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ASTL Portfolio Written Synthesis Reflection

Brittney A. Orsborn

George Mason University

May 18, 2020

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Written Synthesis Reflection

Changes in myself

I had a tough time on where to begin while writing this reflection. The progression of my
journey as a graduate student at George Mason University has changed so many aspects of my
life, thinking, knowledge, actions, and goals of being a teacher. I first entered this profession
seven years ago with the mindset of wanting to “making a difference” for my students. Wow,
was I uninformed about “what making a difference” really means. It was not until three years
ago, when I started this journey in the Advanced Studies Through Learning (ASTL) program.
Unfortunately, at this point in my life, I had no desire to go back to school; as it would create
more responsibilities and acquire more time that I did not feel as if I had. As time went on, each
semester I became more challenged and empowered to become a student advocate and a teacher
leader within my building. This program provided me with ample opportunities on how to
identify my own biases and assumptions, develop questions, collect data, analyze information,
critically and deeply reflect, research, and take action towards educational change.

The biggest change I find in myself today is how I reflect on myself, my students, and on
my teaching. I used to see “reflection” as examining student performance on a task/assessment to
determine what to do or where to go next. I became more and more disturbed with my instruction
and practices as I began to determine the differences between reflect and critically reflect. As an
educator that wanted to make a difference, I needed to begin to change my mindset. Critical
reflection focuses on the hunting of assumptions of power and authority. The best way to expose
these assumptions is to look at what we do from as many unfamiliar angles as possible
(Brookfield, 1995). At the time, I was only looking at my practices/instruction from one point of
view, and that was through myself. As my thinking evolved throughout the program, I saw
myself being able to stand apart from my own opinions, values, rules, and definitions and could
avoid being completely identified with them (Rodgers, 2002). This was not an easy process, as it
was uncomfortable having critical friends read, watch, and provide feedback to our PBA’s or to
the Video Analysis Teaching Practice, from EDUC 614. I feel as if these experiences really
pushed me outside of my comfort zone and allowed me to begin this new journey of how to
stand apart from my individual values and beliefs and lead me to a path of learning how to
critically reflect on practices and actions I make in regards to how they impact student learning.

Diversity

The first ASTL learning outcome in which I feel I have experienced the most
professional growth is through Diversity. In EDUC 612, I was provided with an opportunity that
allowed me to learn more about myself than I realized. Through the readings and the
Autobiographical Study, I began piecing together who I was and how my cultural background
and experiences became factors of my beliefs, biases, and assumptions I had about the students
in my classroom. I grew up in a middle class, white family. I was always engaged in activities
with other children of similar backgrounds and cultures. My experiences, values, and culture did
not reflect the students in my classroom. I learned that this cultural mismatch between my
students and I was providing inequitable practices and unauthentic learning.
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I currently work in a Title I school with a 77% Hispanic population and 79% of students
are eligible for free/reduced lunch. By completing the Cultural Inquiry Study from EDUC 606, I
investigated the mismatches of the students’ group interaction patterns with those of the school
and myself, reflected on students’ preferred learning styles, and examined instructional programs
for English language learners. This study allowed me to move beyond the surface of “cultural
differences” and dive deeper to see how the cultural mismatches were influencing student
engagement in Mathematics. According to Hollins (2008), culture is usually taken-for-granted
and is the least studied when looking for influences of behavior.

There have been many changes in my actions associated with diversity. I continue to
refine my instruction in the area of mathematics by removing the “cultural immersion,” the idea
of implementing repeated exposure to instructional strategies and socially constructed learning
situations that are based on cultural practices other than those of the students’ being taught
(Hollins, 2008). I now have become more mindful about identifying and promoting students’
“Funds of Knowledge” (Gonzalez, 1995), or accumulated strategies of skills, abilities, and ideas.
I continue to implement surveys and activities in which I get to know my students on a deeper
level. I inquire about their skills, abilities, interests, and values through observations, surveys,
and discussions. I have begun making changes to our Title I family nights, in which we
incorporate activities that allow us to learn and hear from them. We no longer are providing
information nights to our families, but instead we are working to build on their “Funds of
Knowledge.” For example, I gave a “multiplication” session one night for families. As I
presented a task/activity, families worked together to model and represent their solutions. Similar
to what students do in the classroom, parents were able to share and make connections across
representations. Their feedback was extremely positive and they want to return for more
sessions, as they want to best help their students. According to Sato and Lensmire (2009),
students’ culture can be an integral part of a student’s successful academic experience when
teachers know how to relevantly build on them. By implementing culturally responsive
instruction and actions, this is hopefully the start of increasing student and family engagement to
better bridge the gaps of the different cultures within our building.

Change Agent

The next learning outcome I feel I have experienced the most professional growth is
through becoming an agent of change in my building. After completing EDUC 615, I absorbed
so much knowledge on what it takes to build a community of strong and effective
educators/leaders that are needed in our educational system today. I found the book Professional
Capital, by Hargreaves and Fullan (2012), to have the most influence on this change in mindset.
Teaching is not the most effective when done in isolation. To make the most impact on student
learning in our building, we as a staff need to build on our professional capital (human, social,
and decisional). If we want to develop high-level capabilities in our students, we need to have
learned and acquired a lot of capital ourselves (Hargreaves & Fullan, 2012). Being in a position
that allows me to utilize a coaching/leadership role, collaborate/co-teach with many teachers, and
facilitate Collaborative Learning Teams, I feel as if I have already begun developing the
professional capital in grade-level teams. I feel like the learning outcome “Change Agent”
became even more of an area of growth after completing the Equity Study from EDUC 615. This
experience made me look at data differently. I no longer look at the data from one perspective
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(i.e. pass/fail of all students). I have begun digging deeper into looking at specific groups of
students that demonstrated performance or not, or which specific standards were met or not. By
digging deeper into data will allow us to further develop our practices and allow us to teach for
equity. Other actions I have taken in working to become an agent of change has been
encouraging conferences and selected PD classes to our teachers, being more vocal about sharing
data about particular students, and being pro-active with researching practices that have been
found to be effective for specific learners (English Learners, Special Education, Gifted and
Talented, etc). I have started being more mindful in how I facilitate Math CLT meetings. I have
begun facilitating conversations and asking questions that allow other teachers to think deeper
about their actions and instruction in the classroom. I have shared recent data collected from the
Equity Study and my plan of action to model the process of teaching for equity. Although, I still
have so much more to learn and discover about our school, I made a vow that I would stay
informed about data in our building to help lead teachers and students to equitable change. These
actions are a step in developing the professional capital within our building and allowing me to
promote equitable change in our building.

Ongoing Development

An area I want to focus my ongoing development would be through the use of

technology. I noticed after each course, I continued to strive to incorporate and utilize more
technology into my instruction. This still holds true today. This rare experience of going through
a pandemic and reverting only to online teaching and learning has made me critically reflect on
my beliefs and practices about the use of technology in student learning. This experience has
quickly allowed me to identify the lack the confidence, knowledge, and technology skills I
currently attain. My biggest fear is that I am not going to be able to provide my students and
teachers with equitable tasks and instruction through distance learning. I find myself feeling
overwhelmed with the number of resources available as well as which tool would best enhance
student learning. My goal is to learn how to best piece together the many resources (videos,
manipulatives, platforms, etc.) to provide authentic, steady, and equitable learning for my
students. The actions I plan to take to reach this goal is to continue to research tools/resources
that are available, take courses that are currently offered by our Instructional Technology Coach,
collaborate with grade level teams and deeply reflect on the learning that we see as we continue
to develop our instruction through distance learning, or by including more technology in the
classroom. These actions will push me and allow me to build my confidence, knowledge, and
skills in the area of technology to best support and provide our students with equitable and
authentic learning.

The ASTL program has challenged me as a learner and provided me with the knowledge
of how and why it is important to becoming a teacher leader. I came into this program with
content knowledge and strong relationships with teachers and students. Over the course of the
program, the readings, coursework, and discussions have provided me with strategies, resources,
and knowledge that will allow me to take this further and to build the professional capital and
leadership within our building. Leadership is influencing. Teacher leaders are approachable and
influence primarily through their relationships, which become the foundation upon which teacher
leaders are able to share and learn with others (Danielson, 2007). I am eager to continue to look
at my practices with a critical lens, to stay informed of what is happening in my school, and to
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challenge other staff members as we help make equitable changes for all learners. This has been
such a incredible and eye-opening journey and I am so grateful and excited to apply and share all
the new gained knowledge from the ASTL program!
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References

Brookfield, S. (1995). Becoming critically reflective: A process of learning and change.

Becoming a critically reflective teacher (pp. 28-48). San Francisco, CA: Jossey-Bass.

Danielson, C. (2007). The many faces of teacher leadership. Educational Leadership. San

Francisco: Jossey-Bass.

Gonzalez, N. (1995). Funds of Knowledge for Teaching in Latino Households. Urban education

(Beverly Hills, Calif.).  29 (4), p. 443 – 470.

Hargreaves, A., & Fullan, M. (2012). Professional capital: Transforming teaching in every

school. New York, NY: Teachers College Press.

Hollins, E. (2008). A framework for understanding cultural diversity in the classroom. In

Culture

in school learning: Revealing the deep meaning (2nd ed., pp. 135-160). New York:

Routledge.

Sato, M. & Lensmire T. (2009). Poverty and Payne: Supporting Teachers to Work with Children

of Poverty, Phi Delta Kappan, 90 (5), p. 365-370.