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Children have a great curiosity about
their world. As a teacher of the
gifted, I embrace the opportunity to nurture that curiosity in each of my
students. When a child enters my
classroom, I want them to experience a sense of wonder, to be filled with
questions and curiosity, and I want to instill in them a desire to discover
the answers to those questions.
I believe my role in the classroom is to
be a facilitator and resource person, guiding students to grasp knowledge and
concepts through hands-on learning and research. I believe instruction should be
activity-based, engaging students in the meaningful and creative aspect of
learning. I believe laughter and joy
should permeate much of what we do as a community of learners. I believe children need to be invested in
what they’re doing for meaningful discovery to take place. I believe that as a learner myself, I need
to model what I’m asking of my students… wondering and discovering right
along with them… finding the answers together… and enjoying the process,
rather than focusing on the product. I
believe that dialog is vital to the success of our classroom… discussing,
defending, and justifying their thinking will create an environment where my
students will learn as much from their peers as they ever will from me.
Teaching is not an exact science, nor is
it easy. I wouldn’t want it to
be. The challenge of teaching and the
demands it takes, make it all the more exciting. In the end, I hope that the thrill and
excitement of learning infects all of my students. Regardless of what details of a unit they
may remember, I consider my greatest successes those students who have
learned to think rather than memorize, to question rather than just answer,
and to express curiosity rather than conformity.
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