Week+3


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"So you want to be a Teacher?"__** The lecture this week embraced the idea that as a Teacher we need our own views on how we think education should be taught and the challenges we may face. Our guest lecturer Dr Howard Nicholas presented us with a variety of different mediums to show us how over time ideas have been formed about education and the affects that it has on the students. The first was a video clip of Pink Floyds 1979 hit "The Wall" in which I understood to describe teaching as putting all students into the same basket and 'manufacturing' them all the same. There are no thought processes and each child is taught without recognising their individual differences. It shows a production line of students who are bought into the education system as individuals but at the end they are all just victims and seem to be failed in some way. The second slide of a cartoon strip described the idea that when a child comes home from school they are not interested in discussing their day because it is the same as the day before and the day before that. As new teachers I feel that it is important that we don't make our days repetitious and can encourage our students to want to go home and share their **new** ideas with their families and friends. Jaime Escalante's video on being a teacher was also very inspirational. He made me think about the 'tough challenges' (by that I mean kids!) that will be in the classroom and how you can work with them. He described that kids need to be challenged in some way, however by making connections with them they have the ability to succeed.

Other views were explored and to me the generation of teaching goverened by the Victorian Government back in 1872 was the most jaw dropping. Gender based issues are still around, however it is great to know that I won't have to work under those conditions! The idea of Social Cohesion was also discussed and how working with the school and wider community, our students are more likey to engage in their education and as a result will produce better results. A great question raised in the lecture was "Who needs to know what and what are the limits of what teachers can do?"

In the tutorial session we undertook an activity of 'Think - Pair - Share' where we did a follow up activity to the lecture, and had the opportunity to write down our opinions on our own education and the teachers we remember and also what we believe to be important as future teachers. We discussed the points we had written down and then undertook a whole class discussion on the key words we all had in common.

Our personal presentation and the way we are perceived by other teachers, parents and students will undoubtedly have an impact on our views and the way we teach but in the words of Jaime Escalante "Be proud to be a Teacher".

Amy McLean 16th March 09

Great reflections Amy...... The guest lecturer Howard Nicholas posed the question 'What kind of teacher do you want to be?', this enabled us to engage into the entire lecture with this thought racing through our heads. We were exposed to different models of being a teacher- do you want be strict and treat everyone the same, do you want to stand and deliver or do you want exceed the typical model of teaching and be influential in enabling your children to come home and say ýeah mum or dad school was really good today'. Howard showed us really funny models of teaching and explainned to us he wasnt going to tell us what model was right he wanted us as future teachers to come to these conclusions ourselves.Values that i left the lecture thinking about was that I want to be a teacher that children remember and admire in the future, i want to be remebered for the passion i have in teaching, for the respect i have for the children and for the proffessionalism that I provide in my classroom. Proffessional Educators like Jamie Escalante believe that 'you have to be proud to be a teacher' and this is so true- you have to be proud because you play an important and significant role in shaping childrens life and helping them building the appropriate morals and skills to use further in their journey. Howard also emphasised that it is important for teachers to work together among themselves and in the wider community to create a strong school environment and to also enable the children to get the best possible results out of their learning.

In this plethora of readings there was a phrase from "The beginning: the challenge of teaching' that has been etched onto my mind since i read it. The following quote is worth discussing because it is a really creative way of explainning and discussing what really is teaching ''A life in teaching is a stiched together affair, a crazy quilt of odd pieces and scrounged materials, equal parts invention and imposition. To make a life in teaching is to largely find your own way, to follow this or that thread, to work until your fingers ache, your mind feel's as if it will unravel, and your eyes give out, and then to make mistake and rework large pieces. It is sometimes tedious and demanding, confusing and uncertain, and yet it is as often creative and dazzling:suprising splashes of colour can suddenly appear at its centre; unexpected patterns can emerge and lend the whole affair a sense of grace and purpose and possibility".

This quote explains teaching as an unpredictable career, a career with many contract changes, subject changes, qualifications change and change in children and in their behaviour from year to year. This quote looks at teaching like a patchwork quilt. You start with one patch and you grow you and your experiences grow so does your patches. You will end up finishing your career with a huge quilt full of an assortment of patches of all colours, shapes and sizes. With the continuing of array of changes that occur in this proffession if you accpet them and go along your journey embracing themyou will have a very rewarding and satisfying career. This links into the Jaime Escalante quote that is you "have to be proud to be a teacher".

Bec Beed  Brent Plowright 17/03/2009

I think that is an awesome quote Bec, it stuck in my head as well. I think it is even more relevant for primary teaching too. Well we were again treated to a very entertaining lecture, and quite thought provoking. In a way it was a lecture that asked more questions than it answered. In a sense I think a main point of the lecture was the people that we are, and the views and beliefs we hold about the world mould us into the teachers we will become. Those questions asked being what are our views about the physical world, the economical world and the spiritual and moral world in which we live. The answers to these questions make us who we are, and, whether consciously or subconsciously, we will project part of ourselves onto the students through what we teach and the methods that we use to teach our subject material.

We were presented with a number of viewpoints on teaching, both current and historical and this is a perfect illustration of the fact that teaching is an evolving, ever-changing process. This makes perfect sense as the world that we endeavour to teach our students about and facilitate the exploration of is itself certainly not stagnant, but constantly evolving. With political, economic, social and even religious circumstances continually shifting, the material we teach one year, or the examples we use, may be irrelevant, different or even politically or socially inappropriate the next. So what then does this tell us about the practicality of teaching?

Well, in my opinion it is necessary for us to constantly reflect upon our teaching methods. This relates well to one of our readings this week where Taubman suggests that if we realise a lesson has not achieved the outcomes it had originally set out to achieve then we perhaps need to analyse the lesson and ask ourselves some questions. Some questions suggested are “Was what I taught age appropriate? Was I clear in my objectives and expectations? Did I make the learning experiences meaningful for my students? Could I have found a better approach to teaching the subject matter? What assumptions about the students or learning informed what I did in the classroom? What educational theory informed or informs my teaching?” (????. p.2) Often, as the reading suggests, it is difficult for new teachers to bridge the gap between the theory behind educational practice and the practice itself. I believe that this will be a challenge initially, however once we have the opportunity to reflect upon our fist year of teaching we will be able to make connections between our practice and the theory behind it, or theories that can assist us in becoming better educators. I must say that I found the reading as a whole a little bit too filled with jargon, and unnecessarily complicated, but useful nonetheless.

There is every chance that a lesson plan may not turn out as you had predicted, which may not necessarily be a bad thing, as encouraging a discussion or debate that emerges from a lesson can lead to equally important outcomes, even if they were not the intended outcomes for that particular lesson. After all “educators have plans that they first visualize and then attempt to predict on paper what may happen in the teaching environment ” (Ryan, T. 2005. p.1) but what may happen and what is visualised as happening won’t always be the case. I can certainly understand why Ryan was confused between the notions reflective and reflexive as after reading his article I’m still not entirely sure I fully understand the difference, except that reflecting is part of being reflexive. Please correct me if I’m wrong here! Reflecting on our own teaching practices will only make us better teaches in the long run, and that is what we should all strive to be.

Ryan, T. (2005). When You Reflect Are You Also Being Reflective. Ontario, Canada. Nipissing University

Taubman, P. (2007). The Beautiful Soul of Teaching: The Contribution of Psychoanalytic Thought to Critical Self Reflection and Reflective Practice. In //Bold Visions in Educational Research// (pp.1-16). Rotterdam, The Netherlands. Sense Publishers.  All the points made above guys have been great, and I'm in agreement with them all. The quote that you have reference Bec I must say along with you and Brent, it really hit a note with me also. The fact is there will no doubt be times where we feel we are "going through the motions" during our teaching career, but that is the same as any job. What we need to make sure is that we are keeping our eyes open for those dazzling moments as they will ultimately get us through our rough days. This will also be really important to keep us fresh and teaching well. Because as Brent touched on what we teach in the class, with regards to our morals and values, alond with the curriculum will certainly have an impact on the kids lives moving forward.  I think the lecture was a fantastic way of illustrating to future teachers exactly how the role has evolved according to many people's perceptions. It is impossible for us to churn students out on a production line as illustrated in the "Brick in the Wall" film clip, as each student will have different needs that we will need to be attentive to as their teacher. The prime example that stuck with me was Jaime Escalante's video in which he said "you must constantly review you teaching methods and see why they aren't working if you are not meeting the expectations you have set for yourself". This was a very profound statement and was also touched on in the Taubman reading, because if we become so set in the ways and methods of our teaching then we will be failing as educators and not give our students the best opportunitys moving forward in their lives. We need to review our lesson's and see if what we taught was transferred across effectively to our students, if not we need to look at developing the right method that will help achieve this.

With regards to the activity in the tute group, the think-pair-share exercise was fantastic as it helped us address what we thought was important as future educators and also great to get interpretations from others in our group as to what we think should be high in priority to create a "good" teacher. It certainly gave me more perspective on what we need to keep in mind if we want to become one of those teachers who children look back on and think, they were a great teacher and someone who really help me, or whether we are one of the other teachers...

Jake Gordon 20/03/09 

ONLINE RESOURCES
[|Interpersonal Relationship between Teachers and Students: An Intercultural Study on Chinese and Australian Universities]

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Names: Brent Plowright Rebecca Beed Amy Mclean Jake Gordon