After reading the syllabus carefully, I have decided on a few goals for my learning in this course. One of my goals is to understand myself as a learner and as a teacher. I know myself fairly well, but because I am not yet a "real" teacher, I do not know exactly how I will act as the leader of the classroom. I know that I like things to be controlled and organized, so I know that I will try to keep my classroom that way, but I also know that when it comes to working with children, organization can sometimes go out the window. I loved a lot of my teachers in elementary school, and so I wonder if I will be a teacher that is loved. I think that if I know what kind of learner I am, it will help me to see what kind of teacher I will be. I believe that the way you learn will be similar to the way you teach.
Another one of my goals for this semester is to learn how to get my future students to love literacy as much as I do. I have always loved to read and I know that reading will play a big part in my classroom. I want my students to enjoy reading aloud and also silently. I hope to have lots of different types of books in my future classroom. From this class I hope to learn and explore many different ways in which I can engage my students in literacy. I believe that reading and writing are very important building blocks necessary for all of subject areas. Knowing how to read and write will help you and be a part of you no matter where you go or what you do.
Another goal that I have is to actually practice teaching literacy in my field placement. Last semester I did not get very many chances to teach in my classroom. I am hoping that I will be able to teach multiple lessons to the students. I want to be able to do this mostly for the experience and practice of being in front of a class and having to prepare a lesson or unit that I actually use. I am in a kindergarten classroom and literacy is a big part of everything that they do, so I am hoping that there will be more chances for me to teach.
2 comments:
Your goals seem very well thought out and appropriate for this class. I strongly agree that the way you learn is closely aligned with the way you naturally teach. Challenge yourself as you plan to think about striking a balance between they ways in which you are most comfortable teaching and they ways your students learn (which will vary). Sometimes the benefits of teaching in a way that makes more sense to some of your students outways the fact feels a bit awkward, others times it won't. Like you, I also like organization. I find that it helps to plan disorganization. Somehow it feels better if it was your intention all along for an activity to have looser boundries.
I think that we may have several of the same goals this semester. Like you I want to find out who I am as a learner and a teacher this semester. I think that both of us will slowly become molded into the teachers we now imagine through maturing and learning this year.
I think what you said about having organization fly out of the window when you are working with kids is true. No matter how much you plan or have been teaching, things will not always go the way you had planned. Therefore, I think that you may need to look at finding a happy balance where you are in control and organized, but your students also have the freedom to move around and converse as well. I think it’s important for teachers to imagine how they acted when they were their student’s age routinely throughout the day. Having ADHD I know that some students attention is different than others. I am in a third grade classroom this semester and talking with my teacher and observing his class has really changed my idea of how I think about my classroom management. He lets his students for the most part get up out of their seat to go get a drink of water, to sharpen their pencil, or to just stand up and move around whenever they please as long as they don’t abuse it. This does not mean however that he is not in control or unorganized. I suggest watching how your teacher manages her classroom this semester and learn from the positives and the negatives.
The other thing that caught my eye was when you said that you wanted to find out what type of learner you are because you thought that you teach the way you learn. I just want to say I totally 100% agree with you. However, make sure that you meet other students learning styles as well because even though I agree with you 100%, me and you could even still have different learning styles.
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