Papers by Judith Bernhard
Early Childhood Education, 2000
A request to Arlene and Judith for a critique of Aboriginal Head Start evaluations led to this re... more A request to Arlene and Judith for a critique of Aboriginal Head Start evaluations led to this retrospect and prospect on purposes and processes of early childhood care and education. 'The work has been a multi-log over several years involving indigenous educators and communities, along with others concerned about indigenous developmental goals, authenticity and power in intercultural relationships. We revisit deeply problematic issues in conventional evaluation approaches. W e theorize and speculate on alternatives grounded in Aboriginal experiencesa nd values of 'good care' in childhood. PARAMETRES D-EVALUATION' DES I BONS SOINS *' DANS LES MILIEUX PRESCOLAIRES AUTOCHTONES CANADIENS RESUME C'est une demande adressee a Arlene et Judith pour qu'elles fassent une critique des evaluations d'un programme Bon depart autochtone qui a abouti a cette retrospective et prospective sur les objectifs et les methodes de soins et d'education de la petite enfance. Le projet s'est echelonne sur plusieurs annees avec des educateurs et des communautes autochtones, et d'autres qui s'interessent aux objectifs de developpement des Autochtones, et a l'authenticite et au pouvoir des rappor Ls interculturels. Nous analysons des elements hautement problematiques dans les methodes d'evaluation classiques. Nous theorisons et speculons au suj et des options enracinees dans les experiences autochtones et des valeurs des « bons soirns-dans la petite enfance.
We went to school to shed bad manners: rowdy manners, nigger manners, Creole manners-all the same... more We went to school to shed bad manners: rowdy manners, nigger manners, Creole manners-all the same thing... The vibrant spirit of learning and our Creole beings seemed to be in insurmountable contradiction. The teacher had not only us to contend with but also the entire country. He saw himself embarked upon as a mission of civilization, something like those missionaries who bury themselves in savage lands. Day after day, from one watering hole to another, without an ounce of pleasure, these finders of lost souls pressed on. The effort demanded was colossal, beyond mere brute strength. Since he had to slog through the mire every second he spent with us, each of his gestures, commands, and murmurs was armored with the Universal. The Universal was a buckler, a disinfectant, a religion, a hope.... (Chamoiseau, 1997, p. 97) As Chamoiseau's (1997) devastating tale of his experiences as a Creole speaker in the Francophone schools of Martinique so powerfully illustrates, subtractivity erases a child's ethnic and cultural identity, and hence can do irreparable damage to his or her self-esteem. In addition, the loss of the home language and culture has deep implications for children and families, not only in terms of lessened employment prospects in the future, but also because home language maintenance is intricately connected with a family's ability to pass on their culture. The subtractive experience that Chamoiseau describes is in many ways similar to that of minority and working class children in Canadian schools. In Canada as in the US, there is much talk of partnerships with parents, and parent collaboration. Parental involvement is said to promote home-school communication, decrease dropouts and absenteeism, and help build parental strategies for helping children. There are also calls for recognizing diversity and promoting a multicultural society. What is not looked at often is the relations between certain groups of parents and the educational system and how these are
What is my child learning at elementary school? Culturally contested issues between teachers and ... more What is my child learning at elementary school? Culturally contested issues between teachers and Latin American families. Canadian Ethnic Studies, 31(3), 72-94.
Professor Judith Bernhard teaches in the School of Early Childhood Education at Ryerson Universit... more Professor Judith Bernhard teaches in the School of Early Childhood Education at Ryerson University. She draws on her own experience of research in the field of transnational families to illustrate the challenges of collecting data that can inform practice in the field. She begins by outlining her own personal history as an immigrant and an academic. The difficulties of attempting to be both an advocate for families and a scholarly investigator touch her personally. She uses two cases to illustrate some of these difficulties. The first is the case of divergent perspectives on the role of a parent in the case of a young adolescent whose family had come to Canada from El Salvador. The girl's teacher and her family differed in their views on her rights and responsibilities, based on their cultural values. Dr. Bernhard describes how these different views were also represented among the members of the research team. Her own roots in South America gave her an understanding of the family's position, while her academic training allowed her to sympathize with the teacher's purposes. The team wrote a report that did not fully reflect the tension between the cultures; however, Dr. Bernhard concludes that researchers need to be more mindful of their own professional training and acculturation as important markers to consider in the research process. The second case she presents raises the difficulties she encountered using interviews to investigate the lived experience of refugee Somali mothers. The first interviewer, although an experienced researcher with immigrant roots, proved unacceptable to the Somali families, mostly because he was male. The next person chosen came from the Somali community and was trained by the researchers to obtain informed consent and conduct standard interviews. Dr. Bernhard describes how cultural perceptions and norms made it impossible to use these standardized approaches with the population under investigation, meaning that no credible research paper on the findings could be published. This in turn meant that information about the families' situation and views would not reach professionals and policy makers whose decisions influence the families' lives. Dr. Bernhard encourages the research community to reflect on how to take cultural issues into consideration when deciding what is meant by significant "data" and the best methods for collecting them.
Recent Perspectives on Early Childhood Education in Canada, 2012
There is little research on English language learners (ELLs) in relation to learning disability (... more There is little research on English language learners (ELLs) in relation to learning disability (LD) assessment and identification. More important, there is a scarcity of research on models and strategies that enhance learning opportunities and outcomes for ELLs prior to an LD diagnosis. We describe in this article an innovative lan-guage intervention program involving the creation of bilingual, student self-authored identity texts. Called the Early Authors Program (EAP), the intervention stands as an example of how spaces and opportunities for literacy development among young ELLs can be created in a classroom instructional environment. The EAP, which reached 800 families, was evaluated using a combination of methods and instruments. The goal of the evaluation component was to collect data spanning one year from 325 randomly selected participating children in both control and experimental groups. Among its several beneficial outcomes, the EAP had demonstrably positive effects on ch...
The focus of a cultural-contextual approach to development is to recognize the fact that consider... more The focus of a cultural-contextual approach to development is to recognize the fact that considerable differences exist among human individuals, especially in terms of their diverse sociocultural backgrounds. This paper examines how a group of early childhood education students responded to the presentation of a cultural-contextual approach during a human development course. A variety of data were gathered on the reactions of 81 students enrolled in the course during their first year of a four-year undergraduate degree program in early childhood education. The data reflected a number of course-related issues, and the investigation looked for signs that the cultural approach was salient for the students. There appeared to be evidence for only a small degree of success in conveying the approach in terms of students actually mentioning such issues. In analyzing the findings we propose that to reach a larger number of students, it may be neces5.:1.ry to address in a deliberate way the explicit and implicit messages concerning what is important to know about human development. The underlying assumptions of the \\ider course of study may need to be addressed as well, both at the program level and within the individual courses themselves. Implications for teaching are presented. Resume Le point focal d 'une approche culturelle-contextuelle au deveIoppement est de reconnaitre Ie fait qu 'il existc des differences considerables parmi tcs individus humains surtout au niveau de leurs antecedents socioculturels divers. Cet article examine comment un groupe d' etudiants a reagi a la presentation d'une approche culturelle-contextuelle pendant un cours de dcveioppement humain. Des donnees sur Ies reactions des 81 cleves, dans leur premiere annee d'un programme de quatre ans dans l'etude de la petite enfance, ant ete recueillies. Ces donnees refletenl un nombre de sujets abordes pendant Ie cours ou I' enquele visait a trouver des signes que I' approche cuIturelIe elail significative pour les etudiants. Il semblait avoir des preuves pour seuIement un degre limite de succes en termes d'etudianls qui mentionnaieot veritablement ces genres d' idees. En analysant les resuItats, pour atteindre un plus grand nombre etudiants oous proposons qu' il serait peut-Nre nccessaire d'adresser directement les messages implicites et explicites concernant ce qui est important de savoir sur Ie dcveloppement humain. De plus, nous devrions peut-etre aussi regarder Ies suppositions sous-jacentes au niveau du programme ainsi qu'au niveau des cours individuels. Les implications au niveau de l'enseignemenl sont presentees.
This study focused on the effects of precarious status on the well-being of fifteen participants ... more This study focused on the effects of precarious status on the well-being of fifteen participants with particular attention to their attempts to claim services, their feelings of belonging and sense of social support, and the effects of parents' status on children. It investigates ways in which the status of one family member can affect the well-being of the entire family. Those who had children reported that the family's status disadvantaged their children, whether they were Canadian or foreign-born, as parents' status was used to justify denying children rights to which they are entitled by international, national, and provincial laws. The paper challenges approaches to citizenship and immigration status that fail to consider the implications of legal status for a person's primary social units and networks.
Journal of Childhood Studies, Apr 30, 1997
The development of a series of theoretically based interventions for newcomer (immigrant) parents... more The development of a series of theoretically based interventions for newcomer (immigrant) parents was undertaken over a 10-year period through an iterative method of designing and analyzing a series of ethnographic studies of its implementation. The results of three such interventions are reported here. The work was based on the critical theory of Freire and the post-Marxist and radical theories of Bourdieu and Cummins. Specifically, the interventions were designed to help immigrant groups of parents (of Latino origin) to understand their position of marginality, to help empower them, and to provide them with a basis for acting in support of their children's education in the new host country. The findings of the interventions reported show how the research program evolved along with the dialectic refinement of practice and theory. Nous avons entrepris le développement d'une série d'interventions à base théorique visant les parents nouvellement arrivés (immigrants) au cours d'une période de 10 ans en employant une méthode itérative pour concevoir et analyser une série d'études ethnographiques portant sur sa mise en oeuvre. Nous faisons état des résultats de trois de ces interventions. Le travail reposait sur la théorie critique de Freire et des théories postmarxistes et radicales de Bourdieu et Cummins. Plus précisément, les interventions ont été conçues pour venir en aide à des groupes spécifiques de parents (d'origine latino) en les aidant à comprendre leur marginalité, en les rendant autonomes, et en leur fournissant les bases pour être en mesure d'appuyer l'éducation de leurs enfants dans le nouveau pays hôte. Les résultats des interventions étudiées indiquent l'évolution du programme de recherche au fur et à mesure de l'amélioration de la pratique et la théorie.
Hospital for Sick Children digital.library.ryerson.ca/object/274
Journal of education for students placed at risk, Apr 3, 2019
Contemporary perspectives on emergent literacy in preschool emphasize the importance of providing... more Contemporary perspectives on emergent literacy in preschool emphasize the importance of providing developmentally appropriate, authentic, early writing experiences and supporting students' home language and culture. The current study analyzed kindergarten outcomes for 82 linguistically diverse, low-income children (60% Black, 40% Latino) who participated in the Early Authors Program (EAP) during preschool , and those for a demographically similar comparison group of 33 children who did not receive the intervention. The intervention emphasized family involvement and cultural sensitivity and involved children self-authoring books about themselves and their family. Children in the EAP program scored higher than comparison children on school readiness screeners a year or two later in kindergarten, and were more likely to be classified as "ready' for school. EAP children also outperformed comparison children on emergent (English) literacy skills in kindergarten as measured by the DIBELS. Boys in the EAP group received higher grades in kindergarten than boys in the comparison group. The positive effects of the Early Authors Program appear to be sustained through kindergarten.
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Papers by Judith Bernhard