Miss K

       I believe education is the most powerful and important way in which we can influence society.  Education isn’t simply teaching children how to read and do math in a classroom.  As a teacher, I believe I will have the power to create change and growth in my community and society.  Being in such an important role, it is necessary to truly understand my views on education and how I will go about fostering this growth and change within my classroom.  The most basic and important aspect of this is forming an awareness of my philosophy of education.  My goal in teaching is to create free thinkers who are accepting of others and also have developed a love of learning.

       Most importantly, I believe the role of education should serve not only to teach students academic subjects but to make them better members of society.  Education should provide children with the tools they need in order to be stronger, deeper thinkers and make decisions within their world that are important and meaningful to them.  I believe that as people gain more knowledge of their world, they become more empowered in their actions and beliefs.  While there are many people in society who are capable of influencing children, teachers have an exceptional role in all of this.  As a teacher, every year you are given 30 new students with 30 different experiences and stories.  These students may have known each other for years or they  may have just met.  You may have students from different neighborhoods, states, or even countries.  More than likely, your students will never have as much exposure to different people and cultures as they will in your classroom.  I want to instill a sense of acceptance, understanding, and love within my students.  When those traits become the expectation and standard within the classroom, I believe the students will come to look for and demonstrate those traits in the world as well.  It is also important for my students to learn about the different cultures that are in our classroom.  Young children are so often told not to talk about cultural differences for fear of them being offensive or not politically correct.  I believe we need to give them all the information they desire and deserve in order to have more well informed and tolerant humans in our world.

        I do not only want to foster a sense of love for others in my students but also, a love of learning.  As it is now, many of our schools and classrooms are not set up in order to create a love of learning in our students.  The purpose of many classrooms is to feed information into children and then categorize them based on their ability to regurgitate that information.  I believe, first and foremost, that instead of focusing on the categorization of students, we need to give all students the opportunity to be successful.  In order to do this, teachers should teach their students in a way that is applicable to and tailored towards their learning preference, not your teaching preference.  I also believe the classroom should be a place where children are able to explore and get to know the world around them.  I want my classroom to be a safe place where my students are able to go outside of their comfort zone knowing that they have all the tools and resources they need to find success.  I want my students to be strong, independent thinkers who are able to take the knowledge they gained in the classroom and apply it to their daily lives and decision making. 

        I believe the teacher’s role in all of this is to be a guide and to lead students to the information instead of telling them exactly what they need to know.  I feel children learn best when they are able to explore the curriculum in a way that is applicable and desirable to them.  I want to watch my students discover what they are passionate about.  I believe teachers should not only find validation in their student’s abilities to pass a test but also when they watch a child discover a new interest for the first time.  As a teacher, I want to set up the general framework for my lessons and have a basic curriculum plan but I also want my students to take charge of how we carry out that plan.  That being said, not every child will explore new curriculum in the same way.  That is okay.  I believe it is important to recognize each student’s individual needs and let them process and experience information in a way that is meaningful to them.  When children are given power over their own learning and allowed to make sense of information in their own way, they are discovering how that information relates to their own lives.  When they do this, they are able to process information in a deeper manner and create a more genuine understanding of the topic.  This is a very student-centered approach and something I feel can be implemented into any classroom at any age level.

        One important aspect of learning, especially at the elementary level, is play. I strongly believe in the power and the importance of play and creative exploration. Young children often struggle with sitting at a desk in a classroom all day long.  They get distracted easily and need the opportunity to move around and talk to their friends.  Children, similarly to adults, need time for their brains to relax.  In addition, children learn through play and through interaction with their world.  In many schools recently, we have been stripping students from recess time or extra curricular classes.  These cannot be seen as expendable but instead, vital parts of the curriculum that create better learners and more well rounded students.  Allowing students a chance to play and move around does not only enhance their experience but makes a teacher’s job easier by having more engaged students.

        I also feel that teachers should expect success from every student.  That being said, success might not look the same for every student.  One student might show success through getting a perfect score on a written test while another student could find success by simply sitting still for the day.  I feel a teacher’s job is to identify what each child needs to be successful and provide them with the tools they need to reach that success.  I have seen many teachers who do not expect success from every student.  In our current education system, we see success only as receiving a high score on a standard test.  Students who do not perform well on tests are often expected to always perform that poorly.  This leads to a self-fulfilling prophecy that is often hard for the student to ever get out of.  I do not want this experience for my students.  I believe a teacher should never stop expecting success, no matter how the student may have performed in the past.  If a student appears to be unsuccessful, it is the teacher’s job to identify why that is and adjust the lesson or activity so the student is able to find success.  The teacher, then, is not simply standing by idly as some students do well and some don’t but instead, they are leading every child to their own version of success.  I believe the classroom should be a place where it is not even possible for a child to be unsuccessful.  Education is not about who can or who can’t gain knowledge.  It is more important to teach children how to learn instead of just teach them the curriculum.

        I want to be the type of teacher students feel comfortable with and find approachable.  My most memorable and influential teachers are not the ones who taught me the most curriculum.  The teachers who stick out the most in my mind are the ones who I could talk to about life and things that were important to me.  They made me feel like I wasn’t just their student, but more like I was a respected individual.  When I felt like I was getting that respect from them, I respected them as well.  This mutual respect is so incredibly important in fostering a positive classroom environment.  Creating a mutual respect between student and teacher also does a great job of modeling the type of behavior that is expected amongst the students as well.  This classroom culture will lead to an environment where all members are able to share their opinions and ideas without fear of rejection. 

        Teaching is not an easy profession and being a great teacher requires even more of you.    It is not a simple or quick task to truly get to know 30 different students.  Regardless, in order to be a great teacher, you must put in the effort and provide every student with the classroom experience they deserve.  I want to be the type of teacher that students are comfortable with and with whom they are able to use as a guide in their learning and exploration.  A great teacher is someone who is able to create engaging lessons that take into account the variety of learning preferences in their classroom and teach in a way that reaches all of their students.  The classroom is so much more than a place where students learn about math and history.  I want my classroom to be a place where students learn how to be better citizens in their community.  While I may not know the exact ways I will achieve this in my classroom, the first step is having an awareness of my philosophy of education and my goals as a teacher.