Arkansas has experienced a rapid growth in the number of individuals moving into the state who speak Spanish. Child care providers, early childhood educators, and other professionals have been greatly affected by this population growth, but many have received little training to assist them in adapting their services to work more effectively with Spanish speaking children and their families. Additional training is needed on cultural differences, assessing children for possible developmental delays, and second language acquisition. UAMS Partners for Inclusive Communities (Partners)is addressing these needs through the Welcome the Children project. Welcome the Children is a two-year (July 2003 – June 2005) training project that is funded by the Department of Human Services, Division of Child Care and Early Childhood Education.
Welcome the Children is using proven training materials developed by Partners through the Nuestra Familia ("Our Family") project to provide training to early childhood professionals and others who work with children who speak Spanish. Two seven-hour training modules have been developed:
Module 1: “Cultural Diversity,†covers recognition and acceptance of cultural and linguistic diversity.
Module 2: “Second Language Development and Assessment in Early Childhood,†covers the firstlanguage and second language acquisition process for young children, how to assess children for language difference vs. language delay, and strategies for working with families to reinforce classroom activities.
To ensure that these training materials will be available statewide, Welcome the Children is developing the capacity of local trainers to provide these training sessions to professionals in early childhood programs and others in their areas of the state. This is being accomplished through the development of community teams that consist of volunteer local trainers and other individuals who provide expertise and ideas to assist the trainers.
Community teams are currently being developed in areas with high Latino populations such as Northwest, Central, Southeast, Southwest and West Central Arkansas. The community teams consist of child care providers; early and elementary childhood educators; disability and healthcare providers; clergy; family members; and representatives of Latino groups. With in-depth support from project staff, these community teams will coordinate local training efforts. Welcome the Children staff will provide training, technical assistance, and some financial support to assist the teams to present the training sessions within their communities.
The Welcome the Children project is bringing together individuals who are committed to working effectively with children who speak Spanish, to be a part of these community training teams. All community team members will receive the two-day Welcome the Children training in addition to a one-day training on team building and developing community training plans. A few volunteers on each team will receive technical assistance to prepare them to present the two training sessions to groups within their areas. The remainder of the community teams will be comprised of individuals who agree to support the trainers through information and contacts. Team members will become resources for others seeking information to support Latino families living in Arkansas.
For additional information, please contact: Brenda Reynolds, Project Coordinator, 501-922-1880 (V/Fax),
[email protected]
