Advocacy Efforts

As language can be a major barrier to communicating with families in the education setting, we strive to bridge the gap as much as possible within our program. The challenges of families' home languages being ones other than English can increase the miscommunication between staff, children, and families. Families are unable to verbally important updates about their children, such as changes in the home, developmental milestones reached by the children at home, and new interests of children and families. In addition, teachers are unable to verbally communicate important updates to the families as well.

In this case, we incorporated other methods of communication and inclusion of the families' home languages into the classroom (Martinez, 2018). This includes communicating through digital platforms that present the information in written form, translating the information to the necessary languages and labeling the classroom materials in both the children’s home languages and in English. Moreover, we embrace different cultures, including languages. Therefore, we are open to learning new languages to help your children continue learning and developing. In this case, teachers usually use words and phrases in the children’s home languages interchangeably with English when communicating with them to help continue meeting their needs.