Education is like a good book...

Education is like a good book.  When you first start to read as a child, reading a book seems like a daunting task to face.  You start a book knowing little about it, and finish the book wishing to know more--and hating the fact that the book had to end.  A good book makes you want to read more, such as becoming more knowledgable makes you want to learn even more. Each book builds a foundation for whatever else you choose to read next, just as you can take all previously acquired knowledge with you for the rest of your life.  The characters in books also teach you lessons, and help you develop as a person--the same type of development a student receives with proper education.  

If there is one thing that I have learned through observation in schools this semester, it is that a teacher should not feel as if they have failed if a student does not seem interested in a given lesson.  Each student is bound to have different interests, just as each person is bound have a favorite genre in a book.  One should try to explain things in a variety of ways, as not every person has the same learning style.  It is important to make sure that you help a student become a more well rounded individual so that they are able to decide what they like, and dislike.  Teachers truly are the building blocks for the future generation, so it is important that we try to give the students all we can to help them succeed.  We need to make sure that they are given as wide an array of knowledge as an avid reader has of books.

Waldorf Education

Waldorf education is a humanistic approach to education that was developed by Rudolph Steiner, an Austrian philosopher, in 1919.  The approach advocates creativity and stresses the role of the imagination in learning.  According to Why Waldorf Works, the approach helps students to gain a greater level of confidence than an ordinary school, as the students are encouraged to think independently, and are always rewarded to see their artwork hanging around the room.  Steiner proposed that there should be both a creative and an analytical side to learning, and believed that students needed to be taught in both ways at equal rates to help the children remain interested in what they were learning as they continued to learn and develop.

I completely agree that the Waldorf approach creates a more well rounded student, as each child is given a multidisciplinary style of learning.  Kids are required to take classes including drama, art, music, and other sorts of crafts in addition to the usual science, math, english, and social studies.  I believe that this approach can be closely tied to the idea of multiple intellligences, and the idea that every child is unique and that they are bound to be smart in different ways.  Everybody has their strong suits and their weaknesses, but it is important to let a child explore everything so that they can find out for themselves.  The teachers at schools that advocate for the Waldorf approach also seem to be happier, as they are given more leeway to decide upon the curriculum.  Lessons are more uniquely crafted to suit both the teacher and the students.  It seems as if the Waldorf approach provides a much more enthusiastic style of learning, and provides just what every student needs: encouragement. 

How to Properly Teach Kids About the Holidays

When I was in elementary school, we celebrated Thanksgiving and Columbus day by having a party and discussing how America was "discovered."  We were taught the rhyme that says "In 1492, Columbus sailed the ocean blue.." and were told that this was the year he "founded" America (even though the Vikings had previously been to the land, and the Native Americans had been living there for thousands of years).  We also studied the "first Thanksgiving," and were taught that it was a day of celebration for the Pilgrims who survived the harsh travels from England.  To me, it was the day that the Pilgrims and the Native Americans sat down for their first meal together.  But is any of this really true?  Is it fair to teach children these same stories we learned as kids, even though we know they are false?

According to an article from Elementary School Issues, it is extremely important for us as educators to formulate a different way to teach kids about these holidays--and I completely agree.  Certainly it is a good idea to teach kids about the importance of giving thanks with the holiday soon approaching, but it is not fair to teach children stories that they will later find out are false.  It is incredibly important when teaching children about Thanksgiving to not refer to the "Indians" or "Native Americans" in the past tense, and to explain to kids that they still exist today.  Many Native Americans in todays society are pushing to rename Thanksgiving "Native American Day," in the hopes to educate the public about their proper history.  For them, the arrival of the Pilgrims was not a positive event whatsoever--it marked a day in which the the Pilgrims tried to impose their culture on them and take their land.  When teaching children about Thanksgiving, we should be very careful not to tell them falsehoods, so it would be a good idea to steer clear of putting on a pageant, such as I did in Elementary School, where kids dress as stereotypical Native Americans and Pilgrims.  Perhaps instead we should take the time to educate the kids about the culture of the Native Americans,  and to read a story from the perspective of a Native American.  Of course we should teach our kids to be Thankful for what they have and to celebrate Thanksgiving--we should just be careful to stay clear of the "first Thanksgiving" story that we were taught as kids.

Community Service

Recently there has been much discussion in the media about whether social justice is being properly taught within the classroom.  Assuming that issues pertaining to social justice should be discussed within the classroom, what are some ways that a teacher could integrate social justice into the classroom?  San Francisco State University has released an article with ten different recommendations, and one that really struck my interest was that community service should be a mandatory component for students to complete.

I had not thought about this conclusion until reading the article, but I completely agree that at least a small community service requirement should be given.  As stated in Creating Classrooms for Equity and Social Justice, "traditional classrooms often leave little room for student involvement and initiative."  What better way to get students involved within the community than to have them do community service?  The students will be taught what it means to give back to a community, and depending on what the task entails, it could potentially address many of the inequalities schools fail to confront.  For instance, one of the boys I babysit attends a private elementary school, and his class goes to the homeless shelter once a month to help feed the people there.  At first I was incredibly surprised to hear that the children were allowed to do that at such a young age, and I assumed that it would be quite a frightening experience for him--but while we were talking more about his experience, it became apparent that he truly enjoyed the trips to the homeless shelter.  He told me that he felt good while helping feed people that had less than he did, which was quite profound to hear from the mouth of an elementary-aged boy.  Hearing stories such as this leads me to believe that a community service component would be a great addition to the current curriculum.  I think community service would help the students learn first hand about social issues that may not regularly be covered within the classroom.  It would help the kids learn life lessons that are just as important as any math or spelling lesson could be.

The Educational Platforms of Obama and Romney

With the presidential election coming up in just a matter of days, one issue that is close to the heart of parents, teachers, and students alike is that of education.  To bring some light upon the subject, our class has been asked to research some of the major platform differences, and it certainly is hard to tell which sources are legitimate, as the liberal and conservative sources hold an equal bias--so I will try my best to leave out all biases in my synopsis.

Obama has previously freed states of the requirements of the Bush-era No Child Left Behind law.  No Child Left Behind focused on standardized testing, and schools were punished if they failed to meet the improvement standards.  Obama replaced NCLB with "Race to the Top" which rewards states for meeting the requirements rather than punishing them.  According to an article in The Quad, many republicans have labeled his plan as "Race to Nowhere," as they believe he is throwing the money away unnecessarily that is being given to the schools as a reward for meeting the expectations and goals set by the state.  Obama also supports a set of common academic standards known as the Common Core, and has successfully increased Pell Grants available to college students as well as other forms of financial aid.

The ideals of Romney's platform were a little harder to find since he does not yet have experience in office, but the main focus of many articles on the matter is that he supports Bush's No Child Left Behind law and has said that he will push congress to reinstate the law if he is elected into office.  His education platform has been named "A Chance for Every Child."  He has said that the testing, charter-school incentives, and teacher evaluation standards of "Race to the Top" are good standards to have, but he believes there should be less government intervention as far as education is concerned.  Romney also wants to get rid of the increased federal student aid given by Obama, as he believes it causes the tuition to increase.

Both Obama and Romney do seem to have pretty clear cut ideas as far as their educational platforms are concerned.  Of course there are many other topics to be considered as well with the election coming to a close, but the topic of education is one of the large focuses of the election indeed.  It will be interesting to see what happens!

A Need for Realism and Humanism in Our Schools

How does philosophy affect a classroom?  This is a question I have found quite interesting this past week, as we have been studying the roots of educational philosophies through the given readings.  While reading, it has become quite apparent that teachers all have their own reasons for wanting to teach, and the manner by which they morally strive to teach often lines up with a philosophical group.  In my opinion, the most important philosophies to abide by while teaching at the elementary age are the philosophies of realism and humanism.

Realism was founded by Aristotle, who sought to investigate the real world around him.  He was taught by Plato (an Idealist), and believed it was more important to see the world one was living in than to strive for an ideal world.  I agree with Aristotle because it is important to teach kids about their surroundings, and if they are taught that an ideal world exists, they will constantly find themselves being disappointed when the world does not turn out to be such a Utopia as they were taught to believe.  Within the Philosophical Perspectives of Education, the author explains that realism introduced a lot of science and math as a means to explain the world, and uses the example of a rose to explain the philosophy.

Teaching students about the world they live in is incredibly important, but as a teacher of elementary aged students, it is also important to advocate respect and kindness toward everyone, as a Humanist would.  The Humanists support classes in the liberal arts that help you develop psychologically.  These classes are supposed to help "mold your mind" and help you grow as a person; to develop your morals. As an elementary aged teacher, it is equally as important to teach the kids how to be good people as it is to teach them the subject matter on the curriculum.  They are at such an impressionable age it is essential to use a combination of the educational philosophies of realism as well as humanism to help them grow.

Teaching the Gifted

There has been a lot of controversy on the news lately pertaining to how a given school system should handle situations within the classroom where students are unable to keep up academically with their fellow classmates.  In an elementary school system, it is a question of whether to keep the kids in the classroom if they do not understand what is going on, or whether they should be placed in a different classroom.  But what about the kids who are at a much higher academic level than their peers?  They are in a similar situation, as the classroom is not moving at the proper speed for those children either.  They will find themselves growing bored as will find that they are not challenged enough.  What should a teacher do in this type of situation?

Within the website for the United Federation of Teachers, the article mentions that most schools do not have enough funding to give students the options of taking accelerated classes within an elementary school.  Of course once students get to high school, honors and AP courses are offered at most schools, but this is not usually an option in an elementary school setting, so it is extremely important that the teacher is aware that students are at different academic levels, and to make sure that each student is sufficiently challenged while still understanding the material.  Often times, teachers may try too hard to teach lessons as a whole group, but this is difficult when students learn at such different paces.  Perhaps it would help after a lesson was given to split the students up into smaller groups of kids with the same learning type as each other, so that the teacher can move from group to group and help students at a more individual level at the proper pace.  This way the students who are gifted can move at a faster pace, and those who have learning difficulties can learn at a slower pace.  We did this for reading groups in my elementary school and the system seemed to work very well, as each group read books that were at the perfect reading level for them.  It is also important to remember that students can learn from one another as well as the teacher, so it may also help to switch the groups occasionally so students can work with different people and share their opinions and findings.  It is certainly not easy to teach a classroom full of kids who are at different academic levels, but there are definitely strategies a teacher can use to make sure that each child is learning at the rate that is right for them.

Is mainstreaming the proper approach?

Schools and teachers have continuously struggled throughout time with the idea of how to best assimilate special needs students, as well as students of different nationalities, races and income levels into a single classroom.  The preferred approach for multicultural education, according to McNergney, for years has been mainstreaming.  In context with the idea of a multicultural education, the approach of mainstreaming aims to assimilate new immigrants into the regular classroom, with the implication that they should learn as they go.  But is this strategy really working?

Of course a student who is a recent immigrant and does not know English would most likely be taken out of class for intervals of the day to help them learn the language, but it is my belief that initial mainstreaming for even half the day is not the right approach to take with a child who speaks so little English that they would not benefit from being in the classroom at all.  It really depends on the individuals situation, but I witnessed a few cases in which mainstreaming did not seem to help the child while I was in Elementary and Middle school.  When I was in third grade, there were two boys who came into our class sometime in the middle of the school year.  One boy had come from Russia, the other from Portugal, and neither one of the students knew even a little English.  They were each taken out of the class for an hour or so throughout the day, but for the most part, they were with the class for the whole day.  The poor kids sat there and looked confused for months on end, and the teacher was unable to communicate with them at all without drawing pictures, and that became very time consuming.  I don't think she knew how to handle the situation either.  Clearly, for these boys, mainstreaming did not help at all, and they probably should have been learning English with a different teacher before getting thrown into the classroom.  Socially, the concept of mainstreaming for immigrants is a positive one because it is supposed to help them meet people sooner, but it is difficult to make friends in the first place if you can't talk to anyone.  I am sure that it made them feel left out, and probably didn't help their confidence either, as I am sure they became frustrated and felt like they didn't know anything. In a situation where a child knows at least a minimal amount of English, this approach may work better if they are able to learn through observation, but it is my opinion that each case should be looked upon in an individual basis.  Mainstreaming is not always the best option.

MCAS Testing

MCAS testing is not only used in Massachusetts as a way to see what abilities a student may possess--but is also seen as a reflection on the student's teachers, as well as the school itself.  Is MCAS testing really an accurate reflection of the students, teachers, and the school?  I do not think that it is.

According to a recent article on wbur, teachers in Hingham mass have come to a general consensus that the "MCAS is misguided in evaluating teachers," as well as students.  Testing can be viewed as a high stress situation to many students, so even if you were to have straight A's in a class, and be an amazing writer, neither of those would necessarily translate into a passing MCAS score.  It is also highly stressful since it is a graduation requirement to pass the test.  In my opinion, testing in general is not always an accurate reflection of a students abilities, and the MCAS is definitely one of those kind of tests.  It is extremely unfair that the test scores also reflect back on a school.  My elementary, middle, and high school had very low MCAS scores in general, but there was never any mention of our test scores in relation to the percentage of students we had that spoke English as a second language.  The same goes for a teacher--if a particular teacher has a lot of students who speak English as a second language, and they receive lower test scores, this should not be seen as a negative reflection of the teachers abilities at all.  According to the Orange and Black article from Wayland Middle School, some believe that the testing is good because it allows a teacher to be more structured and know when certain material should be studied, but isn't that what a school board does for the teachers anyway?  From that same newspaper, others are quoted saying that it is more stressful than anything, and that it is much too long of a test to be accurate, since the students are exhausted by the end of it.  I understand that it provides a way to make sure that schools are on track, but there should definitely be a more accurate way to do it.  MCAS testing seems to be an unfair and somewhat biased test, which I do not think should reflect on the teachers or the schools, and that it should not be seen as a graduation requirement for students to fulfill.

Why Teach?

Why is it that people decide to teach?

Is it the prospect of working with kids in general? Of teaching them new things, and learning new things in return?  Is it simply for the paycheck, and the 10 week vacation time?  Or is it to be the teacher you never had--to help kids through what could possibly be the hardest time of their lives?  The reasons are endless.  The more important question at hand is whether these motivations for teaching are for good or bad reasons.

According to the WorksheetLibrary (http://www.worksheetlibrary.com/teachingtips/becomingelementary.html), there are ten reasons why a person should choose to be a teacher.  They are all very positive reasons that range from having a broad appreciation of the subject matter, to being a creative and a good communicator, to simply enjoying the company of children.  There is no doubt that these are all great reasons to go into the field, but Canestrari proposes that there are people who do go into teaching for the wrong reasons within his book, Education Foundations.  He proposes that if one had a negative experience in school, they might subconsciously use teaching as a way to "get back at" the offense made to them so long ago.  For instance, if boys were particularly nasty to them, one might treat the girls more fairly, or if one has a prejudiced opinion of some sort, that the teacher must be sure that this prejudice does not follow the individual into the classroom.  He states that an aspiring teacher may try to redo their mistakes through the kids-- which of course is impossible.

After reading several articles on the matter, it is clear to me that teaching certainly is still a wonderful profession, but that one should be careful to evaluate themselves and make sure that they are deciding to go into the field of education for the right reasons.  I originally was trying to decide whether to specialize in elementary education or middle school education.  I had a fantastic time in elementary school, and aspired to be the same type of teacher that I had in elementary school.  But at the same time, I had a horrendous time in middle school, and felt like I might have wanted to teach that age group to show those kids what I felt like I never had at their age, and to make sure that they didn't make the same mistakes that I did.  I feel like I made the right decision deciding to specialize in elementary education because I have so many reasons for loving children at that age, but my one reason for wanting to teach kids in middle school was for a more negative reason that had much more to do with myself than the actual kids.  Whether choosing to teach simply for the love of the children, or any other reasons one may possess, it is extremely important to thoroughly examine these reasons and make sure that you are choosing the profession for the right ones.  You must be able to understand the students, and be patient and able to adapt your teaching style to suit their needs.  Make it about the students, and not just about you.

About Me

Hello Everyone!  My name is Rachel and I am currently a student at Salem State University.  I very recently switched my major to Education with a concentration in Elementary Ed.  My mom is a second grade teacher, and I always admired her for doing that, and I would love to be a teacher like her someday.  I always knew I wanted to work with kids, but I wasn't sure exactly what type of environment I wanted to work in until recently.  The first class I am taking for the major is Premise of the School, which I am creating this blog for.  It is the first time I have ever blogged so it should be exciting!

This is a picture of me and one of the kids I babysit on a regular basis!  She likes playing with photoshop on my computer.

http://edu309.blogspot.com/