Professional statement.

Nelson Mandela once said,

“Education is the most powerful weapon which you can use to change the world”.

Upon return from a week long year 6/7 camp I was encouraged by my Early, Junior and Middle years Principal to become a teacher. Judging by responses from current professionals I have had the pleasure of working with and learning from throughout my practicum placements I would have to say “Yes, I can teach”. I now see myself as the professional who can inspire my learners to say “Yes I can”.

My philosophy of teaching is grounded in the theory of Constructivism, as I fervently believe that everything a person learns is mediated by their prior experiences and understandings. Like the theorist John Dewey, I see myself as a representative of the community whose task it is to select influences, which will affect the learner and to assist them in properly responding to those influences.   

I aim to foster a classroom of critical thinkers by engaging and supporting student learning through strategies such as Problem Based Learning, which I believe replicates real world challenges and prepares students for lifelong learning. I have engaged students with a raft of ICT based learning experiences throughout my practicum placements and one of the preferred learning experiences I use is an App titled, Quizlet.

I would like to communicate to my students that learning can be enjoyable whilst I detect and fill in gaps in their prior knowledge, boost their self-esteem and reduce anxiety.

There is in my experience, a very low percentage of male teachers in Primary years of schooling and even more so in the P-3 range. I have a strong interest in teaching/inspiring young minds in P-3, in part because I think it is important for students to experience adult men involved in a profession of caring.

Ongoing professional learning is critical to my capacity to become and remain the sort of teacher I want to be, that is someone who makes a difference in my students’ lives. The quality of my relationship with colleagues, students, parents and the community will be critical in determining the value of the contribution I can make to my students.

Learning has to be relevant to the learner’s experiences thus far in life with connections to their future. A recent prac mentor asked me to develop a lesson on ‘Significant’ for a year 2-3 classroom. Essentially there was little relevance to the learners in the documents provided to me to guide my thinking, so I developed the lesson around significant images from the local area in which the children lived. Formatively the student feedback and feedforward throughout the lesson provided solid evidence that the lesson was a success and the learners understood ‘Significant’. My mentor said “Wow, that was fantastic, I would never have thought to deliver it that way”. As a reflective practitioner, I was disappointed in myself because I did not have the courage to change the assessment and develop my own more relevant assessment piece. For students to be full participants in the learning experience, setting priorities for the learning/ assessment process at the outset is essential and through ongoing assessment a judgement/feedback loop against those priorities can optimise learning.