My Teaching Philosophyby Andrea Baquero Lesmes

"The world doesn't care what you know, but what you can do

with what you know.“

Doctor Tony Wagner in the Conference "Play, Passion, Purpose" (2002)

On My Mind…In my 31 years of life, at least 27 have been dedicated and totally invested in an educational process.

Obviously about 10 years ago, my conception of this process started having a different approach and now I'm the one who has been in the shoes of those teachers that my whole life had to deal with the task of educating, so now I'm the one who must think about how to do or how to get students involved in the learning process in order to understand the importance or meaning of the knowledge I want to share with them. Now, I am the one who is standing in front of a group of students who are watching and listening to me and most of the time have their minds and souls opened to receive everything I can share with them.

Now as a teacher, I understand many things I was not aware before, starting with the fact of envisaging and feeling that there are millions of circumstances and issues affecting our work.

Well if something is completely true is that the success of education needs and depends on many elements that have to be present in every way, for example education needs the government to know the real needs of schools including the students and teachers, and of course they must be ready to accomplish them. On the other hand, students really need to feel the unconditional support of their families and feel they can function in a healthy environment.

I am very conscious that previous generations of teachers, could not, or would not do something about it, for many of them it is too easy to be swayed by a model, an "institutional project" and the instructions of a book created by “experts” which shows the exact steps that must be taken for a class to be successful and to ensure that the explanations and the topics will be clear enough.

But now, being the one who is living the experience of being in front of 40 students who expect me to be their source of “enlightenment” and answer all their questions, I realize that it is not enough, this is not about following instructions from a book or the steps of a Lesson Plan previously designed, if communication with students is not effective, if they are not interested in what I'm talking about and if they are unaware of the benefits that all the subjects and topics worked in the classroom can bring for them in the future.

When I began to work in my current school, a public one, I could face a lot of things that made me put my feet on the ground and I could realize that this kids really need to be motivated, to feel that teachers understand them, that it is possible to have a good communication and that we can really help them to grow and to know more about the real world. It took me just the first three or four months working in the institution to understand that the kids are really hungry of knowledge, they are ambitious, they have dreams and I know they really want to be somebody and to create an effective game plan for their lives; what they need is just support and a guide and that’s exactly our role.

Motivation is not only to give good grades or smile at them, this is about a matter of approaching them, we must know their fears, interests and expectations for the course and work from this for them to realize that they can accomplish many things when they are aware of the need to make things right in an organized manner, to build their own self-knowledge and development without ignoring the previous established rules to ensure the smooth running of classes and their interaction with both, the teacher and peers.

Anyway, it is very important to be able to evolve in the same rhythm of our students, it is obvious they are growing really fast; everyday they want more and they are expecting teachers to answer all their questions, though many people think this is not true, for me is evident that they trust us, they trust our knowledge and our determinations. So, what we must do, what I want to do is to reinforce that connection with the students and let them know that teachers can be real guides for their lives thought we don’t have all the truth in our hands and that’s why we need them to work with us, to let us know what their expectations are and, one of the most important things, to let them know that we, teachers, are getting prepared to learn from them too.

Once I read from Ball & Cohen (1999): “Teachers learn best by studying, doing and reflecting; by collaborating with other teachers; by looking closely at students and their work; and by sharing what they see”, that is why it is extremely important that students can count on a group of teachers who know how to work as a team and are ready to apply Mason’s conception (1986) about what should matters the most is the students success and preparation to face life challenges after school.

Of course this is an amazing idea but sometimes it’s difficult to make it a reality… some time ago, I was trying to pay attention to the classes of some colleagues and the experience has been enriching but shocking at the same time. During that time, I have listened to positive expressions as “Yes, please bring your own proposals to the class”, “Yes, you are right”, “Yes, we can have more practice activities”, but there were also some negative ones as “How can you say I am wrong? Don’t you see I am the teacher? I am always right!” and “Why cannot you behave? You are like little demons!”. Immediately I thought “What have I said and done to my students?” and in spite of being aware that I am really careful in my classes, I remembered teachers are also human beings and our attitudes and feelings also depend on others.

Nevertheless, that made me remember the core principal I have learnt in this master degree about the necessity of designing a course having as a first step a needs analysis because we must know who our students are, what their objectives, motivations and interests are before choosing the topics and resources.

Important not to forget…Planning is the key to success!

In the teaching learning process, planning is everything! It is extremely important that since the very beginning all the subjects, activities and assessment process is planned, so, teachers, students and even parents are going to have a clear idea about what will be developed. Fortunately, at my school, most of the teachers recognize the importance of the planning process and we agree to meet at the beginning of the year, before students come to study, in order to work as a team, check and evaluate the curriculum, so we may know the strengths and weaknesses it has and what adjustments must be done!

Respect Time ClassIn order to achieve goals in class, it is necessary to know how much time is needed to solve every task and activity. Distributing time class since the beginning always work, because they learn to take advantage of every second to accomplish the activitiesthat have been asked, that way, you can guide them to be always focused, organized and punctual.

Identify Strenghts & WeaknessesThere's nothing more rewarding for students that teachers recognize what their abilities are and of course, that they are ready to guide them, so they can empower of their own learning process... that is why I always apply the learning styles test in the first class of the year and we create small groups according to their results... so for them is easier to work and practice in class! Eventually, it is also important to understand and don't forget that every student is an independent world, each of them has a different lerning style, different learning preferences and maybe similar but not exactly learning objectives... so, without mattering that it takes more time and more effort from us, we can never compare or generalize them... we cannot take them forgranted and think they are going to learn at the same pace!

What about troubleshooting…?I am conscious that for everyone every learning process can be difficult, specially because if I think about my students they always have like million things in mind... they are teenagers, they are always thinking about the party of the weekend, the likes on facebok or instagram, the girl or boy they like, all the homeworks they have and how most of their teachers and parents are their enemies and make them feel overwhelmed, etc...

But, more as facilitators and guides than as teachers, is our duty to support our learners and let them know that no matter what, they have to continue doing their best because to get results, you have to deal with the process... they can stay feeling like victims or they can just move on, focus their energy and find answers and strategies that help them overcoming everything that may push them away from the goal!

As I always tell them: Troubleshooting is not longer about how they feel incapable, it is about how they use their intelligence to fight and keep going in order to solve issues and overcome them.

Ball, D. L. & Cohen, D. K. (1999). Developing practice, developing practitioners: Toward a practice-based theory of professional education. In G. Sykes and L. Darling-Hammond (Eds.), Teaching as the learning profession: Handbook of policy and practice (pp. 3-32). San Francisco: Jossey Bass.

Mason, R. (1986). Management Information Systems Quarterly - Four Ethical Issues of the Information Age. Volume 10, Number 1, March, 1986.

Wagner, T. (2002). Play, passion, purpose: Tony at TEDxNYED. (n.d.). Retrieved November 15, 2015, from https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hvDjh4l-VHo

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