My Educational Philosophy
I believe that every child has the potential to bring something unique and special to the world and the classroom. My role as a teacher is to assist children to develop their potential by believing in these attributes. I will help children unmask this potential and express their own opinions while nurturing their ideas. In my vision of the world people respect, accept, and embrace their differences as the core of what makes life so fascinating.
Every classroom is a unique community of learners with a variety of abilities and learning styles. I will adjust my teaching to meet the needs of my students thus making them feel capable and successful, as long as they are willing to learn. In order to foster active learning, I will present a student-centered curriculum that involves the interests of the children and makes learning relevant to their lives incorporating themes, integrated units, projects, group work, individual work, technology, and hands-on activities. I will tie learning into the world community to help children become caring and active members of a global society.
My classroom will be a caring and safe environment where children can grow intellectually and emotionally. My strategies, such as class meetings, positive discipline, and democratic principles, will allow them to become responsible members of our classroom community. By showing students how to become responsible for their own learning and lives, I will provide them with the tools necessary to become lifelong learners, to believe in and to like themselves, and to become successful in their personal and professional endeavors.
Teaching is a lifelong process of learning about new theories and strategies through continuing education, learning from parents and community, from colleagues, and especially from the children. While children need our guidance, they also point the way to the world's future.
Every classroom is a unique community of learners with a variety of abilities and learning styles. I will adjust my teaching to meet the needs of my students thus making them feel capable and successful, as long as they are willing to learn. In order to foster active learning, I will present a student-centered curriculum that involves the interests of the children and makes learning relevant to their lives incorporating themes, integrated units, projects, group work, individual work, technology, and hands-on activities. I will tie learning into the world community to help children become caring and active members of a global society.
My classroom will be a caring and safe environment where children can grow intellectually and emotionally. My strategies, such as class meetings, positive discipline, and democratic principles, will allow them to become responsible members of our classroom community. By showing students how to become responsible for their own learning and lives, I will provide them with the tools necessary to become lifelong learners, to believe in and to like themselves, and to become successful in their personal and professional endeavors.
Teaching is a lifelong process of learning about new theories and strategies through continuing education, learning from parents and community, from colleagues, and especially from the children. While children need our guidance, they also point the way to the world's future.
My Foreign Language Educational Philosophy Globalism is here to stay. Unfortunately, it is too often misunderstood as sacrificing all ethnic individuality and idiosyncrasy on the altar of the lowest common cultural denominator: uniform western pop culture and ever advancing technology with a requirement that everyone must speak English in order to be mainstream and successful.
Learning foreign languages is important and should occur in a student-centered environment. Expressing their own thoughts is vital for young minds. Nevertheless, I believe it to be equally important that students not only express themselves in various forms and media, but most of all acquire observation and listening skills, fine-tuned to the possibility that there is a whole world of diversity out there with different but time-proven values. Students may learn that multiculturalism transcends the globe and is not limited to food stands, snappy ethnic music, colorful costumes, and cute dances at a cultural fair, but a daily way of life for millions (or billions - depending on the culture) of other people. In my Classroom Management Plan you can read about my mission, my thoughts on communication, roles of teacher and students, curriculum, assessments, instruction and motivation. In my PowerPoint presentation on Policies and Procedures you can see what behavior is expected of students. If you are a student (or parent) new to my class later in the school year, please make yourself familiar with the presentation. It can also be used as a refresher. In my PowerPoint presentation about Contextualization you can read about how I use the building blocks of learning to assemble a lesson plan. If you would like to see how I arrange my classroom to allow for co-teaching multiple language levels in one room and still having the flexibility to do projects either within the level or across the levels, take a look at my Seating Plan. E-mail me with questions. In my Culminating Reflection on Technology you can read about my achievements in and thoughts about the Instructional Technology class that prompted the creation of this website. |
© 2011 Bea Pody