Fabulous February

I realize as I look back over the past month I celebrated a lot of amazing things with my students. This month really gave us an opportunity to dive deep into standards and really work on projects and understanding rather than assessments and memorization. As I have read Pathways to the Common Core I realized that it is important to focus on the understanding and the implementation of standards rather than the simple memorization of what students need to do. I really feel like this month I was able to implement standards in my room through geometry projects, iPad presentations, creating musical instruments, and because of all of this, seeing my students take pride in their tests because they know that they know and UNDERSTAND this information. I word that I saw come up over and over again as I read back through my reflections is proud, I was truly proud of my students this month in their dedication, and admiration towards their work. I do however realize that control is something I need to work on. I need to be okay with things that are outside of my locus of control and realize and be okay with the idea that I can’t control everything. I can be proud of my students and provide them with opportunities to be proud of themselves but I can’t control others around the school.

I realize the importance of showing my students how proud I am of them, I realize the importance of explaining to my students the importance of our assignments are learning paths and I realize the importance of making sure they understand the meaning behind things and that they aren’t just memorizing things. I realize the importance of making sure my students are given opportunities to partake in lessons that are engaging, hands-on, active learning lessons where they can use the content around them, their backgrounds, and merge it with the new information being presented to the.

I have done a lot of thinking from our critical pedagogy class on what it means to be an oppressor in the classroom and what it means to not partake in the banking theory. I realize that I do not want to be a teacher that is constantly oppressing students but I want to be a teacher that allows them to use who they are to make connections with the standards. I want them to feel comfortable, safe, and proud in our classroom and in their work. I realize that there  is more than one way to arrive at answers and there is more than one way to decide if someone has an understanding of material, this is the type of classroom I have tried to implement this month.

I realize that teaching my students is about knowing my students. I feel like this is something I have always known but it is so easy to get caught up in what everyone else around the school is telling you, or asking you, or even making you do. It is easy to forget that your students are actually the ones that come first, they are the ones that matter, and they are the ones that every lesson, every idea, every day, should be revolving around. They are the reason I teach, they are the reason I am here so it only makes sense that whatever I do should revolve around what is best for them.

I want to continue to make sure I realize what I can and can’t control and to make sure I understand what this looks like inside the classroom. I want to ensure that the types of learning opportunities that I provide for my students are meaningful and exciting to them, not necessarily to me or administration or our grade level chair. I want to make sure that I continue to teach my students what it means to have control over themselves and the power that comes with that. I want to make sure my classroom is my student’s classroom and my lessons are my student’s lessons!