So, in the article entitled “Reinventing the U.S. History Class in Milton Chen’s Education Nation, Chen talks about how at the end of a Unit in his history class, Anthony Armstrong gives his students an evaluation evaluating the teacher. I believe that this is a very radical, and yet beautiful and smart thing to do. I say that because students are probably going to be honest if they don’t like the way that you are teaching. So, if we focus on what the students actually think about our teaching styles, we will truly become better teachers. Now, tying this in to last week’s presentation on Educational Philosophy, this idea of being evaluated by the student is very student-centered. So, here is another example of why I will be such a strong student-centered teacher.
While I was just thinking about Student evaluation of the teacher and lesson, I thought about the new TV show “Teach: Tony Danza” and in episode 2, he has a parent of a gifted student come in and tell him how her son evaluated him. She said that the first week, her son had given him a 6, and now, a week later, he gave Danza a 4. Now, this is a bit different, but it leads nicely into another person who can evaluate you. The parent.
I think that having an evaluation process maybe not each week, but once a month, with the parents evaluating you, would be a great idea. I say that because it can help bring parents in to help with anything, whether that be during the school day or at home. Parental involvement, especially in Special Education, is critical to student success both in school and once they are out of school. They would evaluate me on how well I connected with them that month, in regards to letting them know when conferences are, when I saw their teenager after school, when big assignments are due.
I would begin the school year by asking the parents to let me know how they would like me to communicate with them and in what capacity, do they want me to let them know when assignments are due, how their teenager is doing in school, what do they want me to notify them on? And how do they want me to notify them, to call them once a week, e-mail them every day, post assignments on a classroom blog? I will leave it up to the parent to decide to what degree they would like to be notified about things.
I will also be working, possibly, with Paraprofessionals (There is a more appropriate name for this now, but I can’t remember it). If I am working with Paraprofessionals, I would like them to evaluate me as well. In the beginning of the school year, just like with the parents, I will ask them what type of role they would like to have in my classroom. Would they like to help me teach a lesson, would they like to teach a lesson all by themselves with me helping behind the scenes, would they like to help with small groups? I would, again, leave it up to them to decide what they feel most comfortable about. In my classroom, there will be respect (because I give all the students respect, I hope that in time they will respect me), so the students will respect the Paraprofessional as well. So, I would ask them to evaluate me on how they feel that they are being treated by me and how I can make them feel more comfortable in my classroom.
I have two reasons for allowing the Paraprofessionals to teach all by themselves if they so wish. The first is that I could have them laminating things and cutting out laminations and making copies of worksheets (Which I don’t plan on using). But is that the best way to utilize the resource of the Paraprofessional? That point was brought up last week when Brad Kaffar came into my classroom for SPED 431 and talked about Co-teaching. The other reasoning behind why I will allow Paraprofessionals to teach if they wish is because they may wanted to become a teacher, but were too afraid that they couldn’t do it. If I can show them that they can, then it is going to be beautiful.
Finally, I plan on accepting Teacher Candidates and volunteers into my classroom, because I want to help them feel comfortable in the classroom. Because right now, I am not entirely comfortable being in a classroom. I want to be, and I was in my first field experience, but I don’t know if I am completely comfortable being in a classroom yet. Now, the evaluation here is just like that for the Paraprofessionals.
And with all who evaluate me, I hope to help them feel comfortable and at home when they are in my classroom because it is as much their classroom as it is mine.
No comments:
Post a Comment