Final post (10)

“In order to take intellectual and creative risks in the classroom, I would need to feel as though I would not be judged by my peers and professor when expressing my thoughts and opinions. Once I gain that feeling, I'm pretty open to sharing my ideas with others.” That quotation comes directly from my original blog post for this class, and having been through ten weeks of ED 100, I’m happy to say that I feel comfortable expressing my opinions without the fear of being judged. Generally speaking, if I become a teacher, I hope my students feel comfortable to say what they want in my classroom while keeping in mind that I will not, nor will their peers, judge them. From my observations gathered at Chipotle with Gabby, I realized that I am quick to judge a person, which is something I do not want to carry over into the classroom; I need to truly get to know my students for who they are and what they can bring to the classroom. Also from those observations at Chipotle, I learned that I needed to also work on not giving into the stereotypes society forms about people. This is especially true if I end up teaching at an inner city school; I would have to work extremely hard to go beyond the stereotypes of inner city school students. The next blog post was regarding a Lisa Delpit quotation, and from that quotation I gathered that our beliefs change our perceptions and the reality around us. Therefore, as we complete our individual observation hours, as well as go on the field trips with the whole class, we need to be able to set our beliefs aside in order to truly understand the situations unfolding in front of us. I will need to set my personal beliefs aside in order to properly manage my classroom and in order to help solve problems that occur between my students. The next blog post continues to look at Lisa Delpit’s work. The most important aspect I took away from this was that teachers needed to be aware that sometimes the language spoken in the classroom is not the language their students are used to. For example, a student in my classroom may come from a Spanish speaking household, and it is my duty to be aware of that and embrace it. Spanish is then the language he or she would associate with love, so I must be conscientious of not telling him or her that he or she is “wrong” because then he/she would feel unloved. The next post was regarding Rofes’ essay. In terms of his concept of liberalism, Rofes believes that parents and those closely related to the LGBTQ people should protect and stick up for those who identify as being part of that community. This is true for teachers as well because teachers should be the voice for students who cannot speak up for themselves, and I would gladly do so for any of my future students. Rofes also discusses childhood in an interesting manner, considering he believes children are the most oppressed in today’s society. If I were to become a teacher I would want to teach in the Early Childhood department; therefore, I will try my hardest not to oppress my students inside and outside of the classroom, keeping in mind that the people I would be instructing are children. The post regarding Freire’s piece continues to resonate through my mind. I said this once, and I will say it again. I refuse to use the banking approach to teaching in my classroom; I want my students to be actively engaged with me and their peers throughout the time we spend together in the classroom, not just sitting in their desks mindlessly taking notes. Blog post seven discusses Ayers’ concept of building bridges, which could be applied to many facets of teaching.  The most important bridge to build, in my opinion, is the bridge between the teacher and the parent, the classroom and the household. Often times, what’s going on in the home is carried over into the classroom and affects the students’ behavior in the classroom. If that bridge is built between the classroom and the household, then the teacher would have a better understanding as to why that student is behaving the way he/she is, and the teacher could possibly then provide insight on a way to work through the situation occurring at home. From creating a school with Gabby, I learned that there are many components and factors that go into making a well-rounded school. One has to take into consideration the attendance policy, the location of the school, the staff to be hired, and so much more. By doing this post with Gabby, I realized that before I accept an offer from a school, I will need to seriously sit down, look at the school as a whole, and see if I, as a teacher, would feel comfortable teaching in a setting like that particular school offers. If, hypothetically speaking, I denied the offer from the school, then I need to reassure myself that there are plenty of other options out there for me.