This is the weekend that I begin to apply for jobs. The resume has been adjusted numerous times, reference letters have been collected and the process begins. Last night I glanced over one school district's application and it asked for a 'narrative' - specifically a .......NARRATIVE DESCRIBING YOUR APPROACH AND GIVING A SPECIFIC EXAMPLE(S) OF HOW YOU HAVE AND WILL PREPARE AND INSPIRE ALL STUDENTS TO CONTRIBUTE AND EXCEL.
Wow!
Well, I have a rough draft together, now I need to go back over my blog and other sundry writings to see what I missed, and get editing!
Here are my initial ramblings......
As teacher, my job is to guide my students towards discovering information so that they can learn as they build knowledge. I will be their supporter, guide and the person who helps them to find the answers. As a life-long learner, I experience learning with my students, leading by example. Whether it is doing my own writing during a free-write, modeling during a read-aloud, or demonstrating writing through an interactive write-aloud, I always strive to model best practices and allow students to experience techniques prior to being released to work independently.
As a student teacher I have worked to create lessons that have purpose to my students. Authenticity, purpose and a real audience make learning more interesting to everyone! In a recent mini-unit I concentrated on interdisciplinary themes and our complex text discussed a real-life problem. As students read text about the psychological effects of captivity on zoo animals, they were focused and engaged. As our lesson moved from complex text comprehension to research about habitats, ending with writing a descriptive text about the habitat, the students remained interested and willing to share their best work.
I begin each task by finding out what the students already know and think about something. That will help me to address and correct any misconceptions immediately, starting discourse, teamwork and sharing from day 1 of learning. After introducing and modeling the lesson, the students then get to work. As they ask and answer questions, try things out, make decisions and record results, students are empowered to learn. I strive to increase cooperative learning. In my classroom at Hudson my co-teacher allowed me to change the seating arrangement to assist in the implementation of more group work. I have seen improved intent through the increased amount of group work that the new arrangements made possible.
I have found out that when students are given a question, they do a great job of finding answers! As they find the answers, they learn - and because they discovered answers themselves, this is information that they will understand and remember. This allows vital life skill learning in addition to the content. I respect both students’ opinions as well as considering their individual learning needs. In my first year in the classroom I have discovered just how hard that can be with 29 different needs in front of you, but as a teacher I feel that the only way to succeed is to keep trying to be aware of each student’s very individual learning strengths.
Students need choices. I recently changed a planned unit to agree to my students’ suggestion that they write their own version of David Wisniewski’s The Secret Knowledge of Grown-ups. Their excitement about the project was palpable, and now we are working to create a classroom book. Both the final product and the learning gained will be far more superior with their investment in the project.
When assessing work, I ask students to critique their work, determine what they did well and look at what they would like to improve. My taking the time to give complete and timely feedback is important, but my students learning to think through their own work, reflecting upon how to make something better next time is far more powerful, real-word learning. When working on writing projects with my students I have strived to give effective feedback throughout each step of the writing process. Being able to conference with students about their writing with their version and my suggestions on hand has been successful and has been reflected in their improved writing.
As a new teacher I really want to focus on strong communication with each students’ family. As a student teacher I have built a classroom website and FaceBook group to help to connect with the home front. In my own classroom I would like to add to the contact with positive phone calls and invites to bring their home community into our classroom community. By building positive relationships with my students’ families it will help me to reach out when help is needed, as well as to be able to take advantage to their family gifts and experiences to share with the class. I believe that in order for us to truly be a team in the classroom, parents and guardians, as well as students, need to be communicated with and be confident that their ideas and opinions will be respected.
