As a teacher I want to instill a love and excitement for learning. It is so important to allow students to have fun in the classroom while also learning. I incorporate relevant play-based education that ties into each school day. Children learn so much from experiencing things themselves and I want to foster a classroom environment that is full of laughter and learning. This involves adding art, music, movement, and hands-on activities into the classroom on a day-to-day basis.
As a teacher I believe in classroom movement. Incorporating movement activities into your academic objectives allows students to realize that academic challenges can be made into something fun, exciting, and engaging. It is important to get your students moving throughout the day, movement is essential for mental and physical well-being.
As a teacher I believe in a math growth mindset. Math is something that can be very discouraging for students. It is easy for them to decide that they are not capable of understanding. Prompting math talk and encouraging a positive environment drastically changes the classroom. I believe small group discussion, promoting learning over grades, teaching classroom respect, and student involvement all work together to achieve this. Blending math into lessons where it doesn’t feel like a typical math class can change students’ views on the subject.
As a teacher I believe in the 5E Learning Cycle. This science learning cycle involves Engaging the students to discover a driving question, allowing them to Explore ideas, having the students explain what’s going on and then tying their responses into the “real” answer, Expanding their ideas, and then Evaluating them on what they learned. I believe this cycle is a good mix of using standards and student interest to discover science. I believe in using both direct instruction and inquiry learning in the classroom to create a balance of student-led and teacher-led instruction. As a teacher I believe in teaching history to elementary students. In many schools, history is not a subject that is touched on until late elementary and middle school. I believe that history education should start right away. Incorporating history into different subjects and helping students to understand historical concepts at a young age is beneficial to their education. Helping students understand that history is not just in the past is vital. I believe it is important to convey historical concepts, explore history, recognize student diversity, have civic education, and become geographically literate.
As a teacher I believe in an emphasis on literature. Books are a wonderful way to see into other people’s lives and develop a deeper understanding of the world around us. Reading books with different cultures, ethnicities, and family backgrounds encourages students to consider different perspectives. This concept is called windows and mirrors. Children should be able to see themselves reflected back to them and look through a window into other cultures. I believe in using books through the curriculum reading science, math, and history books to create engagement and excitement for the topic being learned.
As a teacher I believe in an anti-bias education. I believe that we should help students gradually construct a stereotype free understanding of people’s similarities and differences. Inclusivity and multicultural education are very important to me. I want each of my students to feel seen and included in all my lessons. One way I make this possible is through reading books on different cultures, ethnic groups, students with disabilities, and students who speak other languages.
As a teacher I want to build a peaceable classroom. I believe it is so important for them to feel that their body, thoughts, ideas, work, and words are safe. A peaceable classroom teaches children what peace and nonviolence conflict resolution mean. I provide children with the opportunity to take responsibilities in the classroom, to work together as a team in cooperation, to learn to use their voice to keep them safe. When situations in the classroom arise, we have classroom meetings, talking over how the situation made us feel and what we should do about it.
As a teacher I believe that students should have autonomy in the classroom. I have classroom jobs that occur throughout the day. Such as class clean-up jobs and handing out papers. The students complete these jobs in pairs, they get new jobs and new partners weekly. This allows them to make the classroom feel like their own and helps them to learn cooperation.
As a teacher I believe in improving my students and reaching goals. I sit down with each student and create goals based from Dr. Norman Webb’s Depth of Knowledge model. This model involves four levels that describe different depths of student engagement required to complete cross curricular tasks. Letting students know where they are and their next steps to get there allow them to take charge of their learning.
As a teacher I evaluate my students using curriculum-based assessments. I believe this to be a more effective way to show how the students are performing. These assessments aid me in knowing what I need to work on with each student. This allows me to have intentional small group development for the students.
As a teacher I believe in collaboration. I am a team member of my fellow teachers and communication is so important. It is important to me to be able to surround myself with fellow teachers who will support me through the school year as I support them. I believe in maintaining positive relationships in the field, fostering examples for our students. As a teacher I believe in parental communication. Parents are a child’s first teacher. I desire the legal guardians to know and understand what goes on in the classroom. Having a weekly newsletter with updates and at home activities that will aid the students is so beneficial. It is important to bring the students legal guardians into the classroom through family nights and parent involvement opportunities. This allows for the parents to feel more comfortable sending their kids and allows them to feel comfortable with me as well.