ASSUMPTIONS AND MISCONCEPTIONS ABOUT BEING A TEACHER
ASSUMPTIONS AND MISCONCEPTIONS ABOUT BEING A TEACHER I have a bachelor degree of Graphic Design, but teaching has always been my passion. My teaching career started 3 years ago, so I am familiar with some of the things that are being presented in this course, yet, there is so much new information that has helped me realize and correct some misconceptions that I had about what really means being a teacher and what does it really entails. I thought, at the beginning, that this course wouldn’t be time-consuming, that the course load wouldn’t be difficult to handle, that I may learn something different from what I knew already. What I understand so far is that this course has help me realize that it is not the facts that are important, but the reflection about the information that we already possess. That it does not matter how much time you spend learning, but the process before, during and after learning. One of the first things that really struck me was the realization of how confused, if not wrong, I have been about the aim of teaching “…is not to produce learning but to produce the conditions for learning, this is the focal point, the quality of learning.” (Lori Malaguzzi) When I think about this, it makes me realize that as a teacher, my main focus has been to help students understand what I am teaching, to retain the information, in other words, the content. After watching the lectures and especially doing the think pieces has help me extend the knowledge about the process of Teaching and Learning because it has make me think and evaluate myself as a teacher. Even if the questions are easy, it takes some time to think and answer them. Before I became a teacher, I used to think that being a teacher was a piece of cake. Now I know that being a teacher doesn’t only imply to stand in front of the group and teach students a bunch of information. Now I understand that being a teacher, quoting Spiderman, “comes with a great responsibility”. We have to know who we are and who our students are. During the lectures we learned that “all learning is social, emotional and intellectual”, this made me think that we, as teachers, have to take into account that every single one of our students come into the classroom full of emotions, problems, with different backgrounds, and perhaps even with learning disabilities. And here is where most teachers fail. Some old-school teachers expect all of the students to learn everything that is being taught, and we get angry with certain student because he is not paying attention or learning as we think he should. Perhaps we can stop for a moment to think and ask that student what the problem is before judging, so the teachable moment for that student is achieved. The teachable moment was a new concept for me. I liked the quote from Graham Greene that says: “There is always one moment in childhood when the door opens and lets the future in”, and that moment can occur at different time for every single one of us. I found the suggested
exercise, The Spot Check, really helpful. This is one thing that I’m going to implement inside my classroom to make my teaching better and the learning more effective. Another new concept for me that was introduced during the lectures was the motion that we should make students our partners-in-crime when thinking about the curriculum and more important during the teaching process. Perhaps what I think is working is not working for them, so I will make small pauses and ask students to explain it in a different way, they may even explain it better and I’m not giving them the change to do so. It will help me to consider questions about learning from a different perspective than my own. Now I know that “the real purpose of education is not to have the instructor perform certain activities but to bring about significant changes”, that it is important for teachers to keep on revisiting “big ideas” because we still have a lot to learn about the nature and process of children’s learning and how it can occur without being taught. We already know a great deal but we could not claim that there is little left to know!
exercise, The Spot Check, really helpful. This is one thing that I’m going to implement inside my classroom to make my teaching better and the learning more effective. Another new concept for me that was introduced during the lectures was the motion that we should make students our partners-in-crime when thinking about the curriculum and more important during the teaching process. Perhaps what I think is working is not working for them, so I will make small pauses and ask students to explain it in a different way, they may even explain it better and I’m not giving them the change to do so. It will help me to consider questions about learning from a different perspective than my own. Now I know that “the real purpose of education is not to have the instructor perform certain activities but to bring about significant changes”, that it is important for teachers to keep on revisiting “big ideas” because we still have a lot to learn about the nature and process of children’s learning and how it can occur without being taught. We already know a great deal but we could not claim that there is little left to know!
