Being an educator is a challenging task that often requires a lot of reflection and modification. I started teaching because I viewed myself as a life long learner and I wanted to share that with others. I quickly realized that being an educator entailed so much more than I initially thought! It is an occupation full of challenges and rewards. My job constantly pushes me to try and improve on my practice. When I entered into the graduate program at Michigan State University I knew I would continue to encounter those challenges as well as opportunities to improve my practice. Throughout my studies in the program I was constantly challenged to think about how I was approaching my practice. Several themes continued to emerge during my coursework: creativity and perseverance. Below is a sample of my work that I feel relates to my exploration of those themes. Feel free to check out the short description and click on the photos for more information.
Creativity
Scientific ProcessMy studies in graduate school pushed me to think about how I was helping my students to engage in the scientific process skills. I spent a considerable amount of time thinking about how to push my students to deepen their thinking about key scientific topics and ideas. I wanted to use creativity and exploration as key ideas to guide them in their studying. Learning how to help my students explore ideas more deeply was very important in improving my understanding of how to use creativity in my classroom.
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Creativity in the ClassroomThrough my exploration of using creativity in the classroom I was lead to the idea of the Maker Movement. I played around with this idea and thought critically about how I could encourage my students to learn through exploration and hands on activities. During this exploration I was constantly drawn to the idea of making learning an active process. I was challenged to think about how I could help engage my students by changing my approach to the way they explored concepts and acquired new information.
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Freedom to be Creative |
Networked Learning |
During my graduate studies I have been continuously challenged. One of the ideas that was reoccurring in my studies is the role of creativity in the classroom. I have always approached teaching with an understanding that students can learn so much more and can engage in a more meaningful way when they are given the freedom to create and explore. In the start of my career I struggled with understanding how to work that into my practice. My work in several classes helped to me to critically evaluate how I view creativity. I created this video to showcase my ideas about the role of remixing and creative exploration in education.
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As I was learning about creativity and its roll in the learning process there were many times that I felt overwhelmed with incorporating these ideas into my classroom. Many questions came to mind as I tried to work through this. The primary question revolved around what I would do if my students wanted to explore things I didn't know about. Thankfully I was able to explore this very idea in a networked learning project, where I used youtube to learn about watercolor painting. This was a great opportunity for me to experience first hand an avenue I could offer to my students as they engage in creative exploration.
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Creative Classroom Design
In addition to my reflections about how I can help my students be more creative through planning I began to think about how my classroom space could help my students be more creative. I studied ways in which the classroom space could be utilized to help my students collaborate and engage in a more creative approach. I was able to create a digital redesign of my classroom and reflect on how the redesign would help my students.
Perseverance
A sure part of any learning experience is failure. Despite this fact many students are discouraged by failure and often give up when they encounter it. In trying to create a classroom where creativity was utilized it became clear to me that I must also teach my students that failure is a very real and valuable part of learning. I also noticed a need to engage in meaningful discussion about what can be gained from failure. Incorporating that idea into my classroom and sharing it with students can be quite challenging and was something I spent a lot of time reflecting on.
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Exploring scientific ideas and concepts can be an exciting process. It often leaves students with many additional questions. Some of those questions are hard to find answers to and require perseverance. Good scientific questions can be challenging and require students to work hard to find an answer. Unfortunately many students lose their questioning ability due to the correct/ incorrect attitude in many schools. I did a lot of work exploring how to help students overcome this programming and begin to question again.
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Embracing Failure
I spent additional time exploring failure in collaboration with several of my classmates. We worked together to begin to strategize about how we could embrace failure in our classrooms. We engaged in several discussions and exploratory activities in order to create a video that showcased our thoughts on the role of failure and how we can use failure as a learning tool. We also looked at some possible solutions to the negative views on failure in the classroom. This investigation was challenging but really helped me to deepen my understanding of how failure can change the way people feel about learning. Shifting my thinking on this matter was in important part of helping me to engage in discussions about failure and success with my students.