Final Reflection

I must admit that when I first learned my field placement this semester would have me working primarily with AP-level seniors, I felt a bit apprehensive. I correctly assumed that these students would be extremely smart and motivated and that their abilities would put my own skills as a teacher to the test. The realization that this was a good thing, however, quickly followed the initial nervousness. Sure enough, it ended up being a great experience for mean opportunity to learn as much (or more) from my students as they learned from me, to engage in discussion with bright, articulate, young people, and to build confidence in my persona as a teacher. Especially when coupled with my other UTeach coursework, I can honestly say that this semester has been the most fascinating and challenging one of my career as a student, truly an authentic learning experience! Simple confidence in my abilities is the area that I have grown the most in these four months. It is probably every new teachers nightmare to have their knowledge challenged and found wanting in front of a roomful of students (not to mention a brilliant fellow teacher.) My experience in 640 has dispelled me of this fear; while I am still not entirely at ease as I begin a new lesson, I have always found myself relaxed and enjoying myself once it is well underway. The generous words of my CT definitely helped in this confidence-building. His flattering comment on my final evaluation in which he described my content knowledge as formidable is a compliment that I will cherish as I move forward in my teaching career. Flexibility is another strength that I have cultivated this semester. This attribute strikes me as the cornerstone of responsive teaching, and I discovered quickly in my time in the UTeach program that it is quite difficult to achieve in praxis. My CT and observer have both been wonderful mentors in this department, giving me advice about how to tweak activities according to the needs and moods of my students and make adjustments during the lesson to maximize student engagement. One thing I have learned is that it is crucial to incorporate multiple types of activities into every lesson, thereby keeping students alert and not allowing them to sink into a restless daze. My last lesson was particularly successful in terms of flexibility: when I saw that the small-group activity was taking students way off-task, I cut it short and regrouped to whole class discussion, then returned later in the lesson to the group work once I felt confident that students were more fully engaged. In addition to increasing awareness of my strengths, this semester has given me the opportunity to reflect on the challenges ahead of me in my teaching career. Primarily, it has helped me to recognize the immensity of the work load that is in store for me in the approaching years. While I acknowledge that I am still a budding novice when it comes to writing lesson plans, I have nonetheless been impressed at how time-consuming a process is is, requiring hours to search for materials, anticipate student responses and problems, and repeatedly revisit the instructional objectives to make sure the lesson is realistically aimed at achieving them. I hope to eventually find employment in a district with constructive PLCs in place to assist novice teachers, but even with the help of brilliant mentors, I am aware that my first few years of teaching will be quite labor-intensive. Labor that I hope to find stimulating and enjoyable, to be sure, but an intimidating amount of it nonetheless.

I also anticipate needing to gain some patience in order to work effectively with students, particularly if I end up teaching freshmen or sophomores. For the most part, I have a positive attitude about high-schoolers; I have always enjoyed interacting with young people and challenging them to articulate their beliefs and opinions, and being in their classroom this semester has demonstrated that these students are capable of amazing things, although they might need some prompting to realize it. I am by no means a starry-eyed idealist when it comes to this age group, howeverI am fully cognizant that I will encounter students that will frustrate my best efforts to engage them, and I anticipate having days that I come home feeling discouraged as a result. Ultimately, though, I think that I possess enough interpersonal skills and genuine interest in my students as human beings that working with high-schoolers will be a rewarding experience. The ability to meet students where they are, instead of overwhelming them with unrealistic expectations, is something that I think must be developed through time and practice. Taking the time to truly learn who my students are each year is the biggest part of this skill, it seems to me. The knowledge I have gained about multiple types of intelligences and differentiation will serve me well in this area. By being aware of the variety of learning styles that my students possess, I will strive to ensure that my assessments are diverse in how they ask students to engage content and demonstrate knowledge, hopefully giving every individual the opportunity to be successful in my class. Classroom management is not an issue that I have devoted much time to this semester; as my students were mostly AP-level seniors, they were extremely familiar with the expectations of their behavior and performance and largely self-motivated to fulfill these expectations. In the future, however, I anticipate this being a skill that I need to develop more fully. Central to effective classroom management, it seems to me, is simply having high standards for student behavior. The teacher persona I want to continue to develop is that of an educator that asks a lot of her students; I want to make it clear to my future students that I work very hard to be a good teacher that I expect them to show me the same respect in fulfilling their responsibilities as students. The approach I ultimately take in this area is will doubtlessly evolve each year, as it will be influenced by the specific needs and problems of each group of students. As this reflection shows, I still have a lot of growing and learning to do before I have a classroom of my own. I look forward very much to taking UTL360 in the fall; while I expect it to be extremely challenging, I also anticipate that it will immensely rewarding.