Edu360Final

The Personal Philosophy of an Aspiring Teacher
EDU360 Philosophy of Education
November 12, 2012

In one form or another, philosophies of education have existed throughout many years of our history, dating back much further than the development of the first classroom. From the beginning, the philosophy of education has existed in some sense, whether with the past educational practices of survival of a specific population or culture in a home setting, or the state regulated educational system and practices existing today. While the philosophy of education is a very diverse subject involving many questions, concerns, debates, and opinions, it can be primarily summed up by defining the philosophy of education as an ongoing conversation about the important issues and concerns focusing in education, and involving teachers, students, learning, and knowledge. Many classical educational philosophies exist today, including old to newly recent additions, but as an educator of anything to anyone, it is important to own a personal educational philosophy to help make everyday decisions throughout a career. Many personal philosophies may run similar, but because every individual has their own individuality, ideas, knowledge, experience, and opinion, no two personal philosophies share all of the same views. With some philosophies, theories are teacher-centered, and with others, student-centered, but they all have the same goal: and the goal is to provide students with the best education possible. Being a college student with future dreams of providing knowledge and education to students, I find it essentially important to have developed my own personal philosophy of education, and carry on my philosophy to my future career. Including all aspects on philosophical education, including what I plan to teach and to who, I aim to lay out my beliefs of what makes up the best, personal philosophy of education, and why these beliefs make up a beneficial philosophy.
I believe that by looking into any educator’s personal philosophy, milestones of their career can be explained by their views and beliefs. In this view, I feel that you can see a reflection of their previous career history, ranging from the grade level and subjects taught, to experiences that they have learned from in past situations. While a general philosophy is great to have when entering the basic educational field, a more personalized philosophy will be more benefit a more specific area within the educational environment. I feel that my desired grade level and subject influences my personal philosophy a bit, because I plan to teach a specific, middle school grade level, with a subject area of English/Language Arts. After I find a firmly-planted position as an English teacher, and I have my bearings, I also plan to teach an Art course as well. When I look at my personal philosophy as only an English educator, I see many different views and takes on things. When I look at my personal philosophy as an Art teacher only, I see that some of my views and beliefs as an English educator change if only viewing a philosophy as an Art teacher. While this is a bit indecisive, which is somewhere you usually do not want to be as an educator, I feel that it is good that I have found the fact that philosophies differ based on different educational fields of study, and that I have identified my own views and beliefs that are most likely to change if my area of study changes. Overall, I feel that the look in on philosophy from different subject areas results in different perspectives will be highly beneficial to both me and my students throughout my career. This allows me to view the educational field differently while still holding on to my values as an educator, but also allows me to remain open to new ideas, which proves highly beneficial to students everywhere. Forming a personal philosophy of education can be a difficult task when you do not know where to start. Many times, a task can be broken down in to even smaller, less complex tasks, and also generally starts with the most basic of information, and moves on to more specific, topic-oriented information. With this, forming a personal philosophy is no different. Often times the belief of the purposes of education greatly factors in to other personal philosophies held by great educators around the world, and is a basic starting point when forming a personal philosophy. Education does not serve a single purpose, but rather multiple objectives. The objectives of educators and school systems vary greatly among societies and cultures. Education is very much a “to-each-his-own” scenario. Depending upon location and culture, the objective of education can sway more toward one area of education in one culture, and sway almost completely away from that same objective in another location. Conducting research on the purpose of education throughout the years and areas will show a person that education can be a purpose to prepare children for positive citizenship, to cultivate a skilled workforce, to teach cultural literacy, to help students become critical thinkers, or to help students compete in a global marketplace (Jones, 2010). However, I feel that the overall purpose of education, no matter the culture or location, is to enable individuals to reach their full potential as human beings, both individually and as members of a society. This is fairly basic in thought, yet covers both my personal views and allows for the individuality among my students, which is also a value I hold rather high within my educational beliefs. This does not necessarily mean that college should be their number one objective after graduation, nor does it deny that it is not. My goal as a teacher of my students is to see that each and every individual student puts forth all of their positive capabilities toward learning, resulting in receiving an education which will enable them to think and act intelligently and purposefully in society. Schools exist because of all of the purposes mentioned above, and even some that have not been mentioned. Actual schooling was formed to prepare great-minds or influential individuals for leadership roles, and the sons of wealthy parents were generally the only children to receive schooling during this time. However, as time went on, public and more private schools opened, allowing both female and male students, regardless of their parent’s financial income. In more recent years, even more types of education have been formed, to allow students with learning disabilities or other personal issues to graduate from high school free of charge. Charter schools have been formed in hopes of adding more options to children’s educational career, and allow for more personalized classes and electives at a lower cost to the community. While schools were not always like this, they are very much catered around the individual needs of each and every student. Also strongly influencing my personal philosophy is my belief that education should be either the same, or very similar in curriculum for everyone. Because I have seen the large varying differences between just two schools of the same enrollment age, I have seen how the educational system can be in favor of one student, while the other seems to get the short end of the stick. Ultimately, until every educational option is available to every student, regardless of location, I feel that the educational system is unfair. One of my goals as an educator is to create an environment in which a student will learn the same material regardless of disabilities or location, while still meeting the needs of the individual student and the way in which they learn the information. While I believe that education should remain closely a like regardless of culture, location, or disability, I do feel that curriculum should be altered and/or shaped in a way in which every student understands the material being studied. While a personal philosophy does not generally fall neatly into a general philosophy, my personal philosophy seems closest to the constructivist theory. This theory of learning is uses different types of constructs in order to change our realities from a chaotic life to a life of order. More in general, it is a learning process which allows a student to experience an environment first-hand, with a goal of giving the student reliable and trust-worthy knowledge. “For constructivists, education is not a matter of discovering the fixed patterns of reality, but of building a knowledge system that works for the individual” (Stallones, 2011). I view knowledge as being gained as a learner goes through life, which fits almost perfectly into the constructivist philosophy. I am also an active supporter of charter-based education, which relies heavily upon technological gains today. The constructivism belief embraces technology in and out of the classroom, allowing a positive look into charter-based education through this philosophy. Scaling the philosophers of constructivist philosophy, I came across John Dewey, whose impact on schools in America and around the world cannot be overstated. Dewey believed that the experimental process did not yield universal principles. “He drew from scientific methodologies to formulate his theory of learning and for this reason; his approach is sometimes labeled experimentalism” (Stallones, 2011). There are several roles that education prepares for or involves in society. Whether it is a deciding factor in the conferring of statuses in society, the imparting of values, to transmit central heritage, or one of the many other roles that education plays in society, it can be said that education is a must in any successful society. Personally, I feel that education for occupational placement, education to complete the socialization process, and the formation of social personality are the three most influential roles education has on society. Generally, the higher the education achieved, the higher the occupation is on the importance and pay scale. It’s commonly known that a doctor with a minimum of 12 years educational training will be both a higher society figure and higher income earning than a registered nurse, with a minimum of two years educational training. In addition to education for occupational placement, education to complete the socialization process and the formation of social personality are important influencing factors that education has on society, and vice versa. While many parents nurture their children every way that they know how, often time, children are still underdeveloped socially if no other contact from society is made. Education gives the children the social development needed to reach full development and publically function accordingly. Teachers play a vital role in the lives of their students in the classroom. The most common and basic role that a teacher plays is the educating of the students that are placed in their care. However, teachers also serve many other roles as well. Teachers set the tone of their classrooms in accordance to what they feel will give their students the most-compatible learning environment, mentor and in some cases nurture students, become role models to the students, and listen and look for signs of trouble. While teachers may take a formal or informal form in interacting with their students, teachers must never act inappropriately with or around any of their students. Because the goal of many educators is to become the student’s role model, teachers must act in a way of which they expect their student’s to act, as not to be hypocritical. Failure in any of these roles could, and in some cases, would result in termination of employment at a place of education, and sometimes, any other educational job. I feel that the role of the student can vary greatly from classroom to classroom, given the educator’s personal preferences and grading critique. Personally, I feel that depending upon the subject area and grade level; I would include my expectations of the students at the beginning of the year, to make clear what I expect of them during the time in which I am to educate them. While the expectation list would be very specific, and rather lengthy to ensure that I included all of my expectations, number one on my list, no matter the subject or grade level, would be that I expected them to put forth all effort during my class. Many times, students fail not because they just do not understand the information covered, but because they are not willing to engage themselves enough. I would tell them to help me, help you. If they put forth effort, I would make sure that they did not fail, because my job as an educator is to educate them no matter any disability or difference in learning. My overall vision of the way in which schools should be structured is very in depth, and almost contradicts itself at times. I am a strong supporter of charter-based education, yet I feel that schools should have federal standardizations in place of the current state standardizations. I feel that depending upon the state and location in which a student lives; he or she is not getting as good an education as a student living in another state or location. Many poverty-stricken areas receive very poor education, leading to further poverty development throughout future years. I feel that every student should receive the same materials and curriculum, and that the curriculum should not be different for students based on level of knowledge or disability; but rather altered to meet their individual needs. While today’s curriculum is shaped well and on the right path to success, I feel that the students of today’s societies should be exposed to more cultural education. Immigrants of many different cultural backgrounds move to our nation every year, and bring with them their children to enroll in our schools. Enough education about these individuals with cultural differences is not well-known by many, and many issues often arise from the lack of knowledge once they arrive and enroll.
The curriculum, instruction, and assessment regarding a school system should be uniform while still meeting student individuality, and positively affect the outcome of state standardized tests and overall grades. High expectations of both faculty and students help to promote positive learning experiences in the classroom, and acts such as the use of instructional maps with common weekly assessments to measure “how we are doing with the standards,” help to ensure teachers are hitting the core targeted areas, and that students are obtaining the information being taught” (Ebert, Chaney-Bay, & Underwood, 2009). I estimate that my philosophical beliefs will greatly influence my work as a future educator. No matter how many years of schooling I put myself through to reach my career dream as a successful teacher, I feel that only real-life time in the classroom will teach me what I really need to know. During the first couple of years of my teaching career, I feel certain that I will run in to many difficult obstacles with little to no immediate knowledge of how to solve them or what course of action to take. However, I feel that with the help of my philosophical beliefs, along with other, more seasoned educators, I will possess the knowledge or no how to solve the issues I run across after further thought and insight into the problem at hand. It is important to know one’s educational philosophy for many reasons, but it is essential to know one’s own educational philosophy when one is a teacher. Laid out before you was my own personal philosophy of education, complete with an explanation as to why I stress the values and beliefs that I possess, along with the importance of educational philosophy and personal preferences.

References:
Jones, K. (2010). What is the purpose of education?. Forbes. Retrieved from http://www.forbes.com/sites/sap/2012/08/15/what-is-the-purpose-of-education/ on November 12, 2012.
Stallones, J. (2011). Philosophy of education. San Diego, CA: Bridgepoint Education, Inc. Retrieved from https://content.ashford.edu/books/AUEDU360.11.1/sections/sec2.4?search=constructivism#w18776 on November 12, 2012.
Ebert, O., Chaney-Bay, K., & Underwood, S. (2009). Shirley underwood center for literacy studies. University of Tennessee: Knoxville, Tennessee. Retrieved fromhttp://www.cls.utk.edu/School_And_Family/PDFs/High%20Performance%20High%20Priority%20Schools.pdf on November 12, 2012.

References: Jones, K. (2010). What is the purpose of education?. Forbes. Retrieved from http://www.forbes.com/sites/sap/2012/08/15/what-is-the-purpose-of-education/ on November 12, 2012. Stallones, J. (2011). Philosophy of education. San Diego, CA: Bridgepoint Education, Inc. Retrieved from https://content.ashford.edu/books/AUEDU360.11.1/sections/sec2.4?search=constructivism#w18776 on November 12, 2012. Ebert, O., Chaney-Bay, K., & Underwood, S. (2009). Shirley underwood center for literacy studies. University of Tennessee: Knoxville, Tennessee. Retrieved fromhttp://www.cls.utk.edu/School_And_Family/PDFs/High%20Performance%20High%20Priority%20Schools.pdf on November 12, 2012.