Full transcript
0:06so why is the code important for Early
0:08Childhood
0:09Educators first and foremost and the
0:12thing I I really want us all to remember
0:15all the time is that it's essential be
0:17care because we care for children who
0:19are too young and too vulnerable to
0:21protect themselves and I always like to
0:24quote from Lilian cats's first book on
0:27ethics because this had such an
0:28influence on me I think it is it's so
0:31important she says um the more powerless
0:35the client is in relation to the
0:37practitioner in any pro profession the
0:41more imperative the profess
0:43professionals ethics become so I think
0:46it's very important for us because the
0:48children are so young and and vulnerable
0:51it's important because our work is
0:52complicated you know if you're a doctor
0:54you got a patient if you're a lawyer you
0:56got a client if you're an early
0:57childhood educator you have a child mhm
1:00you have a family to deal with you have
1:03colleagues to deal with you have an
1:04agency to deal with so you're always
1:07having to um weigh in balance your
1:11responsibilities responsib um so I
1:15think I think that it helps us to deal
1:19with that
1:20complexity it's important because it
1:22helps us understand our
1:24responsibilities it helps us find wise
1:26resolutions to dilemmas we have a lot of
1:28dilemmas because it's
1:30complex um it supports Us in doing
1:33what's right MH sometimes it's tempting
1:36to do what's easy sometimes it's easy to
1:39do what will make people like you
1:42sometimes it's easy to do what your
1:43colleagues say oh well you know put on
1:46the Disney video it's a rainy afternoon
1:48you so the code the code backs you up um
1:52my co-author on the two naeyc books on
1:55ethics Nancy Freeman has has a wonderful
1:58line that we use all the time she says
2:00when your back is against the wall the
2:02code of ethics hold the wall so I think
2:05that that that's an important factor the
2:08code communicates who we are to people
2:10outside the
2:11field and uh I was just in a session and
2:14people are saying oh we're sharing it
2:15with our parents and you know so so I
2:18think it it's out there and says we are
2:20professionals because we do have these
2:22ethical commitments and I think it can
2:25help to unify
2:26us we are a very diverse field
2:30um people work in all kinds of settings
2:33with all kinds of age groups and so this
2:35is one thing that we can say we share
2:38right so it it's right something that
2:41brings us together and also because of
2:43our diversity uh we we have our code of
2:45ethical conduct which is aimed primarily
2:47at direct service providers at at
2:49practitioners those who work directly
2:51with children and families and you
2:53mentioned earlier we've also developed
2:55the supplement of the code for program
2:57administrators and the supplement of the
2:59code for uh Early Childhood adult
3:02Educators and you also mentioned that we
3:05at NYC we also have two books which you
3:07and Nancy Freeman have co-authored and
3:10um Eva morovic is is also a co-author of
3:12of one of those books uh teaching the
3:15code and I sometimes think we must be
3:17the most ethical profession because we
3:19certainly have more pages dedicated to
3:21ethics I think many other Prof and for a
3:24very good reason yeah well partly
3:27because it's important and partly
3:28because we don't have the kinds of
3:31structures that other fields do we work
3:33in different settings and so the the
3:36code has a lot of provisions and when we
3:40wrote the code we agreed we would just
3:42focus on the classroom we didn't have a
3:44lot of time we didn't have much in the
3:47way of resources so we said we just
3:49worry about the child the teacher the
3:51director in the classroom and we'll wait
3:54and if there are other groups that have
3:56other issues we will deal with those
3:58another day MH we did and and also our
4:01code has been um uh has been reviewed by
4:05the National Association for family
4:06child care and they have found that the
4:08code Works in for family childcare
4:10settings as well and acei and and acei
4:13Association for childhood education
4:15International yeah so we're yeah so the
4:18code Works in in many many settings