Strengths and Goals
As a teacher, I believe everyone has natural strengths and characteristics that they could work to improve.
One of my natural strengths is classroom management. I have always been drawn to using positive reinforcement rather than a consequence system. I feel that the majority of students respond better to encouragement rather than discouragement. Gaining a student's respect is also a large part of successful classroom management. I also feel that I have very good parent communication. The way you communicate with parents is very important because often as teachers, I think we assume everyone has had the background and training in education that we have received, but this is not always true. We can not assume that someone has had the same training on how to differentiate instruction based on a specific child's needs or on what a good study environment at home should have. Many parents have not been trained to identify the learning style of their child and what type of activities work best to teach each child. This is why it is very important to communicate effectively with parents and guardians on what they can do at home to help their child, what our expectations are, and that they can trust us to do the best we possibly can to educate their child. Another strength I have is developing positive and professional relationships with my students. During my first year of teaching, another very experienced teacher explained to me that at the beginning of every school year, she would set a personal goal to spend at least 2-3 minutes talking to a child in her class about their personal interests. She tried to talk to at least 2 or 3 students each day for that amount of time. She would continue this behavior throughout the year trying, after the first conversation, to meet with one child each day. She explained that if they see you are interested in them as a person and what is important to them, most of the time, these students will begin to trust and respect you more and feel comfortable enough to come to you with any problems or concerns they have. I have followed this concept each year I have taught and for the majority of my students, it has been successful.
As teachers and humans, we also have characteristics that we have to work to improve on, we have goals to set. I don't like to call them weaknesses because I feel no one is perfect, but that doesn't make us weak either. Every year since I have taught, one of my biggest goals is to improve on my organizational skills. In my life outside education, I have always struggled with finding ways to stay organized. This also feeds into my professional career as well. I have attended workshops and asked coworkers for tips on how to organize different aspects of my lessons and my classroom. The only problem I have found is that not everyone has the same style of organization and therefore not everyone can be organized in the same exact ways. I will continue to work hard on finding what works best for me. Another goal I have is to become better at following through with my ideas in the classroom. I have no problem coming up with great ideas to motivate my students or help them learn in a better manner, but many times, I will begin with an idea and then I will turn my attention to something else and not follow through with the original plan I created. This also ties into another goal I have, which is my time management. I sometimes struggle with staying within time limits for different lessons so that i am able to get to all of my lessons each day. I sometimes tend to allow a discussion or lesson go on too long if I feel it is beneficial for the students. The only problem with this is that sometimes I am not able to get to all of my lessons and then I have to go back and figure out where I can work the lesson I missed into a different day's plans. I think another goal I have, being more prepared ahead of time, goes hand in hand with my time management goal in so many ways. Being prepared and having a plan (schedule) is one of my ultimate goals to ensure that I am doing the best possible job I can for my students each day.
During my CoHort studies, I hope to get more insight on how I can not only meet some of my goals such as being more organized and prepared, but also that I will find ways to continue to improve on my strengths as well. I think that the more we further our education as teachers, the more we will be able to adapt to educating the youth in this ever-changing society.
One of my natural strengths is classroom management. I have always been drawn to using positive reinforcement rather than a consequence system. I feel that the majority of students respond better to encouragement rather than discouragement. Gaining a student's respect is also a large part of successful classroom management. I also feel that I have very good parent communication. The way you communicate with parents is very important because often as teachers, I think we assume everyone has had the background and training in education that we have received, but this is not always true. We can not assume that someone has had the same training on how to differentiate instruction based on a specific child's needs or on what a good study environment at home should have. Many parents have not been trained to identify the learning style of their child and what type of activities work best to teach each child. This is why it is very important to communicate effectively with parents and guardians on what they can do at home to help their child, what our expectations are, and that they can trust us to do the best we possibly can to educate their child. Another strength I have is developing positive and professional relationships with my students. During my first year of teaching, another very experienced teacher explained to me that at the beginning of every school year, she would set a personal goal to spend at least 2-3 minutes talking to a child in her class about their personal interests. She tried to talk to at least 2 or 3 students each day for that amount of time. She would continue this behavior throughout the year trying, after the first conversation, to meet with one child each day. She explained that if they see you are interested in them as a person and what is important to them, most of the time, these students will begin to trust and respect you more and feel comfortable enough to come to you with any problems or concerns they have. I have followed this concept each year I have taught and for the majority of my students, it has been successful.
As teachers and humans, we also have characteristics that we have to work to improve on, we have goals to set. I don't like to call them weaknesses because I feel no one is perfect, but that doesn't make us weak either. Every year since I have taught, one of my biggest goals is to improve on my organizational skills. In my life outside education, I have always struggled with finding ways to stay organized. This also feeds into my professional career as well. I have attended workshops and asked coworkers for tips on how to organize different aspects of my lessons and my classroom. The only problem I have found is that not everyone has the same style of organization and therefore not everyone can be organized in the same exact ways. I will continue to work hard on finding what works best for me. Another goal I have is to become better at following through with my ideas in the classroom. I have no problem coming up with great ideas to motivate my students or help them learn in a better manner, but many times, I will begin with an idea and then I will turn my attention to something else and not follow through with the original plan I created. This also ties into another goal I have, which is my time management. I sometimes struggle with staying within time limits for different lessons so that i am able to get to all of my lessons each day. I sometimes tend to allow a discussion or lesson go on too long if I feel it is beneficial for the students. The only problem with this is that sometimes I am not able to get to all of my lessons and then I have to go back and figure out where I can work the lesson I missed into a different day's plans. I think another goal I have, being more prepared ahead of time, goes hand in hand with my time management goal in so many ways. Being prepared and having a plan (schedule) is one of my ultimate goals to ensure that I am doing the best possible job I can for my students each day.
During my CoHort studies, I hope to get more insight on how I can not only meet some of my goals such as being more organized and prepared, but also that I will find ways to continue to improve on my strengths as well. I think that the more we further our education as teachers, the more we will be able to adapt to educating the youth in this ever-changing society.