Teaching–What’s Next?
Posted by Debra Liverman on 01 Dec 2008 | Posted in: Teachers and Teaching
Wow! After reading all the comments left on How Has Teaching Changed? I have to ask, What’s next? We can’t deny that the teaching environment has changed in recent years. However, I know that there are wonderful things happening in classrooms all over the country! I hear about them through emails and idea submissions sent in to our editors. I read about them on this blog. I see them in my own children’s classrooms each day. Teachers have an amazing way of adapting to their surroundings and making the best of a situation.
So tell me what you see as some of the positive happenings with teaching today. Then imagine that in just five short years, you are working in the perfect teaching environment. What does that look like? And more important, how can we make that ideal classroom a reality? What do we as educators need to do to make that happen?
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It is essential to create a more balanced classroom environment. With each new unit I try to include projects which allows them to apply what they have learned in a creative and interactive way. I think it is important for students to “create” not just replicate correct answers on a worksheet or test.
Furthermore, in 5th grade I think it is essential for students to become more accountable for themselves and their work. I like to set up weekly plans where they receive a few assignments on Monday and they have to manage their time to complete them by Friday. The first few weeks some students fell short of the deadline, but now they are managing their time very well. I’m quite proud of their accomplishments, and I think they feel it too.
Overall, it is essential for these students to be able to step out of the testing blueprint and have more autonomy within their day. In the beginning it was a true challenge, because the students were not used to having non-teacher directed time to work on a project, to use their own creative will, or to manage their own work. They would remain off-task, not complete the assignment, and display very low maturity levels. Yet, I stuck with this model because I felt it would benefit them. Students who were not engaging in their work would get assigned the “alternative” assignment. It did not take too many of those to get all the students engaged and finding success in this model.
I will not actually be in my own classroom until Jan. 5th but I was a paraprofessional in the classroom last year. I have seen teachers that are caring and love their students. Unfortunately I have also witnessed teachers that did not even like their students or children in general. I am a teacher who loves children and can not wait to get to my own class. In five years I would like to see all teachers be in the classroom because it is their calling not convenient or something they consider an easy profession.
for the holidays my class made stockings to hang on their desk and on christmas eve santa will come and put goodies in their stockings