When I first started working with the Gender, Sexuality and the Family team at the Institute, I was troubled by the use of the word ‘consent’ in relation to interactions between children and their caregivers. For me, the word consent belonged within the field of law, in relation to sexual assault. In their patient and…
Megan Madison and Jessica Ralli Publish First Conversations
Megan Madison, an innovator at the intersection of social justice and early childhood as well as the leader of the Gender, Sexuality and the Family team at the Institute and Jessica Ralli, the Coordinator of Early Literacy Programs at Brooklyn Public Library, have recently published the Our Skin: A First Conversation About Race. This book…
The Moms. We are Slowly Breaking.
Early childhood educators are mostly women and many of us are mothers or caregivers for elderly relatives, or both. After a December jobs report in which all of the jobs lost were women’s jobs, with women losing 156,000 jobs and men gaining 16,000, there has been more discussion of the experience of working mothers during…
Your Weekend Watchlist from Our Gender, Sexuality and the Family Team
If your pandemic winter is dragging on, and there’s nothing new on Netflix, consider using some viewing time to learn about the experiences and perspectives of LQBTQIA+ children and teens. Catalina Schliebener, an artist and trainer on the Institute’s Gender, Sexuality and the Family in Early Childhood team, put together this watchlist for you. Note…
Lesley Koplow Publishes a Book for Children in the Time of COVID
This month Lesley Koplow published a new book for young children living through the pandemic. Lilah in the Land of the Littles: A Story for Children in the Time of COVID tells the story of a pre-school age child as she navigates the isolation of quarantine. Lilah misses playing with her neighbor. Her mother is…
Vote for Early Care and Education
We know it’s rainy and the lines are long, but nothing is more important than voting right now. Let’s do this. Early voting runs until Sunday, November 1. Your early voting polling place may be different than your Election Day polling place. Click here to find out where to vote early. The hours are not the…
New York Times: The State of Play
A recent series in the New York Times investigates how play shapes how children see the world. The series is affirming for the early childhood field as it discusses how the games children play encourage resilience, help motor development, are full of cultural meaning, and more. Read the series
Laleña Garcia Publishes “What We Believe: A Black Lives Matter Principles Activity Book”
We are happy to share that Laleña Garcia, who works as a facilitator of Gender, Sexuality and the Family trainings at the Institute, in addition to teaching at Manhattan Country School, has announced the publication of her book What We Believe: A Black Lives Matter Principles Activity Book, illustrated by Caryn Davidson. The guiding principles of…
Children Wearing Face Coverings: Questions and Answers
On September 10th, the New York City Division of Early Childhood Education (DECE) updated its guidance on face coverings, bringing the guidance for 3K and Pre-K for All classrooms in NYCEECs into alignment with the guidance for district schools: All children ages two and over who can medically tolerate a face covering should be expected…
Arts and the Revised New York State Early Learning Guidelines
All children are artists. The problem is how to remain an artist once he grows up. – Pablo Picasso From an early age, children engage with the world as artists, composing arrangements of objects, lines, colors, words, sounds, movements, and gestures. Children use art all the time, to represent their ideas about beauty, science, math,…