Growth & Change

One of my assignments this week is to reflect upon my growth as a teacher in the areas of instruction, discipline, environment, & assessment (IDEA.)  Following are my thoughts on how I have grown and changed as an educator over the past year since beginning my learning through St. Mary's University Master's Program.

Instruction- This past year has been one of the most challenging years that I’ve had as a teacher.  Thankfully, I have had a lot of people cheering me on throughout it all.  I am also grateful that I have been learning so much about myself as a teacher.  I am much more intentional at how and why I am teaching the concepts/ideas that I am teaching.  I have also been more academically and socially aware of what my students need and want.  I have learned ways to make my classroom and my instruction align more to a constructivist classroom. 

Discipline/Content- Throughout this last year I have learned new ways to instruct.  I have learned how to create units of study with essential outcomes and have enjoyed designing lessons using the backwards design philosophy.  I have found that this is fairly easy and highly effective.  I would like to take future units of study and start with the standards and create essential outcomes.

Environment- I have always loved thinking about how I want my classroom environment to look & feel.  I love making things look nice and have enjoyed creating a welcoming environment that is cozy, fun and unique.  I also believe that it is not just my room; it belongs to all of us who spend many hours at a time within the four walls.  One area where I have grown and changed with regards to environment is student ownership and relationships.  For student ownership, I have had my students help in making classroom rules with my guidance and have decorated the walls with their work.  On the subject of relationships, I have learned the importance of building relationships and how communication can directly be related to how well our classroom climate functions.  I have been more open and focused on group work and group interaction through positive community building activities.  I have also learned that it is okay for students to play w/o being bombarded with academics...especially in kindergarten.  I have always encouraged learning through discovery.

Assessment- For assessment, I think this is the area that I have grown most.  I have always thought of assessment as summative.  What my students are able to do at the end of a unit of study is how I assessed how much they have learned (and even how good I taught something!)  What I have come to realize this past year is that assessment is on-going and is just as important, if not more important if assessment is formative.  I have come to see that formative assessment is much more helpful for me as a teacher if I assess at a more informal way throughout a unit of study.  Formative assessment has helped me to differentiate learning in my classroom and design lessons according to what my students need at any given time.  I’ve learned through formative assessment that my students learn so much more and their learning is more authentic and student centered.  I’ve learned that different types of assessment have different uses.