Fiona Worcester

Educational Philosophy

ED692 - Educational Seminar

Stacy Golden

July 13, 2010

In a sense, I have always been a part of the community in which I intend to teach. I was born and raised in Anchorage, Alaska, and graduated in 2005 from West Anchorage High School, where I will be doing my student teaching. For college, I went off to Massachusetts in search of solid academics and competitive skiing. Though I received an excellent education on the East coast, I was quite unhappy. I didn’t realize until I returned, however, how much I had missed Alaskans themselves, with their friendly frontier attitudes. I spent the year after college working as a substitute teacher, mostly at West, and coaching cross-country skiing at East Anchorage High School. It was the happiest year of my life. I got a great sense of personal growth and accomplishment from being a part of these communities. My experiences have helped me to realize my purpose in life as that of an educator, a life-long teacher and learner, in the public schools and in the community.

 

It became apparent quite quickly, however, that my experience in the highly (-tracked) gifted program had put me on the elitist fringe of the community for most of my life. Most of the 1,200 kids or so I taught in my days subbing at West I would never have met while attending West. I have learned so much from helping West students of all abilities, and I love to see the way their faces light up when I remember their names. I have to remember, constantly, however, that many are slightly different critters from me, and be vigilant in my teaching strategies, so that we both stay on track.

 

After a year of substitute teaching, I have observed dozens of classrooms, and the one universal truth I have brought away is that classroom management is the first, most all-important aspect of education. The way a class behaves is directly symptomatic of how much – or how little – they are learning. Without classroom procedures and respect for the rules of the classroom (written and unwritten), there will be no learning. To this end, I have an extensive classroom management plan, with intervention strategies and class rules, founded most importantly on the idea that my students want to learn to be successful and that I want to teach them. Beyond my classroom procedures, prevention, and intervention strategies, I think the best defense is actually a good offense! 

 

As noted earlier, my students are not the nerds that I am. Many kids, for instance, are not intrinsically motivated to learn, and I need to be using and constantly developing strategies to entice them into learning. After all, teachers cannot force students to learn. We must bring the proverbial horse to the water and then, make the act of drinking water look – if not fun and exciting – like the only sensible thing to do. As a teacher, I plan to do my best to create engaging lessons, with built in breaks and active roles for the kids. Whenever possible, I include pop-culture references and examples; they are not only appreciated, but help to drive home the lesson. Kids learn best when I am excited about my lessons – it makes them curious. Calling each individual student by names is another critical method that got many students listening to and respecting me even as a substitute teacher.

 

Students learn best when they feel this sense of mutual respect; it helps to let them know that they are important, part of a caring community. As noted by psychologist Erik Erikson, teens are in a stage of development where they are trying to figure out who they are. They regularly experience confusion and frustration in discovering their role in society during these years. With my English classes, I not only want my students to be more effective writers and more passionate readers, I also want them to learn to be more imaginative, about their lives and the lives of those around them; to become more empathetic about the people in their world, and less cynical during a time in their development where apathy is a high risk. If they feel that I am personally invested in them; if my lesson plans address questions that they themselves are curious about in exploring their roles in society; if I express interest in pop culture, and notice their individual efforts; they will hopefully want to learn from me.

 

In my curriculum and my demeanor, I want to aid my students directly in forming and navigating their roles in society. I want my students to understand the English language not simply as letters on a page, but as the way we communicate, read and written, and spoken and listened. Ultimately, I hope to emphasize the development of the language and social skills necessary to help them connect with and relate to whomever they wish to in the community, to take on whatever role and put on whatever shoes they would like and be able to walk around in them comfortably.

 

This is a monumental challenge, because each student has a unique background, a unique set of challenges, prior beliefs, misconceptions, and misgivings about the information that I aim to teach them. We can (probably) all define alligator, but, as cognitive theorists will note, none of us experience alligators in the same way. We each have individual definitions (my alligator is smaller than my mother’s, less scary, and grayer) and we have to build on prior knowledge – or deconstruct prior knowledge – in order to learn anything new (just as you require knowledge of English vocabulary to tabulate the words I am writing to you now, and are even now slightly altering the way you remember alligator). In the constructivist style, I believe that each learner has their own experience and unique understanding, and I aim to build a detectable amount of new knowledge as best I can on top of that already existing in the minds of each of my students.

 

My beliefs about what assessment should (and should not) entail are based on more behaviorist principles of reward and punishment. Assessment should be seldom punitive, as students learn very little when we tell them something is wrong. In that situation, in the whole universe of possibilities, anything that isn’t marked red might be right – how can they know where to explore next? When we tell them what is correct or how to do something correctly, they have a clear idea about what they should be doing.  Students benefit most from assessment when we show them examples from which to model their behavior, and provide positive reinforcement when possible and constructive feedback when necessary. Also, as with B.F. Skinner’s mice, students learn much more if they receive feedback promptly – the teacher’s grade is then related to their recent action, and they know what to change in their minds. If they receive feedback weeks later, they may have already internalized improper information.

 

            My views as a teacher are changing rapidly, and will undoubtedly change drastically over time. Also, I am starting to realize that I may not have the requisite lesson plans, time, or skills implement my philosophy, except on a timescale of years. And this is the time scale on which brilliant teachers bloom. I earnestly hope to be one of them.