Professional Documents
Culture Documents
Background
The multi-dimensional project gave me the opportunity to develop to address the
needs of different educational theories and how I would incorporate them into my
philosophy as a teacher. For this project I chose the picture of a Mandala, which is
an Indian religion representing the universe, but is now common name for
geometric shapes put together symbolically. Mandalas have a focal point and
spread out with different lines and patterns to create a beautiful picture/meaning.
My mandala is made up of different theorist intertwined to create a beautiful
education experience for student by addressing their needs.
The first Theorist is John Dewey. He is the center of my Mandala, because of his
child center approach to individualizing education based on child needs. It then
progresses to James comer who represents the creative and positive environments
to help the child develop as a whole: physical, cognitive, psychological language,
social and ethical. The collaboration with adults helps develop the child, each
shape of the Mandala interacts with the lines and creates new shapes changing the
picture. Just as James Comer states developing the whole child with collaboration,
each aspect of the child interacts and forms the child as a whole.
Rationale
For this project I wanted to be creative. I am an art person so I was also trying to
incorporate that piece into my multi-dimensional project. I chose a mandala
because they all specific representation through pictures, lines, shapes, and the
interaction of them throughout the piece. This mandala represent my theories of
education and how I would apply different theorist into my work with students.
Teaching Standards
Standard #2: The teacher understands how children learn and develop,
and can provide learning opportunities that support their intellectual, social,
and personal development. In this project I demonstrated my knowledge of
how children learn and develop differently. The Mandala displays the
different shapes interacting with one another changing the overall picture
and outcome of the Mandala. This reflects how children grow ad learn. Their
interactions with adults and peers over time change their perception which
can change the child for the better or worse depending on the amount of
positive interactions. This Mandala shows the understanding that it is
equally important to develop students not only intellectually but social,
psychological language, ethical, psychological, and cognitive. Each one of
these is a piece on the Mandala and is shown through various colors and
shapes. The different colors and shapes represent a different part of the
child being addressed and needing its needs met to develop successful
adults.
CEC Standards
MULTI-DIMENSIONAL RATIONALE
Alverno Abilities
MULTI-DIMENSIONAL RATIONALE
Educational Framework