PHILOSOPHY OF EDUCATION
Q What are your beliefs about how children learn?
In my experience, all students have a unique and diverse way of learning. It is paramount to create a physical, social, and psychological climate conducive to learning. By creating a safe classroom community where students are known, needed, and cared for, students may be whole-heartedly engaged and function at the highest level of learning.
Q How do you balance the needs of individual learners with the needs of the entire class?
As every teacher is presented with a wide diversity of students in the classroom, differentiation is key. In differentiating, we can address the variety of learning styles, interests and abilities found within the classroom. By designing lessons that incorporate auditory, visual, and kinesthetic elements, we can create opportunities for students to construct meaning and apply concepts in ways unique to them.
Q What is your classroom management plan?
For me, classroom management begins the first minute of the first day of school. In establishing student-created classroom expectations from the very beginning, students take ownership of the classroom procedures. Once this expectation is set, clear, and understood, students begin to settle and succeed within the class. Using positive reinforcement as a driver, students feel intrinsically motivated to not only meet the classroom expectations, but exceed them. As an educator, firmness and consistency are two qualities I never leave home without.
Q What instructional strategies can be found in your units?
Inquiry: More than simply knowledge and information, my students develop an understanding of how to acquire and make sense of information. By emphasizing the development of inquiry skills and the nurturing of inquiring attitudes, students may develop the skills and habits of a life-long learner. In conjunction with Bloom's levels of learning, students are challenged to apply, analyze, evaluate, and create to synthesize information.
In staying true to differentiation, classroom instruction should include a range of approaches and strategies. My students experience a variety of instructional strategies: interactive instruction (debates, role-playing, think-pair-share), to indirect instruction (problem-solving, case studies, reflective discussion), to experiential learning (experiments, field trips), to indepedent study (journals, logs, research projects). As an educator, I believe it is not what they are taught, but how they are taught.
Q How do you meaningfully assess your students?
In applying both formative and summative assessments and providing instructional rubrics, students are guided in developing oral, reading and writing skills. Student-created portfolios help document student learning and give students an avenue to set and achieve individualized goals. In my classroom, students are ready for assessments at a variety of times: a pre-assessment to ensure the preparedness of students; assessment during the exercise to monitor student engagement, progress, and cooperation; and post-assessments, like an Exit Ticket, for students to process, reflect upon, and think critically about new information.
In my experience, all students have a unique and diverse way of learning. It is paramount to create a physical, social, and psychological climate conducive to learning. By creating a safe classroom community where students are known, needed, and cared for, students may be whole-heartedly engaged and function at the highest level of learning.
Q How do you balance the needs of individual learners with the needs of the entire class?
As every teacher is presented with a wide diversity of students in the classroom, differentiation is key. In differentiating, we can address the variety of learning styles, interests and abilities found within the classroom. By designing lessons that incorporate auditory, visual, and kinesthetic elements, we can create opportunities for students to construct meaning and apply concepts in ways unique to them.
Q What is your classroom management plan?
For me, classroom management begins the first minute of the first day of school. In establishing student-created classroom expectations from the very beginning, students take ownership of the classroom procedures. Once this expectation is set, clear, and understood, students begin to settle and succeed within the class. Using positive reinforcement as a driver, students feel intrinsically motivated to not only meet the classroom expectations, but exceed them. As an educator, firmness and consistency are two qualities I never leave home without.
Q What instructional strategies can be found in your units?
Inquiry: More than simply knowledge and information, my students develop an understanding of how to acquire and make sense of information. By emphasizing the development of inquiry skills and the nurturing of inquiring attitudes, students may develop the skills and habits of a life-long learner. In conjunction with Bloom's levels of learning, students are challenged to apply, analyze, evaluate, and create to synthesize information.
In staying true to differentiation, classroom instruction should include a range of approaches and strategies. My students experience a variety of instructional strategies: interactive instruction (debates, role-playing, think-pair-share), to indirect instruction (problem-solving, case studies, reflective discussion), to experiential learning (experiments, field trips), to indepedent study (journals, logs, research projects). As an educator, I believe it is not what they are taught, but how they are taught.
Q How do you meaningfully assess your students?
In applying both formative and summative assessments and providing instructional rubrics, students are guided in developing oral, reading and writing skills. Student-created portfolios help document student learning and give students an avenue to set and achieve individualized goals. In my classroom, students are ready for assessments at a variety of times: a pre-assessment to ensure the preparedness of students; assessment during the exercise to monitor student engagement, progress, and cooperation; and post-assessments, like an Exit Ticket, for students to process, reflect upon, and think critically about new information.