TEACHING

PHILOSOPHY
The art of teaching is a thoughtful process. Every decision I make in the classroom serves a purpose.
My teaching philosophy will provide a detailed look into the classroom environment I thoughtfully created.
Every decision is supportive and inclusive to ensure the success of all students; continue reading to learn
how I achieve this.

Classroom Management
My classroom management style is proactive; the instructional strategies I use aim
to prevent problem behaviors. I create a sense of community with students by
modeling and praising positive behaviors in the classroom. I also provide
opportunities for meaningful peer-to-peer and student-to-teacher interactions,
which provides an opportunity to learn more about my students and how I can
best support their needs. A meaningful activity that I like to do with my students at
the start of every school year is to co-create classroom rules. This activity sets a
positive tone for the school year and lets students know that their opinions and
beliefs are valued.

Classroom Environment
My classroom environment is inclusive of all cultures, backgrounds, languages,
and family styles. I create an inclusive learning environment by using the proper
pronunciation of students’ names, using inclusive language, and using diverse
examples during instruction. For instance, I have adopted a weekly activity in my
classroom that celebrates individuals from diverse cultural backgrounds. Once a
week as a class, we learn about an individual who is important to America's
history. The individual could be a scientist, inventor, politician, astronaut, doctor,
historian, or researcher. The goal of this activity is to teach students about
influential individuals that are similar to themselves.

Education and Learning Goals for Students

Establishing education and learning goals in the classroom goes far beyond
writing the objectives on the whiteboard. Effective teaching and fostering student
achievement is directly related to establishing education and learning goals. I use
learning goals to guide my teaching and to identify the knowledge, skills, and
capacities students should achieve during each lesson.
 Teaching Methods
Inquiry-based
“It must be remembered that the purpose of education is not to fill the minds of students
with facts…it is to teach them to think, if that is possible, and always to think for
themselves.”
- Robert Hutchins
It is important to challenge students by teaching content in a non-traditional way. The
inquiry-based model is a student-centered teaching model that challenges students to
critically think, ask questions, and share ideas. In my classroom, I frequently engage
students in group projects, research projects, and daily activities that involve
collaboration and discussions.
Multiple intelligences
“Ask ‘How will they learn best?’ not ‘Can they learn?’”
- Jaime Escalante
To meet the diverse needs of all students, I adopt the multiple intelligences theory into my
teaching. Not all students learn the same way and may need instruction delivered in a
particular way or multiple ways. To address this need, I provide multimodality instruction
in my classroom. This form of instruction is proactive to the needs of students by
designing learning experiences to be accessible to all students.

Methods for Assessing Students’ Learning

I assess my students’ progress using a variety of assessment tools. When it comes to assessment,
there is not a one size fits all approach to interpreting what students understand and what they
need additional help with. For instance, during a science lesson, I have students engage in think-
pair-shares to think about and discuss a question or a prompt. As students talk, I walk around the
classroom and informally assess their understanding of the content. This allows me to quickly
gauge student comprehension and adjust content if needed. Another form of assessment that I
use in my classroom frequently is asking open-ended questions. I avoid yes or no questions
because I want students to think about the content deeply and to give detailed responses. There is
a lot to learn about students’ backgrounds and prior knowledge from their responses to open-
ended questions. From their responses, I fill in the gaps in content areas they have not mastered
or help students build and expand on ideas that they may have.

Assessment of Teaching
In order to continue to grow as a teacher and a lifelong learner, I continually self-assess and
reflect on my teaching. The method I follow of self-assessment is as follows: I plan lessons that
are engaging and take note on what worked and what didn’t work if I have taught the lesson
previously, next I implement the lesson and take notes about how the lesson went, and after I
evaluate students understanding of the content taught while also taking into consideration what
went well and what didn’t work well. I use this cycle constantly because there will always room for
improvement in my teaching. Additionally, I always take data on students’ progress and what
worked for each class because every class is different; what worked one class may not work for
another class.