It was a very rewarding experience, and thankfully you never have to hear me discuss the Graduate Experience again. So in honor of this fact, I would like to share my final Grad Assignment for my last posting on Grad School. The assignment asked me to write a reflection on Grad School Experience and how it changed me. Enjoy!!
Well,
it has finally come to an end. After 25 months, and about 198 assignments I
have reached the conclusion of my Graduate School experience at Saint Xavier
University. When I first began the program, I really did not know what to
expect. Now that I am at the end of the program, I can safely say that my
outlook and philosophy of education have been completely changed by my time in
the program, the professors who taught me, and the students/peers I met. It was
the very definition of peer-to-peer learning. This radical changed I experienced
has been for the greater good; it has made me a more informed educator, a
better listener, and an advocate for social justice. In this reflection paper,
I will review some of the courses that changed my perspective, my overall
experience, and where to go from here.
I
began my graduate school journey in May of 2010. At that time it was safe to
say that my views and philosophy of education were pretty mainstream. It had
been about two years since my student teaching experience, and I had focused my
attention away from the formal world of the classroom to the Student Media
experience of running a college radio station and newspaper. At that time, I
viewed the classroom in the same light in which I was taught for most of my educational
life. The teacher was at the front of the classroom, lecturing, writing notes
on the board, assigning reading assignments in the textbook, passing out
worksheets, and occasionally showing a video in class. This was the way I was
taught, that is how the students of today should be taught. I could not have
been more wrong.
Two
years does not seem to be a long time, but it really is. And in that time I
forgot the most important rule my corporating teacher, Mr. Mike Doyle had
taught me. Mr. Doyle always told me that: “A good teacher always relates the
classroom learning experience to life outside of the classroom. This will then
cause you to adapt to changes in society.” It was not through any purposeful
action on my part; I was just focusing on something else, and had inadvertently
fallen into the black hole of apathy that most Americans are in, regarding education.
Thankfully, by participating in this program I awoke from my slumber and
reignited my passion for teaching and helping young people.
The
course that really started me on my path of self-discovery and change was the
EDUG 509 course. It focused on Educational movements of the 20th
Century and was taught by Dr. Wolf. If you approach any individual and ask them
about their school experience, more than likely they will remember those few
teachers that change their life forever. We all have them. They are those
individuals who challenged us, guided us, and were always there to give life
advice. For me, Dr. Wolf was one of those teachers. It was Dr. Wolf who
introduced me to the writings of Mortimer Adler, the Paideia program, and the
Great Books Foundation. It did not take me long after reading these texts to
become an advocate for this style of education.
At
its most fundamental level, Adler’s educational philosophy tried to return
education to the style of the ancient Greeks. Where reading, writing, rhetoric,
and physical activity were the centerpieces of education. In this methodology,
the ultimate goal of education was not to help the students get a “good job”,
but to become virtuous and engaged citizens with a desire for life-long
learning. This meant that no matter what professional an individual chose,
whether it was working for McDonalds or law professor at Harvard University,
the individual would be a virtuous person and work towards the common good and
social justice. These are actions that we desperately need in our society
today.
For
the first time in my educational life, I felt like I had found a philosophy
that I could stand behind completely, something had finally made sense. Before
I was introduced to Adler and the Paideia program, all of the formal education
philosophies (Dewey), felt a little off to me. In Paideia I found an ideology
that I was completely in line with. Paideia helps the students experience the
world through literature, art, music, religion, and discussion. Science and
math are no longer tied to worksheets, and boring textbooks, but the actually
writings of the brilliant men and women of their respective fields. I truly
believe that the Paideia program lays the foundation for life long learning. It
shows the students how we are all interconnected, and makes the subject matter
jump off the written page. At its very heart it is student centered which leads
us into the second class that had a profound impact on my journey.
The
class was EDUG 526, Literacy Issues in Curriculum, and Dr. Hilton taught the
course. It was in this course that I learned the definition of a student
centered learning environment and why it is so important. We had a
long-standing question in the class, we never “formally” answered it, but it
always guided our discussion, and assignments we worked on. The question was:
“Why are we here”. What is the
role of the teacher? Too often in today’s modern classroom, the teacher is the
center of the class. The teacher decrees the activities for the day, and all of
the students are forced to adapt to the desires of the teacher. This is not a
successful learning environment, and this will not create the desire in
students for life long learning. In fact it will probably put a terrible taste
in their mouth, and the individual will come away hating school forever.
In
this course we learned that to truly be a student centered learning
environment, all activities need to revolve around the needs of the students.
That meant that even if the teacher worked on a lesson plan for three weeks, if
the students did not respond well to it, the lesson plan was thrown out. By
making our classes’ student centered, we are tailoring everything to the
current need of the students at that present time. By doing this, we would be
in a greater position to better serve and engage their needs, and guide them
through the wonderful process of learning. It also shows the students that they
are apart of the process and that they are important. Too often students do not
feel like they are important in the classroom. They will not feel that way in a
student-centered classroom, because we teachers are always adapting to meet
their needs.
This
segue ways into my final class that had a profound impact on my learning, EDUG
529, Leadership, Collaboration, and Change. Dr. Knight taught the course. It
was in this course where I learned the importance of teacher adaptability. We
heard it all the time in our undergraduate classes that every student learns
differently. When we student taught we saw a very small sample of this. But for
me, I really did not appreciate this aspect of education until Graduate School.
I think it was because I did not fully understand the concept.
Ever
student learns differently, based on his or her own abilities. Some students
can learn from listening to a lecture, others can learn from creating a
diorama, while others need to be able to act out an idea. And this is the
beautiful part; they are all equal, and all equally important to the
educationally process. Too often we think that if a student cannot sit still
and listen to a lecture and then automatically understand the material they are
stupid. That is furthest from the case. Successful educators embrace all
dynamics of education and incorporate it so that every student’s educational
needs are met. This means that no two lesson plans should be that same, and
diversity is embraced. Lessons need to be tailored to meet the needs of the
students in each individual classroom. Now this does not necessarily mean tons
of work for the teacher, it just means that the teacher needs to be observant
and flexible with their units while instructing.
The
Paideia program, student centered learning environments, and teacher
adaptability. These three concepts have completely changed my educational
philosophy for the better. It puts the needs of the students as the number one
priority and gives them the tools they need in order to be engaged citizens in
our democracy, life long learners, and most importantly virtuous individuals.
But to implement these concepts, our current educational structure needs to be
completely overhauled. The over importance of standardized tests as the sole form
of student assessment needs to be dropped. If our politicians and members of
the department of education truly understood adaptability, they would see that
standardized tests are the least adaptable form of assessment because it does
not embrace student-learning diversity. If you ask the average young person why
they attend college, it is met with the response of: “I want to get a good job,
so I make a lot of money”. If we properly incorporated the Paideia program and
making virtuous individuals, the goal of education would be to make a better
and more just society. If we truly wanted to have student centered learning,
the economic gaps between poor and rich schools would begin to close.
So
where does this leave us? There certainly is a lot of work to be done, and at
times it can feel a little hopeless. But there are educators out there, who
give teaching 110% everyday, who try and incorporate the above concepts into
their everyday classroom. Hope should not be lost; in fact this should be a
time of great hope. But in order to accomplish this great change, teachers need
to stand up for what we believe to be right. I have met some incredible
teachers in this program, that are terrified to speak up for fear of losing
their jobs. This cannot be allowed to stand. As a doctor is an expert in
medicine and the health of the human body, so are teachers are experts in
education. If we stand together and say there is a better way to do this, and
demand the respect that is owed to us, then we can change education for the
better.
This
program has shown me the excellent teachers we have in the world, and it has
given me the tools to be a student-centered teacher. It has challenged me in
every imaginable way, and has made me a stronger and better-informed educator.
The man that began this program 25 months ago is not the same man who is
leaving it. I am better informed and ready to jump into the front lines.
