Like all of you, I met with Jesse last week, thinking I had a pretty good handle on my philosophy paper. Instead, I was met with questions like "Why do you believe that?" or "How will your teaching practices affect the community in which you work?" Even worse...."How will your teaching practices affect society at large?" My gosh....do practicing teacher really think about this stuff? I suppose most of them did at the beginning of their careers, and I know for certain that only the good ones continue to think about these questions.
So, I suppose I need to answer theses questions more thoroughly. I ponder these questions daily it seems, thinking of a way to answer them in the form of a paper. I have to admit this has been one of the more difficult papers I have written, and I wrote more than you can imagine in graduate school. The difference is that this paper requires me to think more about what I believe and how I want to implement it in the classroom, instead of reviewing others' work. The latter is far easier!
I struggle with those same questions myself. I too need to answer these questions more throughtly, but I struggle with those looking at those questions. I wish we had a chance in class to discuss these questions with our classmates as a way of working out out answers.
ReplyDeleteI tell you what: this theory stuff is very interesting, but right now, for me, it's taking a back seat to the problem of learning how to do my job. I constantly remind myself that I will be able to achieve some of the more high-minded of my teaching goals later in my career (hopefully I can get started on some of them by next semester!), but at this point in my rookie school year, all my efforts are toward keeping my classes learning and behaving while meeting administrative expectations. I look forward to feeling comfortable enough at my job so that I can begin to really stimulate change in society. Patience! It's hard!
ReplyDeleteLisa, I've had some of the same issues. They way Jesse makes me look more deeply into my paper and my beliefs is good but overwhelming. I have discussions with my sisters about their beliefs, how if they were teachers how would they affect society, and how they would apply that to the classroom. Sometimes we just seem to go in circles but its helped talking about it.
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