Interactive Classroom

One thing that is very important to me is having an interactive classroom. As I have previously mentioned, the subject matter that I am studying to teach is English. I believe that having a classroom where the students are interacting with each other is extremely important when being in an English setting. Students learn a lot from discussing ideas and the class material with each other. In an English classroom the material is going to be different passages and books. I am currently in the class EDU 245 (Children's Literature), and one great thing that I have taken away from it so far, that I will use in my classroom, is literature circles.
Every time that we read a book in my EDU 245 class we have a literature circle where we discuss the book. Each member of the circle has a different role that they need to fulfill. These roles are discussion director, literary luminary, vocab enricher, investigator, travel tracker, connector, and illustrator. I think that this is a great way to get students talking to each other while also being extremely productive and gaining a deeper understanding of the assigned novels. The roles help the students really dig into the book and having discussions help the students see the novels from different points of views. Overall, I just think that students communicating with each other plays an essential part to their learning.

One Thing that will Never Occur in My Classroom

One thing that I will make sure never happens in my classroom is gender and cultural bias. I am extremely passionate about this, especially in a society where schools are becoming more and more diverse and the white race will eventually become the minority. I do not believe in white privilege or male privilege, and will do my best to make sure that my students never feel like they are experiencing that in my classroom. I want everyone to feel like they are in a welcome and safe environment.
 Going through school, I know that there are definitely teachers that favor males over females or females over males. I had a Spanish teacher who loved the boys and did not like the girls. A boy and a girl could hand in the same assignment done exactly the same way, and the boy would get a 85 and the girl would get an 80. She would always call on them, and even at certain times would sit on their desks. I found this extremely inappropriate and it strengthened my belief that my classroom will never have gender bias and everyone will be equal.
In my EDU 200 class, we learned about culturally inclusive teaching. This means incorporating different cultures into lessons. I think that this is important because everyone should feel included. I think it is vital to recognize the uniqueness of some students so that they feel included instead of like a minority. It is also important that they are treated like everyone else and that there is no bias towards white students because that creates an extremely hostile environment. That is the exact opposite of what I want for my students. A classroom should feel like a safe place, and I will ensure that my students feel that way in mine.

Technology Experience

My experience with technology in K-12 was very limited and involved a lot of typing. The only memory that I really have of technology in elementary school is going to computers class twice a week and having typing lessons. There was an online program that taught us the home position on the keyboard and to have your pointer fingers on the F and J keys. The program would also time how fast we could type and it tried to make it into a game. The faster and more accurate you could type, the more you would move up levels. There was a skateboarding game that you could play if you were really good at typing and finished your lessons before class was over. Throughout the class the teacher always stressed to not look at the keyboard while typing because you should be able to know where the different letters are through the online typing program. If she thought that we were looking at our keyboard too frequently then she would put a pad over the keyboard that was fitted to it, but covered up all the letters. Being able to type was a huge stress in my elementary school.

Once I was in middle school and high school the focus was less on typing and more on doing research. In middle school we were first introduced to writing research papers. Granted, they weren’t anything very substantial but it taught us how to find useful information on the internet. Most of the projects that we had involved putting together Powerpoint presentations and these incorporated research that we found, giving us another source for technology education.  In high school there wasn’t that much of technology used. We had computer labs for doing research and typing papers, we had laptop carts that rarely worked, and there was always the charming experience of one of my teachers not being able to get their smart board or internet to work. All and all technology was never that much of a success throughout my education experience.

Journey to SNHU

My journey to EDU 235 is most likely a lot different than many of my other classmates'. While I am a sophomore at SNHU, I am also a transfer student and this semester is my first semester as a Penman. I didn’t even know that this class existed. EDU 235 was chosen for me and automatically put into my schedule. I transferred from the University of Rhode Island, which is about four times the size of SNHU. I have noticed a lot of differences between the two schools, my favorite one being the class size. At URI my classes were huge and intimidating. I could raise my hand and ask a question but I would be asking it in front of at least a hundred people. The professors had no way of knowing if you were in class or not and if you weren’t then that was your business and they weren’t going to help you. I love that at SNHU I have no more than 30 people in each of my classes. I am happy that I am going to be able to actually participate in class and get the most out of my professors in my journey to become an educator.

                What ultimately brought me to SNHU, EDU 235, and made me transfer was my desire to be a teacher. SNHU’s education program far exceeds URI’s and that got my attention and ultimately solidified my decision to transfer. I didn’t know that I always wanted to be a teacher, but once I changed my major to elementary education and started taking the classes I knew that I found the right choice for me, just not at the right school. I’m hopeful that SNHU and EDU 235 will provide me with everything I need to be successful in my own classroom.