Melanie's Semester Goals

 I have established many goals that I hope to complete from this course. My principle goal is to better identify with myself as a teacher. I hope that gaining more experience with students through field will help me better understand learners and how they respond to my teaching strategies and me. I’ll consider the quality of their responses and modify my approach as needed. I’d also like to develop an idea of the environment of my future classroom, my personal teaching theories, what I value as a teacher, and what I value for the well being of my future students.  Again, I hope to achieve a great part of this by analyzing the quality of the time I spend with students in field and by considering the comments that I hear from my peers, CT, and professor. I believe I can slowly discover my personal teaching theories through discussions in class and by hearing other students’ teaching experiences as well. However, I don’t want to solely rely on students’ and my peers’ opinions to discover my strengths and weaknesses. I hope to develop a strong method of self-assessment to analyze myself and really discover what I value in a teacher and learner. Another goal that I have is furthering my experience with students that have English as a second language. I am very interested in bilingual schools, particularly those that deal with the Spanish language, and I would like to improve my interaction with these students. I want develop a teaching approach that targets these students so I can discover how to meet their needs. I aspire to be a teacher in a bilingual school, so it is crucial that I understand how to teach, inspire, and motivate these students. Lastly, I hope to learn more about discipline and how to properly utilize it in the classroom. One of my major weaknesses not knowing how to be an authoritative figure. I have always been afraid and hesitant to discipline children, but I realize that it is important that I learn how to discipline in an appropriate and efficient manner. Not only would this create a better learning environment for my students, but it would also help me complete my responsibilities as a teacher. As a future teacher, I need to have a stronger presence in the classroom, and I want students to take me seriously. I hope to gain ideas on how to do so from this class, my peers, and my CT. I’ve developed these specific goals because I feel that these skills are what I lack in the most. I hope to attain all of these goals so I can transcend these lessons into my future teaching career.

Semester Goals

My primary goal for this semester is to continue developing my teaching philosophy. Questions underlying this development are "What is the purpose of education?" "What do I believe about my students and learning that must influence the way I teach?" and "What do I know about myself and my worldview that will shape my teaching?" Literacy never stops being part of teaching and learning, so the questions "What is true literacy?" and "How can I as a teacher promote literacy in the fullest sense of the word?" are very important. If I can even begin to answer these questions at the end of the semester, I'll know that I've been successful.

Literacy itself, and really all language, is a mystery. How did human beings evolve an ability to speak, to read, to write, to communicate so effectively and through so many methods? And the worlds that literacy allows us to enter are magical. How can I convey to my students the wonder and excitement that literacy brings? How can I encourage them to enter not only the magical, fictional worlds that come from reading and writing stories, but also to take advantage of the real world opportunities that come from critical literacy? My goal, at the end of the semester, is to wrap my head and hands around strategies that will help me do this.