My teaching philosophy for science and mathematics is to create classrooms that cause

students to explore. Sometimes they will explore a topic before they have facts and details about
it. I wish to create classes where thinking is a skill. I want students to have the freedom to not
always produce the correct or fastest answer to a question or problem. I want the students to
value their ability to think, comprehend, analyze, create and communicate. Most of all, I want to
impact students in such a way that they will know who they are academically, and they will
challenge themselves to move forward from that position. I will challenge students to assist their
peers in learning. I ascribe to the 5E teaching strategy. Engage the students as a means of
making learning exciting and fun. Engage the students to get their schema activated. Frequent
student exploration will assist in producing the habits of scientific behavior. These habits may
become a place where new explorers, scientist, and researchers will grow. In the end, I would
like to use strategies like the 5E to assist my students in becoming knowledgeable, curious and
contributing members of the community.
I would like to develop the skill of critical thinking in my students. In science and
mathematics, critical thinking involves many elements. Science and mathematics should
challenge all assumptions about ideas and concepts. Students must view the information from
multiple points of view and context. Critical thinking and science share these things: reasoning,
purpose, question, problems, assumptions, and objections from different points of view. Some of
the ideas above were honed from www.criticalthinking.org. Teachers can learn their students
personalities and personal interest while walking around the class checking for correct use of
skills practice and correct use of academic language.
Teaching in a Diverse Student Population: more advanced, below norm, reading difficulty,
race and culture. For all classroom types teacher can ensure differentiation takes
place by developing curriculum that addresses the perspective of all of the
students.

Students who excel or perform slightly below the required standards may need to be
challenged in the following ways before an appropriate strategy can be identified for
them.

advanced students can be offered more challenging questions, content, or find specific
areas of interest

less advanced students can have more time allotted for task, quizzes and test

For students with difficulty or challenges reading, the teacher can provide listening
stations to assist students in understanding the material.