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Kevin Gutierrez-Fuentes
EDU 202
Artifact Rough Draft
20 November 2022

Philosophy of Education
Most of our lives are spent in school. For many of us, our teachers become second parents and
our classmates become a second family. Growing up I never imagined myself to be studying to
become a teacher because I always wanted to be a pediatric nurse. I’ve always known I wanted
to help people, especially children, so I thought the medical field would be a perfect place for
me. After taking a Certified Nursing Assistant course and spending two semesters taking classes
in nursing, I knew it wasn’t for me. I couldn’t be in a job where I saw death that often. This is
when I started some thinking and meditation. As I previously mentioned, I knew I wanted to
work with kids, and that’s when I remembered I took a teaching and training course in High
School. This is when everything clicked for me. I realized that my calling was to help inspire,
motivate, and encourage children. I am currently in pursuit of my associate degree in secondary
education. My end goal is to become either a middle school English or history teacher. As a
future educator, I see the importance of having compassion and dedication to what you do, it’s a
job where many teachers get burnt out quickly. I plan on creating and finding new ways to make
learning fun, interesting, and engaging for my students.
The teachers I had throughout my educational career helped inspire me to become a teacher
because they showed that an educator who cares can make an impact on a child’s life. The goal
of an educator should be to make a student fall in love with learning. Throughout my school life,
I had great and not-so-great teachers. In Highschool I had great teachers, 3 to be specific, they
were Mrs. Bass, my business and administration teacher, Mrs. Harenberg, my teaching and
training teacher, and 1st Sargent Vega, my JROTC instructor. All three teachers inspired me to
chase my dream and that the word impossible says “I’m possible”. These magnificent teachers
taught me very valuable skills that I will use as an educator. The skills they taught me that I will
use are management, organization, responsibility, communication, relationship building,
adaptability, empathy, and patience. A teacher needs to be well organized and good at managing
a class because it will allow for efficient learning time. Good communication and being able to
build relationships with your students will help trust between a teacher and student form. A
teacher needs to be compassionate, adaptable, and patient because not all classes or students will
be the same. Educators should have these traits because it will create a classroom where trust
grows.
I will bring the personal knowledge and skills that I gained from my time as a teacher’s
assistant to my classroom. Being a teacher’s assistant taught me how to multitask and how to
make learning fun. It also taught me that students love when learning is fun and interesting. Once
in a classroom, I will try to make my lessons and instruction fun and intriguing for my students.
For example, an activity I will be implementing in my class would be the Thumb ball team
bonding activity. This activity would make students catch a ball and answer the two questions
that their thumbs land on. This will build good communication in the classroom and creates a fun
game for students to partake in. During my field observation, I learned that the teaching
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environment is planned yet spontaneous. On one of the days that I observed Mrs. Menard, a 7th-
grade English teacher at Johnson middle school. Her class was learning about poems and stanzas
but towards the end of the class period, Mrs. Menard allowed her class to work on decorating
their classroom door. If a classroom is always the same and has no new activities, it makes the
classroom uninteresting which causes a student to be distracted or uninterested in the subject. A
teacher must create an engaging classroom to help students develop a curiosity for what they are
learning. I believe that keeping a planned and spontaneous class makes it more intriguing for
students. For example, I wouldn’t stop my students from discussing a certain topic that was
interesting to them because students need to learn as much as possible even if that means giving
a topic a few more minutes. My field observations also taught me that teachers play the role of
parent, counselor, friend, and teacher. While completing my hours at Johnson middle school I
saw that if a teacher shows care and compassion to their students, it creates a bond in which the
student loves attending class and is willing to learn. I also observed that many students will come
to a teacher to ask for help, guidance, tips, etc. because of the trust the teacher creates.
The educational philosophy that dictates my current beliefs is a mix of perennialism and
progressivism. I agree with perennialism because the classroom should be teacher-centered in
the sense that teachers are the main people teaching. Even though students helping or leading a
class is good, the teacher needs to be instructing and guiding their students. It is important to
teach students to think rationally and critically and perennialism does this. I also believe in a
progressive classroom because I think it is important for students to be allowed to lead certain
class activities. For example, I believe that it is important for students to engage in group debates
because it allows them to engage with other students and make learning connections in ways a
teacher could not do on their own. A progressive classroom allows a student to take control of
their education, allowing them to learn and talk about certain topics. I favor more with a
progressive classroom more than a perennial one because I feel that it is important for students to
be involved in their education. It will help them develop a love and a passion for learning. A
progressive classroom allows students to learn by doing and it encourages students to be curious
and ask questions. I truly believe that when a student is engaged in learning, they are more likely
to understand and comprehend the material.
My knowledge of historical events helps set the stage for how I will think about children and
schools because history has shown the importance of learning. I believe that we as humans learn
from our past, so seeing the conditions of children before education and seeing the impact
education has on a child is important. For example, the textbook Teachers, Schools, and Society
talks about how people of color were treated and how they were denied education. We saw how
hard they fought for education and see the impact it had on them once they were able to gain that
knowledge. Knowing how the past treated children helps a teacher be compassionate, caring, and
dedicated to teaching. It helps teachers want to provide the best learning experience for their
students. I truly believe that knowledge is power, and I want to be able to give my future students
all the knowledge they can have. Knowing about historical events helps students understand how
our society has changed and is changing. Knowing about historical events will help me be
compassionate and loving to my kids because it will help me remember that not long ago not
everyone had the same rights that we have now.
Once I begin teaching, I plan on providing feedback for students, implementing cooperative
learning, and having student-led classrooms and discussions. Having these strategies in my
classroom will allow the most growth in my students. I believe that when teachers provided
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feedback to students, you are giving them corrections to better themselves. While in school I
rarely had teachers give feedback but did have a few who would. The feedback of those who
gave ended up helping me later on. Feedback helps students learn from their mistakes, if we
don’t give feedback students are not going to understand what they are doing wrong and how to
improve it. This lowers their confidence in their academic ability. Cooperative learning is so
important for a classroom, it allows students to work and learn from each other. Cooperative
learning provides communication skills, problem-solving skills, and critical thinking skills for
students. Having student-led activities and discussions is important because it allows students to
learn things, they wouldn’t be able to learn, and it allows them to gain other points of view. I will
try to learn about my community’s diverse population, this will give me background on how
students will be able to learn best and what motivates them. Learning your communities
background will help students participate and succeed in the classroom. In my field observation,
one way the teacher would grade students would be by the amount they participated in group
discussions and if they through exams. I would implement these assessments into my classroom
because they proved to be efficient for my field observation teacher. I want to create a classroom
environment that best fits my students, this will come with changing certain things for certain
students. Being flexible is something that I plan to implement in my classroom.
The qualities that I need to possess to move forward in this career are more knowledge,
confidence, and adaptability. I want to be as knowledgeable as I can be, so I can provide the best
learning experience for my kids. Teachers will never stop learning, in my opinion, we will be
constantly changing and gaining new information. I need more confidence before moving on in
this career, I am currently too shy and need to break out of this shell. I want to have confidence
so that my students see a confident teacher who knows what he’s doing. Specific steps I need to
take to advance in my career are I need more education and more experience with middle
schoolers. I plan on completing my associate degree here at the College of Southern Nevada, I
then plan on transferring to UNLV to complete my bachelor’s degree. To gain more experience
with students I plan on volunteering at after-school programs or even in my church’s middle
school program. I believe that once I can get used to how these kids interact with each other I can
gain confidence in teaching them. It will also help me prepare for how these kids will act in the
classroom.
In conclusion, I am excited to start teaching. I want to be able to teach students that with
persistence and dedication anything is possible. Teaching is such a rewarding career and helps
you teach the future generation. I can’t wait to create an environment in which students can grow
and be themselves. Educators need to have a passion for teaching and compassion for their
students. I can’t wait to help my students grow.