Do I Have the Full Picture?
Everyone has a story. Whether it's a sweet one, a sad one, or a happy one, we all have a story. Not everyone has the same story though and for the most part, you never really know what others have experienced or are currently experiencing. Not everyone is open about their situation so it's best for us as people to always be nice, considerate, and helpful to one another.
Many students experience a lot inside and outside of school and it's our job as teachers to make sure the students are not getting treated differently based off of the situation they are experiencing. We only get a short amount of time with our students compared to the amount of time they spend at home. So, while student is in class, it's best to not only educate them, but also get to know and understand them.
As a future educator, I plan to establish a positive learning environment for my students. I want to build a safe community in my class, where my students know and trust that I am treating them with equal respect. I think it's important to make my students understand that as their teacher, I am on their side. As teacher, I am there to educate, listen, and help. It's best to never assume and to always be accepting of other people and their stories because you never know if you have the full picture.
Thank you for sharing this, Ana. It is so important to always be nice, considerate, and helpful to one another. Offering students a safe place to learn is one of the most important foundations of education, in my opinion. However, along with us assuming we don’t know the whole picture in the classroom, it is important for this to be taught to our children, especially when it comes to history lessons and the background America has in racial inequality. I think if we tell them what we know to the best of our ability, never omitting uncomfortable information, but adjusting it to be age-appropriate, and teach them that there is so much more to history than can be taught in class, we will begin on the right path to correcting our social injustices. It is our duty as teachers to teach them the things that have been left or deleted from the typical curriculum.
ReplyDeleteHi Christel! I completely agree with you! I like how you mentioned to express to our students that we are giving them the information to the best of our abilities rather than just not give them the full story. When i think back to grade school and thinking of the things i didn't learn, it may have just been because my teacher too didn't really know much about it, not because she didn't want to teach the material.
DeleteHi Ana! I really like this post. When I worked in a 1st grade classroom, my mentor (the teacher) would give me incredible insight into the student's lives. I would learn why the student is the way they are. I learned things that I wouldn't have known just by talking to them. As a teacher, I also want to get to know my students on a deeper level than just teaching them. I feel it is so important for educators to truly know their student's situations, because it'll help them understand why the student acts the way they do. Most children are good at hiding their external problems, although most of the time it still shows on their school work. Another thing I am planning on doing as an educator is giving my students the full story of historical figures. Growing up, I typically learned the good parts about our history, but if I were to have learned the full story, I would probably think differently about certain topics now. As future educators, we need to learn the full story of our students, and teach them full stories about our history. Thank you for sharing!
ReplyDeleteHi Mallorie! Thank you for sharing your classroom experience with me! It must have been so fun working with 1st graders. I'm glad to hear your mentor was able to help you out by explaining the students behaviors to you, sometimes it's hard to get to know a child depending on the situation their in. It's extremely important to understand a student and to assure them that you're on their side. It makes me so happy seeing everyones post about making sure they're giving their students the full picture when it comes to lessons in the classroom, our students depend on us for education and it is our responsibility as teachers to give it to them.
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