Teacher Work Sample Teaching Creating

Teacher Work Sample

Teaching

Creating and sustaining a culture of curiosity and continual learning that leads to long-term motivation on the part of students is the cornerstone of my teaching philosophy. I want my students to be lifelong learners, not just from an academic standpoint, but from a social and cultural one as well. Too soon they will step onto the playing field of global competition not just for jobs, but for opportunities to learn and grow as well. I want them to be ready. My instructional strategies include inductive reasoning, role playing, and scaffolding-based approaches to personalizing learning programs. My advisor Mrs. Michelle D'Amour continues to be a trusted advisor and invaluable in providing me feedback as to how I can balance my natural inclination to share knowledge gained from my own education and through hours spent preparing for a class session with getting the students to participate more.

My three dominant instructional strategies of inductive reasoning, role playing and scaffolding also have led to scenarios that have brought the students into the learning process itself. As Mrs. D'Amour has mentioned in the Indicators of Student Teaching Effectiveness evaluation of the Social Studies lesson plan for World War I Trench Warfare that the use of inductive reasoning combined with participative techniques brought the students directly into the learning process. I've set the developmental objective of interpreting the learning needs of each class session and then attempt to integrate teaching styles and approaches that are the most effective in attaining the teaching objectives. Over the duration of a semester this approach to integrative use of teaching styles and techniques will be effective. I'm led to this conclusion based on the feedback from the lesson plan regarding education in America and the letters written to President Obama. Challenging the students to think about why they are writing to the President, which questions to ask and what the underlying logic is, and defend their opinions and perspectives in the process, also forces them to think inductively. My natural tendency is to guide students and help them through this process. Mrs. D'Amour's guidance has helped me to mediate my natural tendency to assist students quickly get them to the learning goal or objective for the class session and lesson plan.

This is a paradox that my instructional strategies have created especially in situations where students need to be taught confidence and ownership while at the same time being led outcomes. My natural inclination is to share as much as I know about a given subject or topic, which typically doesn't work with students who lack focus or long-term learning motivation. This is the case with young man who struggled in 8th grade Social Studies. He was from a military family that had moved every 12 months, on average, of his academic career. His written work was excellent, yet he never participated in class. After speaking with him, he said he was waiting for his father to get another set of orders that would send the family to yet another location. This was his reason for not taking ownership of the learning process or more importantly, a subject area. Using scaffolding techniques to create individualized lesson plans in American history based on his high level of interest in World War I, we created an entire learning plan for him to be the in-class expert of that era. Scaffolding serves as immediate need of creating lesson plan customization and support for specific student needs. Over time, I observed this student gain greater mastery of the subject and find purpose in studying American history. We set the goal of having him go to the whiteboard and lead discussions of World War I at least three times during the semester. We practiced and walked through concepts. As I learned to modify my teaching style to restrain myself from carrying the class from a response standpoint, this student began to progress. I deliberately began leaving out aspects of Word War I history and would look to him to fill them win when I asked questions of the class. Soon, he was participating and is now on his way to presenting three times in front of the class.

What this experience showed me was that having emotional intelligence and situational awareness as an instructor is critical if students are to be given the opportunity to intellectually challenge themselves. It also showed me that too much coaching, too much sharing of information was actually making some of my students pull back from participating. Being comfortable with silence in the classroom after asking particularly challenging questions is never easy; one feels as a teacher that silence needs to be filled. Yet as Mrs. D'Amour has pointed out, these silences are exactly what students need for reflection as well. All of these factors came together based on the experiences of helping this young man realize that learning isn't situational or external, it's about facing down challenges within yourself to grow intellectually, socially and emotionally. The experiences of working with scaffolding techniques for this young man also showed how critical it is for students to have a strong sense of mastery over a subject, along with the autonomy to learn at their own pace, all unified with a strong sense of purpose. These insights gained form the scaffolding exercise also illustrate how important inductive reasoning is to the learning process. What unified or galvanizes all of these aspects together from personal experience, as was very clear form working with this young man, that just the act of creating an individualized lesson plan communicated that the faculty of Myra S. Barnes Intermediate School believed in him; they are in his corner.