kindergartners how family doesn’t have to be a direct relative but instead a
group of people that care about them and their success. Our School Motto is “Together We’re Better”;
I think my ethnography shows that.
One of our Social Studies units
is Individual Development/Identity and my ethnography
lesson fits perfectly into that. My
students will get to learn a little bit more about me in a fun way. It will be a little tough for my students to
complete their own ethnography online so instead I will have them work on their
family tree and important people in their lives. Students will then get to
share it with their classmates and then post it to the classroom blog.
I am looking forward to sharing
my ethnography with my students and their families. It is a fun way for them to learn about
me. I was anxious about sharing my
ethnography with family and friends but I wanted to hear their thoughts before
I put it out for the world to see.
Everyone said that it was totally me with the pictures (don’t mind the
crazy hair styles) and the music. What I
wanted them to understand is that I am where I am because of them and their
support and encouragement that I have achieved many successes. So even though this ethnography was an
overwhelming task it was worth it and I look forward to using it in the future.