Reflective Discourse
Not every journey follows a straight path; some of the most valuable routes to a destination contain winding turns and unexpected hills and valleys. My journey has been the latter. I remember a distinct moment of student teaching when I was 20 years old and my student was an unmotivated 18-year-old young man who was in school at his parents’ insistence. When I asked him why he didn’t want to learn such a great subject, he laughed at me and said it was boring and stupid. I was shocked and appalled. It was my first bump on the road.
Many years have passed, and I have encountered many kinds of students. There are many types of learners who come from an even more varied home-life. When I was a newer teacher I was able to recognize a need to show concern and compassion for my students, which is valuable to most students, but I didn’t really understand how to think about their motivation and styles in terms of addressing it with my teaching style and strategies. The longer I taught, the more I understood the need, but I still lacked answers. Then, last year I enrolled at the University of New England (UNE) as a graduate student, I began to gain a deeper insight into motivational theory and teaching strategies than ever before. With the careful instruction and planning by my professors, I realized that motivation is a rather paradoxical idea. While my behavioral psychology courses had taught me to look for transferring the importance of external rewards, newer educational psychology purports that it is the development of intrinsic rewards that cause students to truly be motivated to learn. The focus must shift from student products to student understanding.
Following this, the concept of Differentiated Instruction was highlighted, where students pick activities based on their preferred mode of learning, towards gaining the same knowledge. Different strategies for different learners, helping them to find their intrinsic motivation: a plan for success in the classroom. This was paired with understanding a Universal Design for Learning, and the incorporation of technology into the classroom benefitted all learners, and offered new strategy for working with students on Individualized Education Plans. This was important within the Inclusion model of teaching in middle and high school.
Then the content area literacy courses underscored the essential nature of using varied strategies for building literacy in all courses – even mine, where English is not the first language of the classroom! I found the most amazing primary sources through online video, books written for French children that had serious value for my new French-learners and speakers! The students have tied this into meaningful cultural experiences, and no longer have to struggle with old-fashioned, boring readers that only underscore specific grammar points!
Finally, I have been involved in an amazing Action Research project. I have created lessons for my students to do at home. In class, the time we no longer need to spend on direct instruction can be devoted to project-based learning and differentiated choice-board activities. Students are individually motivated; learning at their own pace and depth; and working collaboratively to produce work that is meaningful to them.
As a student myself, I an ecstatic that my studies have had such an impact on my students’ education, and find satisfaction in the changes I experience in my day-to-day life as a teacher. There is new understand-ing gained through my UNE experience that has revolutionized my professional life the knowledge gained by all of my students. For this I am so grateful, and hope that I give back to my district multiple times over with all that I have learned. I believe my collaborative efforts in Professional Learning Communities will continue to be a positive change brought to my district by UNE through me. I believe that as an educator I will continue to grow and contribute in new and amazing ways. I also believe the 21st century learners in my school will have more opportunities to learn in new and meaningful ways.