Last day of Literacy and Assessment

Today was the last day of literacy and assessment and both were really good. In Literacy we learned about multicultural learning and how to teach to all students. This was a great last lesson to have because in the New Zealand schools there are going to be many ethnicity's that I will have to teach and respect. I never realized the differences between culture before; for example, with many Chinese it is not appropriate to pat their head or touch their shoulder. Other cultures aren't used to looking elders in the eye, and as an American teacher, that is one thing that is expected of our students; that they look the teacher in the eye. Carol Anderton made it very clear that we need to respect all of our students and learn about them and then include the rest of the students in the multicultural learning. This goes along great with my theme for my future classroom: Sailing on to Discovery-with a captain leading the way (the teacher, aka me) and sailors who are equals and work hard on the ship to get to our destination of education (students).

In Assessment class today Dr. Jacobs told us again the definition of education which is general knowledge and being able to reason and judge. After telling us that he also reminded us that those teachers that all 16 of us remembered so well were great at 3 things: they had a relationship with their students, they loved their subject matter, and they let their students know they believed in them. I want to be this type of teacher, so I got to work really hard to love all the subjects, especially math. There is one book entitled, "I Hate Mathematics," and it seems like the perfect book for me to see the practical and fun side of math. I hope to get it when I get back to the States.

We also talked about assessment in the classroom and Dr. Jacob's gave us a great challenge: we need to involve our students in the assessment process so they feel an ownership. While this is harder, it is better. And come on, when is anything worthwhile learning and doing easy?

Finally, we reviewed the importance of reading. I love books and I want my students and children to love reading too. Yesterday Dr. J gave us some examples of how reading can give us general knowledge such as how the dinosaurs got extinct in "Asteroid Impact," and what real children did in the past in "We Were There Too." I am so excited to increase my library in my classroom so that I can have many genres for all types of students to read. One of my favorite quotes Dr. J gave about the importance of reading is, "If you can do nothing more during the nine months you have students in your classroom than help them believe books are of genuine value in their lives, you have done very well indeed as an educator..." Wow. I am worried that my 1st year is going to be rot and just knowing that if I encourage a love of reading, first by being a reader myself, the students will gain something from my class, makes me feel so much better.

Also, we were given a taste of Marmite, a dark chocolate ice cream bar that was so good! Dr. Jacob's told us it was wonderful, but we never could believe him until we tried it, just like with reading a book of our choosing. You really can find lessons in everyday things...even yummy foods :)
It was a wonderful class today, and here are a few quotes from today's lecture:

"Your primary job is to provide vision."
"The most powerful component in education is the teacher."
"If the students are to be motivated, active, involved learners, the teacher must first be a motivated, active, involved learner."