Philosophy Statement

                     Philosophy Statement

My best teacher was my 9th grade English teacher, her name was Mrs. Dodds. She didn;t teach in the traditional method, lecturing and students just taking notes. We did do that from time to time, but she also taught outside the box. You can tell she loved her job and her students. She was always engaged with us and you can tell she generally cared. When we read novels we actually wanted to read the book. I can specifically remember reading Beowulf and she had someone come is dressed as Beowulf and he gave us a summary of the book before we actually read it. It was pretty cool, me and my classmates were pretty impressed and we were ready to start the story. She asked if we wanted parts in the play and everyone who played a part got to dress up when they read. It was fun and that really stood out to me. My worst teacher would have to be Mr. Newton. He would not interact with us at all. He lectured in a monotone voice and bored the students to death. He taught history and it was horrible. He got the material across but they way he did it could have been better. The impact these teachers had on me was great. I will be a teacher that is engaged and interactive with my students. If my studnets see me engaged it will rub off on them. I want to have the class that is fun and exciting, but at the same time the students are learning the material.

   I think I fall into the constructive philosophy, I encourage higher-level thinking for students. Although I believe the teacher should intiate the lesson, students should still have the ability to be creative when doing there work. I love working in groups as well. cooperative learning is huge for me, it gives students a chance to interact with thier peers and to also bounce ideas off each other. Working in groups will also keep my students engaged and break the traditional teaching method that was used when I was coming up in school. Learning is an active, social process. I also fall into the pragmatism philosohpy because I beleive education is life. We need education in order to learn things that we don't know. There is a saying in the legal world, "ignorance of the law is no excuse for a person to break a law." Its the same thing when it comes to education, if you do not learn then you are left behind in the real world. Education is power!

   I chose to become a coach/teacher because I have always wanted a career where I was helping children. I was orginally going to become a juvenile attorney to help at risk youth get on the right path. I have always loved teaching children new things and seeing the joy it brings them when they learn something new. I am going to be a teacher that thinks outside the box, being a coach, I will bring things from gym into the classroom that will help my students study for the material in my lesson plan. I will teach this way because of what I learned from Mrs. Dodds when I was in the 9th grade. Being interactive and showing an interest in the subject you are teaching goes a long way with students. When we have novels that we read in my class, I will also do the dress up method for the students who play a part in the story, and Beowulf will be one of the stories we read in my class. My personal definition of a great teacher is someone who is enaged with there students, someome who truly loves teaching children new things, and truly cares about thier students. I got this definition because of my 9th grade teacher Mrs. Dodds. I want my students to take away the knowledge they are supposed to learn but at the sametime experience a new teaching method that they will never forget and also be a teacher that my students will never forget as well. Im choosing to teach this way because I want to students to learn but at the sametime be interested in what I am trying to teach them. I've said it time and time, if the students are interested, they will want to learn the material. In the school district where I will teach and coach, students were given Ipads. They will be used in each class and the students will download there books to them and read off of the Ipad instead of having an actual book. I thought that was pretty neat. Therefore teachnolgy will be incorporated into what I teach. Technology has come a long way.

                           Reflection

Response to Stephen Dowels- One major potential I see for blogging is networking with your peers and other teacher or collegues from different districts when it comes to teaching. It can also be used to network in other professions. I think we have met this potential, the internet is ever changing. We have several social media sites that can be used for networking and blogging.

Response to Alan November- Out of the six areas the author mentioned, I believe the collegiality is whats needed section is the most important. Teaching at the middle school level, i think all teachers in there respective departments need to be one the same page when it comes to teaching units. This is big because we know the students at this level are required to take a state test, if the teachers are on the same page when it comes to teaching certain units it will benefit the students. The phrase he used, "don't train teachers to use technology without kids" made alot of sense to me as well. We should not teach teachers to use certain technology and leave the students behind. It reminded me of the teacher student training on how to use Ipads my district held this two weeks ago. It was a pretty neat experience.

My expectations for this class

When I am done with this class, I want to be able to use teachnology a little better than I can now. I am pretty good at certain things, but I know there are new things I will learn in this class and I look forward to it. I want to be able to incorporate what I learn from this class into the real world when I get a job somehow as well.