Think back to your Reflective Portfolio Activity from Unit 1. In the first unit, you were asked to consider the way in which you defined learning and how that definition might influence your classroom expectations about student performance. In this last reflection, consider your understanding of teaching. This final unit included readings that suggest that there is no one theory or approach that applies to each student. Different students with different needs require various approaches; different curricular benchmarks require different delivery styles; different teaching experiences require differentiated approaches.
Given the materials from this unit, as well as any of the earlier materials you have completed, how would you characterize your pedagogical philosophy? Your pedagogy refers to the way in which you construct lesson plans, deliver instruction, evaluate student learning gains, and the strategies you include in your best practices of teaching. If you are currently not teaching, how would you respond if you were? For your consideration, think about:
How do you teach or plan to teach?
Moving forward in your teaching career, what values do you consider a priority?
Which theoretical principles will drive your classroom planning?
Which student characteristics do you think are critical to successful learning?
You may want to review your first Reflective Portfolio Activity in order to ensure you have a complete concept of both teaching and learning in your reflection. This final Reflection Activity should serve as a culmination of the course objectives. They are provided here as a reminder to inspire your reflection:
Identify the parameters and crucial features relevant to a learning situation and students
Examine the major theories and models for understanding how students learnbehaviorism, cognitive information processing, observational and social learning, constructionism.
Identify the cognitive, affective, and sensory/psychomotor domains and implications for learning through differing modalities
Explore the contributions of neuroscience to adolescent brain research and understanding behavior
Explain structural barriers to learning such as stereotype threat, curriculum-home mismatch, and use of particularized materials and approaches
Describe the interplay of learner characteristics, prior experiences, learning styles, the medium of instruction, and cultural influences and understand that learning is dependent and contextual with no single theory universally applying to every student in every situation
