I received my Education Assistant and Community Support Worker in March 2020, just as COVID-19 hit. While was happy within the daycare setting, I wanted to work within the school district and provide extra support for students who may need extra assistance or more challenges. I found this to be a very meaningful experience for me as I was very new to the world of exceptionalities. This gave me a basic understanding of the variety of challenges, obstacles, and variety of factors children face in their everyday lives. I appreciate this learning opportunity, and I know it was a guidance in working towards the Bachelor of Education program.I completed my Early Childhood Education Certificate just before completing my CEA certificate. I was working in the daycare at the time and through this experience and education, I gained knowledge in the development of children’s minds from a young age. This aided me in guiding, helping, and supporting students in ways that I otherwise wouldn’t have known to. It gave me great insight into the why’s and how a child’s mind works. I believe this part of my education will greatly benefit my teaching journey, especially within the early years learning as it gave me a basic understanding of expectations for children and students that are age appropriate and set the child and myself up for success.In 2024, I enrolled in the ECE Special Needs Certificate. This was a program I was very interested in specifically once I became a lead educator in a daycare setting. Within this setting, I experienced children who faced additional challenges. I did my best to support them, but ultimately, I knew I needed to gain more knowledge. This program helped me view student’s struggles from a different lens and it guided me into a new mindset of how to support children at a young age go through their obstacles each day. I found this program to be extremely beneficial and valuable, and the fact that my daughter received her autism diagnosis during this time also gave me opportunities to express my thoughts, ideas, and feelings to my class as a means of support, and helped me view the diagnosis in an alternate way.
