Mrs. Clark's Teaching Philosophy
"Everyone's a teacher. Everyone's a learner."
−Kayla Delzer
I love teaching because I love inspiring students to find joy in learning. Each day in my classroom is a new day full of educating, inspiring, and motivating. I firmly believe that all students are capable of learning and achieving success given the correct tools. I believe that every child can be motivated to tremendous depths of learning. Every child is a teacher, and every child is a learner.
An exemplary education starts with wholehearted quality instruction. I believe that first and foremost I need to foster a sense of community within my classroom to ensure that my students feel comfortable participating and sharing ideas. Students need to be willing to take risks through questioning and learning. My students also know that I have sincere interest in them because I take the time to develop personal relationships with them. As a result, I am aware of their interests and backgrounds.
By getting to know my students personally, I am able to provide differentiation in my lessons. I respect that each student is unique, and I use students’ strengths to build and work through the learning process. When planning lessons, I take into consideration the needs of the students, and I provide many different opportunities for collaboration, whole group work, and individual work. I also utilize multi-sensory instruction and tech integration in order to provide multiple different access and exit points in a lesson making students' knowledge visible at all times. My students are given the chance to succeed in an environment where they are believed in to reach remarkable achievement.
I also am a firm believer in hands on learning. Students learn much deeper through meaningful experiences. I provide opportunities for my students to engage & experience real life phenomena. These opportunities make their connections and learning experiences very powerful. Students are given chances to collaborate, communicate, think critically, and use their creativity on a daily basis. Giving students these opportunities on a daily basis will not only develop self-regulated learners who can persevere, but it also will begin to prepare our kiddos for this 21st century life. Knowing my students personally also helps me to purposefully plan lessons that are relevant to my students’ lives.
Another powerful tool of quality instruction is the use of the backwards teaching design. This approach allows teachers to first come up with goals that students need to meet, and then from there a lesson/activity/experience can be formed to meet this goal. This approach allows for a continual progression of assessment throughout the planning, enactment, and closing of lessons. Of course, this model provides multiple opportunities to assess the progress toward learning goals through the use of formative and summative assessments. This approach also ensures that every lesson taught is enacted to meet a target of learning. One of my favorite tools to formatively assess my students is through GoFormative.
Another significant aspect of teaching is effective communication. In order for students to succeed, they need to be given ideas that are communicated explicitly and clearly through modeling. When giving directions or assigning small group work or projects, I am always sure to give explicit directions so that my expectations are very clear. I also believe that forming consistent and positive communication with parents helps students thrive in an educational setting. I find it advantageous to utilize each family's expertise of his/her child to further help meet the needs of all children in the classroom.