Beliefs Statement and Reflections on Student Teaching

BELIEFS STATEMENT

As I continue to learn and grow in this program, through my student teaching experiences, I have begun to develop some beliefs that stem from the idea of teachers as researchers.

As teachers we must constantly be researching our students, our methods and finding ways to grow and improve. (Berthoff, 1986) First and foremost I believe that for students to really grow as learners they must feel like they are in control of the process. Students will be more actively engaged in the material when they feel they have ownership over it. I would like to see my students questioning each other, looking to each other for help, and generally engaging in helpful and active discourse throughout lessons. For this reason questions that I try to develop for my lessons are not there simply to reiterate something I already know, but to get more from the students. (Bransford, 2000)

Additionally, when constructing the lessons I always had in the back of my mind particular student's in my classroom and their individual interests and strengths. I am interested in finding ways to give students more opportunities to show their classmates their strengths and interests through sharing work. I want to make this as authentic as possible and therefore I believe that flexibility on what direction a lesson may go is key. 

Finally, I care deeply about each and every one of my students and wish to see them succeed. In order to make sure that each student is getting what they need out of the lesson I hope to provide opportunities for every voice to be heard and give them an active role to promote agency. (Johnston, 2004)

FINAL REFLECTION

As I come to the close of my year of student teaching I can look back and find moments that defined who I am as a teacher today. This portfolio is only a small portion of those moments captured in one place. However, a general theme across the entire year is that I learned the most and grew the most as a teacher when I stopped to listen. When you do this in the classroom it can not only help you teach better to the kids, but it can help reduce classroom management issues because you know what makes the students tick. Dewey proposes that we reconcile the often conflicting ideas of subject matter and the child. We must work as teachers to develop curriculum that shows the students how the material being studied is not really some distant, abstract concept, but a part of their understanding of the world. Part of this is getting to know our students and finding ways to relate the material to their own personal experiences.

The teaching profession requires you, as a teacher, to act as a perpetual student. I fully plan to continue question and reflect on my teaching practices. Some questions still remain as I leave this year. First, how can I create more opportunity for the students to engage in discourse with each other? Much of my time this year was spent finding ways to have students find a voice in the classroom and engage in discussion-based lessons. However, I think it is equally important for students to learn how to turn to their peers. Particularly, during the discussions I’ve had over the past year I would have liked to see students responding to what their peers were saying (agreeing, disagreeing or simply adding on). This kind of discourse requires modeling and set up that begins on the very first day of school and I look forward to working on this over the coming years. Lastly, how can I motivate my students or give them a sense of independence to want to push themselves and challenge themselves academically that comes from an intrinsic (rather than superficial) place. Thinking about myself as a learner I always enjoyed the challenge and it pushed me to do better in school. This is something I hope to pass on to my students as their teacher.

REFERENCES

Johnston, P.H. (2004). Choice Words: How Our Language Affects Children’s Learning. Portland, Maine: Stenhouse Publishers.

Bransford, et al. (2000). How people learn: Brain, Mind, Experience and School. Washington, D.C: National Academies Press. 

Berthoff, Ann E. (1986). The Teacher as Researcher. In D. Goswami and P.R. Stillman (Eds.), Reclaiming the Classroom: Teacher research as an agency for change. Upper Montclair, NJ: Boynton/Cook Publishers. 

Tomlinson, C.A. (1999). Teachers at work building differentiated classrooms. In The Differentiated Classroom: Responding to the Needs of All Learners. Alexandria, VA: ASCD.