Educators demonstrate a broad knowledge base and an understanding of areas they teach.
Throughout the teaching program, I have had the privilege to be in many different grades. This experience has given me a lot of wonderful teaching opportunities. These various grade levels have also meant that I have had to switch content and curriculum when teaching my students to the best of my ability.
From the beginning of my practicums, I have tried to always abide by some simple principles to make sure that I am giving my students the best learning that I can in my classroom. One of the first ones is that I never give my students work that I cannot do or explain myself. This principle means that I always teach myself the content I am going to teach my students and I practice the concepts that we will be learning to ensure that I can explain it to my students. I have also tried to find multiple ways to either explain the content or to make the learning meaningful to my students.
These principles have also been very key in making sure that I am doing my best to meet this standard 6 in my own teaching practice. Before going into a lesson, I make sure I have a good knowledge base in order to help my students when they need it. I also do the work with the students not only to model for them, but also to show them the expectations for their own work.
One of my best examples of my dedication to this standard is my math or numeracy lessons. As you might know from the other pages on this blog, math has never been my strong suit. Due to my own insecurities with the subject, before I teach a math lesson, I make sure that I know how to do the concepts using a few different strategies.
Recently in my practicum in a grade 4 class, I was teaching addition strategies. To teach the students, I didn’t only use the carrying method, but I also learned about Carole Fullerton’s place value method. After a discussion with my Coaching Teacher when planning my addition unit, we decided the carrying method might be key for number sense and aiding our students in the future. Now, before this practicum I had never used this method before, but after educating and teaching it to myself I realized how beneficial it was for my students. Without doing the extensive teaching to myself, I wouldn’t have been able to see its benefits let alone be able to truly show my students its value.
After my own experiences, not only do I think that standard 6 is not only important, but non-negotiable. As a new teacher, I know that this standard is going to be crucial in my first few years as I am not only learning how to fit my own teaching style in my classroom, but also getting to know the curriculum to best fit my student’s interests and needs.