JULIE LEATON

[Date]
MY LEARNING PHILOSOPHY

One of the most difficult things for a teacher to do is to figure out if a student is learning.

First, it is almost impossible to get a concrete definition. A teacher may know it when they see

it, but they can’t tell you exactly what learning is. In this paper, I will attempt to explain what

my personal definition of learning is, how I see if a student is learning, and what I do to facilitate

learning in my students.

From the view of a teacher, complete learning occurs when a person can take new

information or a new skill and use it in a unique situation. For instance, in my foreign language

class, my students have learned the vocabulary when they can create with it in a spontaneous

way, such as creating an advertisement, or designing a dream house. As level one students, my

students are by definition low novice Spanish speakers. At the end of my class, they will not be

able to speak like a native, nor will they know every word in Spanish. If I have successfully

done my job, they will, however, begin to be able to use Spanish in a spontaneous way. This

would include having simple conversations about common topics if they travel, ordering a soft

drink, or asking where the restroom is.

To understand how my students learn, I will use the social cognitive lens (Ormrod, 2016, p.

114). As a beginning student learning Spanish, my students begin by watching me, their model,

and videos, as symbolic models, to learn how to use the language correctly. I also understand

that most of what my students are learning are cognitive processes, such as mentally rehearsing

that I might not observe immediately. Before making my students do a performance, we do

many, many rehearsals. For my example, I will discuss the first day of learning greetings. First,

they repeat me, the model. I will say the greeting and my students will repeat them back. Next,

they say the phrase in small groups. I will tell them to tell a classmate good morning. Then I will
 JULIE LEATON
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MY LEARNING PHILOSOPHY

tell them to tell the phrase to someone else. Finally, after much rehearsing, they will perform for

the class. After learning and practicing with the phrases, my students will create a simple script,

in which they will perform for the class. This would be “hello, good morning” “good-bye” or

something similar. By rehearsing and then performing the learned phrases, my students are

motivated to put the phrases in their memory code. I teach beginning vocabulary this way to

build my nervous beginners’ self- efficacy by making them believe that they do, in fact, have the

ability to learn a foreign language and can be successful in my class.

As a teacher, I have learned that many things can influence whether students will learn in my

class or not. One of the most important is their personal agency (p. 115). If an older student

does not want to learn or believes they are incapable of making good grades, it is nearly

impossible to change their mind. I have worked with students that have parental support, a good

home, but will do everything in their power to fail. I have also had students living in the most

horrible conditions succeed in everything they do. This tells me that a student’s background is

only one of the things that effect how he/she will learn. Fear of failure is another problem I see

in my junior high, high school age group. If a student has efficacy expectations that they will

fail, they will tend to not try rather than work hard and possibly fail. This self-handicapping will

cause students to purposefully fail in order to protect their self-worth; letting the student keep

their “reputation” while protecting them from failure. Their attitude is “if I don’t work and fail,

no one will know that I can’t do it.”

As a teacher, I feel it is my job to build up my students’ sense of competence. For many of

my students, beginning Spanish is different than other classes they have experienced. There are

many new skills they are expected to master. Do help their self-efficacy, I help them set realistic
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MY LEARNING PHILOSOPHY

goals for the class, give them definite expectations, and raise my weak students’ self-worth. My

students know that I care more about what they learn than what their grade is. This means if they

fail an assignment, they can redo it. They also know that I will help them get it right. They can

also finish something late if they need to. They know they can improve in my class. If they are

failing, it is because they are not trying, not because of me. I have seen an improvement on the

percentage of students turning in work. A few years ago, many of my students would stop

working. They had so many zeros, it didn’t matter if they continued working or not. Now, most

will attempt to do the work and the number of non-performers dropped. To get to this point, I

have had to rethink all of my lessons, created most of my daily activities, and spend most of my

free time trying to find new and innovating ways to reach my students. As of now, I see myself

continuing serving students this way for many years to come. Every year, my goal is to reach

each student and help them to succeed. One day, I hope to reach this goal, so I will keep trying.

References

Ormrod, J. (2016). Human Learning (7th ed.). Pearson.