Personal Philosophy of Teaching and LearningGrowing up I was always aware of the importance of education and its ability to influence the direction that my life would take. Its impact has been extraordinary for not only myself but millions of people across the globe. If anything as I’ve continued to grow older I only see the importance of education more and more clearly. I see that education is changing and am excited to be a part of a new generation of teachers that will be soon embracing the schools across the country. I believe that education and the schooling experience should no longer be a formula in which each child receives the same of everything and is expected to all achieve the same of everything. I believe that the individual aspects of students should determine what and how they learn and should be accommodated for as much as possible. Understandably in a classroom of thirty students one teacher cannot provide a different activity for each of them, however creating more options which truly meet the diverse needs of their learners already paves a path for success for students. I cannot expect a child to learn anything if I’ve given them a task which they can’t find a way to relate too and I cannot expect them to understand anything if I’ve only incorporated one learning style when I’m direct teaching a class using only a whiteboard and marker for stimulation. In my own experience as a student I would fear the classes where I did not have a natural ability because I knew that the usual smarter children would get it straight away and the teacher would move on, subsequently leaving me behind to try and work out how to do a task which was probably beyond my level. This is something that drives me and inspires me to be a teacher as I do not want students to be left behind and forgotten as I have experienced it and continue to see it in each placement classroom that I have been in. I want to create a partnership in which I facilitate but do not dictate the paths that they take in their learning. I want the students to become teachers and to investigate and discover new and amazing things that assist them in their finding of solutions. I want them to be challenged not by the equations on a worksheet but by the problems that the world and our environment can create. I endeavour to help my students find connections to their learning and their experiences and what they have seen, I want them to learn by doing and take on new responsibilities that challenge them to extend and change their thinking. My teaching philosophy is that in which students have control in their learning and responsibility for themselves where they make connections with the world and their peers. I want to create a classroom of unison where we all work together instead of me dictating the actions of thirty different individuals. This is how I believe the most beneficial learning will take place both for my students and myself.
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