Knowing our Learners

No two students are the same.  Each individual student has different life experiences , a different upbringing in their family and could possibly have a learning disability.  As a future teacher I need to be aware of this going into the classroom.  I will also take that extra time to get to know my students on a personal basis while exploring their learning strengths and weaknesses.

Todays classrooms are very diverse and have students with different economic, cultural, ethnic and linguistic backgrounds.  In my opinion, student diversity will be one of the most challenging aspects of being a teacher.  Classroom management of such a diverse group of students will affect how successful I am to reaching out to each and every student in my class.  My first step in addressing the diversity of my students will be to recognize those differences.  There are a variety of sources of student diversity.  As I read the chapter I was going to pick a few to discuss but honestly felt that I couldn’t because I believe they are all important.  In order to apply all these diversities into my classroom as a beginning teacher I am going to have to be aware of the issues in the school, community, and school division I am teaching in.  I also believe that asking previous teachers of the students may help me to get to know them a little better.  Asking fellow colleagues for ideas, examples and researching areas that I feel are important to my students will be the key to a successful plan.

I am becoming a teacher because I love to be around kids.  I know that my classroom will be a caring and supportive environment for all of my students.  I am a firm believer of creating a positive environment within the classroom as well as encouraging others to be the best they can be.  Using differentiated materials within the classroom that follow the curriculum guidelines will accommodate different learning styles.

Even though I feel that I am going to change the world as a new teacher I am aware of the realistic challenges in the classroom.  Something that I can take away from this reading is to make an effort with each individual students in my class.  It may not to be realistic to do that every class but taking even a minute or two a day to touch base with every student is a start.  The only problematic issue I see in this whole picture is that there may be only one of me, and 32 students.  Time management and spreading myself out to connect with each student seems pretty intense at the moment!