Starting a Journey

I took this course out of curiosity. It is not a part of my requirements for my MA in Elementary Education. I took it knowing that life takes you different places sometimes, especially when you least expect it. So this course is an attempt at gaining more knowledge about myself and the diverse environments and currently and in the future, will find myself in. A couple week in, I was not expecting to be actively approaching some of these topics as much as I have within the context of my current job.

This week, I have found myself considering the premise of "connecting with students" beyond academia. One of the first texts that I read which made me really start thinking about this is Start Where You Are, But Don't Stay There by H. Richard Milner IV, a text we are reading for this course actually! I've posted a picture of the book below. The teachers in this book make such as an effort to connect with their students, despite huge cultural differences that may exist between them. When I first started working at the school I'm at now, I felt a huge cultural gap between the students and I. For a while, I couldn't seem to connect with them and it started to affect my facilitating their online language course. It was a really difficult situation I found myself in.

While searching around the internet, I actually found an article by the author of this book written through the Harvard Education Letter, titled Five Easy Ways to Connect with your Students. It's a quick but interesting read if you're interested. One of the main ones that stuck out was was number four: attend extracurricular activities featuring your students. Here are some of the main quotes I took from that particular section. 

"It means something to students when teachers take time out of their schedules to visit an activity they are involved in." 

"Teachers from elementary through high school should feel a sense of responsibility to be present at events that help complete students’ educational experiences such as those connected to extra-curricular activities."

I've never really considered how showing interest in student's activities can motivate and inspire them. I think it also builds trust. For someone to take personal time and dedicate it to their students, it shows genuineness. Hopefully students react positively to actions such as these, so I'll have to consider this as a future tip when connecting with my students.

I'd like to learn more about...

• Next week, I'll be observing a 5th grade class for my field experiences in an urban environment. I want to start noticing how the teacher works with her diverse community and how she considers their needs within her classroom. I need to find out if there is anything specific to note within these environments, so I'll report back to you next week! 

References

Milner, R. (2011, February). Five easy ways to connect with students. Retrieved from http://hepg.org/hel/article/492

Milner, R. (2012). Start where you are, but don't stay there. (2nd ed., pp. 109-146). Cambridge, MA: Harvard Education Press.