Here is my final podcast!
April 25th, 2006 by ericaphotiades · 16 Comments · Podcasts
Final Paper
April 13th, 2006 by ericaphotiades · 8 Comments · Final Paper
I believe that people are born with a gift for teaching, almost like an instinct. You don’t “grow to love” teaching or choose it because there aren’t any other professions. You don’t teach because you like kids, even though that is definitely a requirement. I know that I teach mostly from instinct guided by my past experiences. It is true that teachers teach what they know, and if they are good teachers, they will make sure to impart everything they know about their subject to their students. More important than classroom management, teachers need a goal and the necessary interpersonal skills to guide their classroom into achieving the goal.
As I progress through the Teacher Education program, I am finding through my reflection that my identity as a teacher is shaped by experiences I had as a student. I was shaping my identity unconsciously when I taught violin in high school, but the guidelines I used are still the ones I abide by today: I refuse to duplicate methods my teachers used that I disliked, and I make sure to include everything I loved about my learning/teaching experiences. I had a hard time reading McNeil’s Defensive Teaching because of my beliefs, even though I have had so many teachers who were only interested in exerting the minimal amount of effort to get their classes to behave and learn the narrow material the teacher presented to them.
I was a sensitive child and I remember vividly most of the bad tactics teachers used on me as well as the good, so maybe in my case my past effects my teaching more so than most people because due to my experiences I have always had strong opinions on how people should and should not be treated. If teachers are expected to prepare their students for the real world, they need to establish a relationship that is built on mutual respect with an open line of communication between the students and the teachers. I believe that a good teacher would realize this and work on establishing a classroom atmosphere of trust given on the condition of responsibility for both the teacher and the student. I always ended up learning more from teachers I respected because I was more receptive to what they had to say, so I can believe when a teacher has gained the respect and trust of the class, the flow of information and ideas will be a lot smoother.
Literacy
This class has done a lot to shape my ideas on literacy. It is not just about learning to read, as I originally thought. I agreed with Lankshear-Knobel’s “application of the term literacy to an ever-increasing variety of practices, to the point where it now seems that practically any knowledge and learning deemed educationally valuable can somehow be conceived as literacy.” (Lankshear-Knobel pg. 14). Lankshear-Knobel’s idea of “New Literacies” doesn’t necessarily need to be new information either; it looks at old material through “new” eyes. I was initially indifferent to our use of blogs and internet technology in conjunction with this course, but I have learned through using them that these are “new literacies” that we are now proficient enough in to use as teaching resources in our own classrooms, allowing us to be included in the “paradigm shift” making its way into our classrooms. I am now very interested in incorporating podcasting into my classroom, because as music teacher, it a resource that I can definitely find a use for. I never had any sort of computer technology in any of my music classes in high school, so already I can see the possibilities for change that programs like itunes can offer a music class.
Right now I am still developing my personal beliefs on literacy, but I do believe that music is definitely a subject that is host to many new literacies. Music has so many genres, the majority of which are not taught in schools. I have thought about ways to teach students more than just “dead white guy” music, such as incorporating styles such as jazz, world music and even popular music. All of these genres could be considered literacies, and I can honestly say that a big reason why they are not taught in schools is because the majority of music teachers are not competent or “illiterate” to them (Lankshear-Knobel pg. 14). I know that I have a very limited knowledge of music that is not “dead white guy” but this is not to say that I should limit my students because I am illiterate. The wonderful thing about literacies is that teachers are never illiterate for long if they make a conscious effort to learn. One of the ways I hope to develop new literacies in my classroom is to expose my students to as many different styles of music as possible. The more students can be exposed to, the better chance I will have at changing the way students view a subject.
Motivation
I have to be honest: music was my second choice as a subject matter to teach. I loved English when I was in high school, but I was so frustrated at the lack of motivation my classmates had for the subject that I thought I would go crazy if I ever tried to teach it. I choose music because I believed most students took music classes because they wanted to, and would be easier to teach. What I have realized about English or any subject matter that students aren’t crazy about learning is that somewhere their in history they encountered a bad teacher who ruined their perceptions of the subject, probably because they used defensive teaching strategies: oversimplifying an assignment, mystifying a subject or spending so much time on classroom order that nothing was ever taught. “Much of the student apathy, even occasional resistance, which administrators see as a motivation problem requiring more discipline procedures arises in these schools precisely because goals of order have already undermined the ability of staff to deal with educative goals.” (McNeil, pg 161). I believe that 90% of all motivation problems arise because there are too many bad teachers damaging students’ love of learning. I know that is a harsh statement to make, but we can’t really blame the students if we don’t first blame ourselves.
When students are young, they can barely contain their enthusiasm about going to school. Eventually this enthusiasm for every subject starts to taper off and students begin to find their niches, which is normal. But complete disinterest in school is not. Students come in all levels of learning and teachers need to realize that students are not all motivated the same way. I believe most motivational problems stem from damage done by a previous teacher’s attempts at “motivation.” Bad examples: empty threats, ridiculing, allowing the student to slide with mediocre work. All of these examples show that the teacher is not concerned with helping the student learn, but initiating a power struggle between the student and the educator. The students, in turn, develop the coping mechanisms Brophy describes in “Rebuilding Students’ Confidence”: disadvantaged learners-low achievers, failure syndrome, problems stemming from performance rather than learning-related goals, and self-worth protection to defend themselves against the teacher (Brophy).
While I can’t be responsible for the behavior of any teacher besides myself, I know that one of the best ways I can motivate my students is to be motivated myself. I would like to use new literacies I find in music, and I would love my students to share their knowledge with me. If I am interested in the subject I am teaching, and convey to my students that I am interested in their individual progress, this will establish a relationship of respect and trust that defensive teaching does not. I have already made the choice that I am going to be a teacher who cares about her students and genuinely wants to learn as much from them as they learn from me. I would structure the environment in my classroom to facilitate “motivation to succeed”, not “motivation to avoid failure” (Brophy pg. 56). The Brophy articles discuss several strategies for motivating students, but one I particularly liked from a music education standpoint was, “help your students learn to attribute their successes to the combination of sufficient ability and reasonable effort, and their failures to lack of task-relevant information or lack of effort” (Brophy pg. 63).
What do we want from our schools?
I don’t have delusions that all of my music students will one day be performing in major symphony orchestras. My philosophy of music education has always been to impart my love of music to each one of my students and help them become the best musicians they can be. I’m not sure which educational philosophy this fits into, or which model of schooling it best represents either, but I can’t stress enough that music and arts education needs to be a part of the school curriculum. I believe schools should educate based on the interests of their students and community. There is a great demand for music education in this country, and if public schools do not provide it, private organizations will. The more that school boards and government legislature whittle down the general education curriculum to keep up with the progress in other countries, the greater disservice they will be doing their students. If social mobility is the direction our schools are going towards, they will not achieve a well-educated society by severely limiting their students’ options for success.
I have a personal problem with education in this country because if the trends caused by NCLB continue, I might not have a job, or even a job market. There is no reason why every student in this country should not have the right to a music class, yet the majority of schools do not have funding for it, and the ones that do are usually located in affluent areas. There is no federal legislation that protects public school music legislation. What I would like to see from our schools is that every subject have the right to equal representation, arts included. If our educational system focused on providing a well-rounded curriculum of histories, sciences and arts, I think the young people of this country would have the resources to be able to compete with any other country.
Works Cited
Brophy, J. (2004). Supporting students’ confidence as learners. In Motivating students to learn (2nd ed., pp. 55-86). Mahwah, NJ: Lawrence Erlbaum Associates.
Lankshear, C., & Knobel, M. (2003). From ‘reading’ to the ‘new literacy studies’ In New literacies (pp. 3-22). New York: Open University Press.
Lankshear, C., & Knobel, M. (2003). The ‘New literacy studies’ and the study of new literacies. In New literacies (pp. 23-49). New York: Open University Pres
McNeil, L. M. (1986). Defensive teaching and classroom control. In Contradictions of control (pp. 157-190). Boston: Routledge.
Tutoring Reflection #7 (#6 Part II)
April 12th, 2006 by ericaphotiades · 9 Comments · Tutoring Reflections
My last visit to the middle school was rather bittersweet. I really enjoyed working with the students. The last day I came they were finishing up watching the movie Tuck Everlasting—the new one which I loaned to the teacher because of all the complaints she had gotten about the old movie they tried to watch a couple weeks earlier. I was disappointed that even though the students had asked for a different video to watch, they did not pay attention to the movie I had brought for them in compliance with their request. Maybe it was because they were sixth graders and it was the day before spring break, but I had hoped they would watch the movie that they wanted to see.
After the video, the teacher attempted to get a classroom discussion going about the meaning of the film and what it would mean to live forever, but the students didn’t really participate. The teacher spent so much time trying to get the class quiet and then disciplining the students that were speaking out of turn or not paying attention that the discussion didn’t really work. I was impressed that she tried to get them to think critically about the book and the movie, but it didn’t really surprise me that due to the last six weeks of their classes consisting of nothing but worksheets and silent reading that the attempt was unsuccessful.
The teacher even said to me (in front of the class no less), “See, you’ve just witnessed one of the most important jobs of the teacher: classroom managment.” I’m not sure I agree with that statement, though I understand why she said it. I do think also that maybe the teacher’s discussion failed because when a teacher spends most of his/her time communicating to the class that they should be quiet and only do as they are told, when given the chance to speak out by the teacher, it sends a mixed signal that confuses the class and irritates the teacher.
I could tell that these students were not used to being asked what they thought about something, and the majority of them said they didn’t know or didn’t have an opinion instead of starting a discussion. I had a feeling that if she had tried this with her honors class, the activity might have worked better, being that those students are used to giving their opinions and have been encouraged to do so. From what I saw of her honors class and the way she interacted with the students, they were used to having more responsibility and freedom to make choices about their curriculum. She communicated the need for mutual respect between the students and the teacher far more strongly in her honors class than in the remedial class. I think that maybe if she applied that strategy to all her classes, not just honors, she might see a big difference in the way her students responded to her, and it wouldn’t be just because they were “honors.”
The other interesting thing that happened to me while I was there was that the teacher allowed me to give my parting statement to the students and I asked if they had any questions about me or about MSU and what it’s like to be in college, and I got some surprising results from my inquiry. Besides asking my name, was I married or did I have kids, a couple of the students asked very specific questions about the cost of college. These questions came from the “misbehavers” and it became obvious to me that even at a young age, these students were conscious about money because their families didn’t have much. They wanted to go to college, but were worried that they wouldn’t be able to because they couldn’t pay for it. They asked about loans, about scholarships, all sorts of things I wouldn’t have even thought of when I was in sixth grade-and I was honors! I didn’t even know how to answer their questions properly, which made me feel kind of silly that they knew more about finance than I did.
I wonder how many of those students will make it to college, or if they are already pinning their hopes, as one student did, on “getting a scholarship to play football at MSU.” As if this was the only thing he could hope for. I gave them the best advice that I could, that their chances for a college track were best if they worked hard in school and learned as much as they could before they had to pay for the knowledge. And even I could feel that those words were empty, because they are already on the generic track that will prepare them for nothing if they were to continue and even get straight A’s in their general or remedial classes. I have not felt more strongly than I did at that moment that I was staring into the faces of the students that schools are failing right now. Schools are failing to provide them with the education they need to go to college, because college isn’t about worksheets and showing up. College-bound students need to have a good work ethic and higher-level thinking skills that these students have not been exposed to, the teacher’s attempt to discuss Tuck Everlasting emphasizing this oversight.
I hope that these students continue to seek knowledge and that they encounter teachers who are willing to teach them more than how to sit down and shut up. I know that even from my brief time with them that I will try my hardest to provide my students with the knowledge they need to find their place in the world.
Reading Response-Labaree
April 9th, 2006 by ericaphotiades · 5 Comments · Class Readings
With all the readings we have been doing concerning the different educational philosophies as well as our class discussions about the effect of said philosophies on the topics of tracking and standardized testing, the Labaree article probably would not have had as much of an impact on my understandings of the goals of education and the politics behind those goals.
I have read articles for TE 250 about democratic equality, social efficiency and social mobility as the three main structures of education in this country, and because of the conflicting pedagogies and conflicting philosophies, this has brought about some of the failures and stresses we see in today’s schools. It seems that no one can agree on why our citizens should be educated, and it usually depends on the current majority opinion to provide the structure of schools. But majorities change, and as viewpoints shift, these three basic structures, democratic equality, social mobility and social efficiency begin to clash because they are not compatible with one another, and often contradict.
I like to look at the historical aspects of each philosophy because at their most basic and fundamental, you can usually pinpoint what point in our nation’s history they came from. While each philosophy has beliefs that transcend the passing of time, it seems to me that it is these core beliefs that are gumming up the wheels of our education today. Do we educate students to become good citizens and operate how our government wants us to? Do we educate students to preserve the status quo and the class barriers we have? Do we encourage every student to become a doctor or a lawyer?
I agree with Labaree that it seems the social mobility track is currently the one in power and because it is not possible for everyone to become a doctor or a lawyer, education is no longer as valid for those who do not rise upwards on the social scale. We teach subjects because we are told to, because they have always been taught, but even though we are encouraging students to rise above, we are not providing the education they need to do so. I’m not yet sure what track I subscribe to, because I think it is important for students to learn how to be citizens as well as to become as well trained as they can be in whatever field they choose and hope to rise above the race and class barriers that separate so many people in this country.
The good thing is that we are aware of the descrepancies in our educational system, and awareness always brings about change.
Personal Reading-Why I want to move to New Jersey
April 5th, 2006 by ericaphotiades · 4 Comments · Personal Readings
I just read a posting from the Blog of Music for All talking about a survey that the state of New Jersey is conducting to evaluate the status of arts education in their public schools. The survey was initiated by the secretary of state and the commissioner of education. All public schools are participating and the purpose is to give educators an in depth look at arts education in order to improve all offerings of its programs. I think in a country where music and art are so often the first things to go in budget cuts, it wonderful that the actually board of education for the state of New Jersey is taking the time to insure that their programs are preserved. I wish Michigan would take the hint from New Jersey and adopt similar policies to critique their programs with the end result of improving them for future generations of school children. There’s a lot more to education than just math and science, folks!
Tutoring Reflection #6
April 5th, 2006 by ericaphotiades · 1 Comment · Tutoring Reflections
This entry is going to be a two-parter because I am returning on thursday to finish my tutoring in a manner that is satisfying to me (saying goodbye to the students I have worked with and providing them with Easter candy!) On tuesday I was disappointed to note that the students I have been working with did not have fifth hour because of an assembly that threw their schedule off for the day.
I stayed around to use the opportunity to observe Mrs. S. 4th hour honors class, but all they did was go to the library to pick out a book to read over spring break, so I don’t have much to report on in terms of what I did.
I did notice several differences between Mrs. S’s treatment of her honors class and her treatment of the remedial reading class that stood out to me. These classes were both sixth grade, both the same racial makeup, but because fourth hour was “honors” Mrs. S demanded a higher standard of them than the remedial class. They were turning in essays and working on book reports and the books they were choosing for spring break also had to have book reports accompanying them when they returned back to school. The students were typical sixth graders, there wasn’t much about their deportment that set them apart from the class I work with, but instead of reprimanding them by way of punishment as Mrs. S has done with her remedial class, she instead gave them options for their repercussions that required adult-like choices from her students. I wondered was this because they were more mature than the other class (I didn’t think so) or because of their labelling as “honors students”? There was also the issue of coursework descrepancies between the two classes. The honors class was working on essays and book reports while the remedial class answered questions from worksheets or read silently for the entire hour while the teacher did something else. Yet these students are the same grade level and will one day be expected to compete for the same opportunities in this world, which they are not being equally prepared for. I understand that the skill levels of these two classes are not equal, but I would hope that a remedial class would be structured in a manner to speed up the development of its students to be able to acheive as close to an honors level as possible.
The discussions we have been having in class concerning tracking and especially the different educational philosophies really started to make more sense to me as I compared Mrs. S’s treatment of the different classes. I never really realized just how much teachers relied on tracking to dictate the curriculum and the structure of their classes, and the different philosophies about education that teachers subscribe to, at least in practice, really make an impact on what students learn. I wouldn’t call Mrs. S lazy, but she was a lot more lax in her expectations of the remedial class than the honors class. In order to make the honors students behave, she would stress to them that they were an honors class and that should tell them how to behave. She never did this with her remedial class, her discipline tactics, as I mentioned before, were mainly to get the students to sit down, shut up and do their worksheets.
I never got a chance to ask her what her personal beliefs were on tracking in schools, but I do know from watching her that she perpetuates the necessity of tracking, whether or not she would agree with it in theory. She is a good, efficient teacher in both environments, but when those two environments are compared, it paints a very different picture of her teaching. When I go to tutor tomorrow, I would like to find out what the expectations are for her remedial class over spring break. I have a feeling that they will not be expected to read books over break and that they probably won’t because they have had six years of public schooling not stressing enough that reading is a skill they need to have. The honors class will read their books for class and probably start new ones because they have been taught that reading is important and it is also enjoyable, which makes reading books fun instead of homework. These two classes are still made up of sixth graders, and already the seeds are being sown to divide these groups forever.
I will post one more tutoring reflection after this, though I’m not sure if it will be in the same vein of thought. Right now I don’t have the answers I need, I only know that my eyes are opening wider every time I come back to that school.
Reading Response-Critical Thinking and Critical Pedagogy
April 3rd, 2006 by ericaphotiades · Comments Off · Class Readings
There is a lot to be said for teachers who refuse to teach material without first examining it themselves to make sure it is information that is relevant and imperative for their students to know. Critical thinking and critical pedagogy are two veins of teaching that I agree should be insisted upon in the schools. I believe it is a bit more difficult to teach critical pedagogue, because teachers often don’t have the control over their curriculum that is necessary in order to begin throwing out most knowledge schools teach in order for them to continue reproducing societies regulated “truths” and ultimately the status quo.
Any challenge to the curriculum a school presents to its teachers and students is something that should first be brought to administrators, since they are the ones with more jurisdiction to make changes that enable something like critical pedagogy to be taught in schools. I’m not saying that I don’t agree with critical pedagogy, but unless it is approached correctly, it will be seen as radical by any force opposing it and most likely will result in the “radical” losing his/her position.
I have had one teacher in high school who attempted to get us to think outside the box. The class was on sociology, but mainly it dealt with current events that were steeped in controversy and conflicting opinions. I loved the class because the topic material was events and people I had never heard about. This class was more an example of critical thinking, which I believe is the option teachers should try to teach because it challenges students to look outside of the world they are presented in textbooks without accusing the textbooks of lying.
During the process of critical thinking, certain skills are taught to students, such as logic and reasoning and evidence comparison that will help them combat the inequalities they see in the world without teaching them that everything they believed in before the class was wrong. The article’s depiction of critical thinking gives many different definitions for it, starting with logic and going into a more in depth analysis of what truth is and how do we define it?
What I like about most of these philosophies is their emphasis on change in the mindset of education. I’m a little leery about the emphasis on Marxist philosophy that critical pedagogy takes, but obviously, philosophies can be as radical or tame as a person decides to make them, and the basic tenets can still be used without overthrowing the entire school system. I do believe that change will be emminent in the schools if future teachers continue to be exposed to the changes in technology and software that can be used in the classroom to update learning. We were all born with minds of our own, and school is the place to learn how to use them, not to supress them. I believe anyone would agree with that.
My very first podcast!
April 3rd, 2006 by ericaphotiades · 9 Comments · Uncategorized
Since I was unable to do the reading for tomorrow’s class (silly me, I left it on my school computer and went home for the weekend) I decided to take a crack at podcasting. This is a recording my boyfriend and I did today of the second movement of the Wieniawski violin concerto which I am currently learning. I am playing violin and he is playing flute. I hope you enjoy.
http://ia310135.us.archive.org/2/items/Wieniawski_2nd_Violin_concerto_2nd_Mvt./Ourduet.mp3
Tutoring Reflection #5
April 1st, 2006 by ericaphotiades · Comments Off · Tutoring Reflections
Thursday’s tutoring provided some very interesting experiences that I would like to talk about. I have now been working with the same sixth grade reading class for over a month now and thursday was the first time I saw some drastic behavior changes in the students I’d been observing. These were changes for the good, I’d like to add. The two students I saw in a different light were chronic misbehavers, one was always targeted by the teacher and the other would usually just sass me when I tried to help him. The student, R. who was always targeted by the teacher was African-American, as was the teacher. R. would usually be sullen and unresponsive during the class, and would act out in ways that made his teacher ridicule him in front of the class for his behavior. The other student, A. would also not pay attention, but more in a chatty, disinterested manner. He was less often reprimanded by the teacher.
Thursday, however, both of these students decided to be on task, and it was amazing their behavior had on the class atmosphere and my initial impressions of them. R. was not feeling well and came into the class wheezing because of his asthma. He didn’t have his inhaler so the teacher blew him off and told him to stop wheezing. Knowing that this student frequently acts out, I can see why his teachers wouldn’t take him seriously, but if he were to have an asthma attack, wouldn’t there be repercussions for any teacher who noticed it and ignored it? I decided to tell R. that if he wasn’t feeling well and needed to go to the office to let me know and I would go with him. I’m not sure if that was what did it, but his behavior improved and he actually started doing the assignment the teacher asked, even going so far as to ask me for guidance, something he had never done before. I was unfamiliar with the book they were reading, so I asked him to give me a synopsis, and his summary was very thorough. I had somewhat expected him to want me to give him the answers, but when it became obvious to the both of us that he already had all the information he needed to complete the assignment, all I had to do was give him some encouragement and smile as he did the task by himself.
I’m telling R.’s story because it was an example of a turning point in my own observations of him and his class. I was beginning to believe that R. was a student who was on his way to becoming yet another casualty of a school that refused to evaluate him based on his needs. He is already in remidial classes as a sixth grader, and from what I can tell, none of his teachers take him seriously. He is used to be reprimanded and lectured and will shut down as soon as he senses that another teacher is doing that to him. I don’t know if he has one teacher in that school who will look beyond his bad attitude and see the child struggling to learn a subject that no one is interested in teaching him if he can’t play by their rules.
R. is a direct result of defensive teaching, a student who has adapted his defense mechanisms in a negative way in order to circumvent the attacks or the disinterest of his teachers. He is not being taught English, he is being taught how to sit down, shut up and “pay attention.” While all of these skills are necessary, these students are not learning the reasons behind why they should pay attention. Their teacher is too busy telling everyone to be quiet and settle down that when they are ready to learn something, all they are given are worksheets to do while the teacher does her own work on the computer.
I have not seen much interaction between the students and the teacher that goes beyond the realm of discipline. Each time I have observed the class they are reading or doing worksheets silently while their teacher sits at the desk and watches them. There is always a reason for the teacher’s inattentiveness, and none of the reasons are bull, but at some point these students need a teacher to be present and teach them English.
The other occurrence I wanted to talk about happened when I was helping A. and C. with their Tuck Everlasting worksheets. C. was frustrated because he didn’t feel that the teacher did anything to help him. He went so far as to say, “She doesn’t respect me. She doesn’t like anyone who isn’t black.” That statement shocked me, mainly because it was a strong accussation, and I didn’t see the teacher that way, but I could see how a sixth grader might. What was interesting to me is that while the substitute does interact more with the African-American students, it is more often in a disciplinary situation than socializing. In fact, it is when she is interacting with the African-American students that I feel she is most out of line with her comments to them.
Their substitute is a very intelligent, sharp woman and I respect her a great deal, but she is sometimes a bit abrasive in her interactions with the students, a trait I have noticed that is probably cultural (she did once mention that her father was in the army) and she is African-American. The classroom is very diverse ethnically, with an even distribution of caucasian, african-american, latino and other ethnicities. C. is from England and in addition to experiencing a different school, I have gotten the sense that the atmosphere and culture of this middle school is very different from his school in England. C. was very forthcoming with his opinions of the substitute, and though he was looking at things from the eyes of a 12-year-old, I could see his point. The culture difference is significant enough in that classroom to cause the “not black” students to feel alienated from the instruction and the world of their teacher. He is not the only student who has voiced these concerns to me.
How does a teacher deal with these issues? I understand that it is necessary for a teacher to have their own identity, but in an ethnically diverse school like the one I am tutoring in, the way that teachers approach teaching material, disciplining students and establishing classroom order varies a great deal based on the cultural background of the teacher. I feel that in addition to the students not having a consistent teacher they may not be learning as well because the teaching style of the person who is currently teaching them is radically different than their regular teacher and at their young age they don’t have the maturity to try and learn what they can from whoever is teaching them.
I have tried in my tutoring experiences to be a sympathetic listening ear to the students I work with, and I believe this has allowed me access into their minds that I might not get if I only worked on homework with them. Their concerns are very real and the environment in which they learn in does not always do the best job to accommodate those concerns. I am glad that I can see things from both sides of the fence, but I worry that when I teach I will be so preoccupied with other matters that I will begin to forget that my students are also people, and misbehavers still want to learn just as much as those who do everything they’re told. I hope I can retain my desire to know everyone of my students beyond just what they do in class.
Personal Comment-Jessica’s Tutoring Reflection #6
April 5th, 2006 by ericaphotiades · 9 Comments · Personal Comments
Jessica, your post stood out to me as I was reading through my bloglines today. What do you think of the tactic that the teacher used to get her students to think about high school? Do you think you would ever use a tactic like warning the students that they might not go to high school in order to get them to focus and do their work? Obviously, there is some type of motivation going on in the class, but I felt very uneasy reading about the choice of motivation and the reaction from the students. I don’t believe that a teacher should ever threaten students in order to motivate them. If I remember correctly from TE 150, threatening to take something away from someone was a negative reinforcer that ultimately lead to goal-settings and motivation that was always extrinsic and usually for the wrong reasons.
Your description of the teacher searching for pencils when half the class didn’t have them just accentuates the point that she is not helping her students prepare in any way for high school by threatening them and then still letting them get away with being unprepared for class. You cannot motivate students if you are sending mixed messages, which might explain why the teacher’s class is so rowdy most of the time. You said that you were glad for the motivation skills that you had, but what or who helped you acquire them? You probably weren’t just born with them. I think in a situation like that, sometimes the best way to reflect on the descrepancies between your skills and the skills of your students is to think about what worked for you, and how you can adapt that to your own classroom in the future.