Academic Success and Students

¶ … Learning My professional goals with regard to the development of students with whom I work is to enable them to develop a better grasp of the English language and to advance their English language skills in reading, speaking and comprehension. In a sense, my goals are intertwined with their academic success. However, on another level, I can identify professional goals that are independent of my students' outcomes. These are to come to class prepared, enthusiastic about what I am teaching, and always in a positive mood.

If I can meet these three goals, I can effect an atmosphere in my classroom that facilitates constructive learning, that promotes engagement, and that supports everyone's desire to want to be there. A teacher who projects surliness and lack of preparation is more than likely to develop an environment in which negativity is the result. It is better to promote positivity in the classroom because enthusiasm is a strong factor in the way that we all engage with our duties, challenges, and tasks at hand (Landecker, 2009).

Likewise, as Knight (2009) shows, the teacher's professional demeanor plays a tremendous role in how students' perceptions are shaped. Finally, I would like to engage parents more directly in terms of their role in their children's education. Incorporating parental engagement into student development is an important way to ensure students' academic success (Vera, Israel, 2012).

My view of the student as a learner is based on the constructivist framework: I believe active learning is a good way for students to engage with the learning material; I also find cognitive theory to be helpful in that new material can be presented to students that builds on their prior knowledge in an effective way (Jensen, 2005; Dobbs, 2011).

Thirdly, classical theory is a very helpful tool as well because it allows me to discuss openly with the students questions and issues related to the text: I can ask them questions much like Socrates or Plato would have asked of their students in order to challenge them and direct them towards identifying a solution or way forward on their own (Kristjansson, 2014).

My view of teaching has changed because of these theories because prior to interacting with them, I felt that teaching was primarily an activity in which I the teacher was active and students were to sit there and be passive. But these theories have shown me that the students actually learn more and learn better when they are actively engaged with the material, which occurs through active learning (constructivist theory), cognitive learning (Gestalt theory), and classic inquisition (classical theory).

My role in the development of student learning has changed because of my new theoretical knowledge in the sense that I have a greater appreciation of the methods that I may use to help enable students to reach the goals that we set together. I no longer see myself as a lecturer throwing material out for them to process and then simply grading them to see if they have processed it correctly.

Now I see myself as a facilitator, I guide and supporter of their academic and intellectual growth -- almost like a gardener. The theoretical approaches I can use are like the tomato stake around which the tomato vine winds its way in its search for the sun. I now play the part of supporter in my students' quest for academic success and growth with the English language.

Three examples of what I plan to do differently in my professional life are: 1) I will get students up to the board more often, diagramming sentences and fixing sentences -- this will promote active learning; 2) I will relate material/texts to former lessons that they will have already mastered and to outside concepts that are part of their lives outside school -- this will promote cognitive learning; 3) I will engage students directly by asking them questions about why they believe a sentence should look a certain way or what they mean when they say a specific phrase -- this will promote classical learning and challenge them to more deeply analyze and comprehend what they are reading and saying.

These practices would help met to support the students' growth in a variety of ways and better ensure that they reach their potential and maximize their learning opportunity. The student's role in his or her own learning is, from what I have learned, to be first and foremost active in the enterprise. A passive student is not like an empty receptacle that is simply filled up with knowledge and then sent out the door.

Instead, a passive student is more like a rubber wall: the more information that is thrown at the student, the more likely it is to simply bounce right off. The student is making no effort to engage with the material if he or she is passive all the time. Instead, the student should make an effort to engage with the material by making.