Lauren Grumka

Professor Suk
Education Field Experience EDUC 230-01
Spring 2016
Rational Statement for Standard One
Standard 1: Learner Development:
The teacher understands how learners grow and develop, recognizing that patterns of learning
and development vary individually within and across the cognitive, linguistic, social, emotional,
and physical areas, and designs and implements developmentally appropriate and challenging
learning experiences.
Artifact: Personal Teaching Philosophy
Date of Completion: 18/02/2016
Course Completed in: Education Field Experience EDUC 230-01
Rationale Statement:
The artifact at hand is a personal teaching philosophy that I comprised in response to
Standard One, Essential Knowledge, IV of the NJ Professional Standards for Teachers:
The teacher understands the role and impact of language and culture in learning
and knows how to modify instruction to make language comprehensible and
instruction relevant, accessible, and challenging. (NJPST, 2014, p2).
Within the artifact I detail what I desire to accomplish as a teacher, the basis from which that
comes, and a specific project I will use that represents these desires, and that I hope will be an
excellent means to accomplish the aforementioned Standard.
First and foremost this artifact is a constant reminder to myself to keep in mind the goals
I have set for myself as a teacher. In preparing it I was forced to really examine myself and
prioritize. What kind of teacher do I want to be? What impact can I have and want to have?
Instead of just saying the easy I want to be a good teacher, it was a means of introspection to
figure out how, on a personal level, I wanted to be a good teacher. Not that I want to be a
particularly hard teacher, but I feel that by being easy or too lax with my students will be a

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greater disservice to them in the long run. I want to be strong, teaching them not only my subject
area but, how to be more effective and adaptable students as a whole. Study habits and time
management skills are the most vital non-subject area items I want to focus on. I also want to
make sure I have a practical classroom, where students can really say I learned something
relevant to my life in here. As well I can look back on this as a way to test myself and make sure
that I am at the very least focusing on these points. It can be easy to get overwhelmed, especially
I imagine in the first years of teaching, and it is good to have methods of dealing with that. I
hope that this document provides me with that grounding.
In regards to the benefit to my students, that is almost a repeat of the above reasoning.
Students deserve a poised and prepared teacher who knows who they are, and what they want to
accomplish so that they can not only learn in a productive environment, but also have a lead to
follow. If you as the teacher are unsure then that will most certainly bleed down to the students.
As an eventual World Language teacher this indicator is especially relevant because
language and culture will be my main foci in the classroom. As such I will try to have a keen eye
in being able to understand students personal cultures and how that fits into their learning style.
I already will have practice doing so as cultural exploration and education are a fundamental part
of language learning. The project I detail within said artifact is all about the connection between
language and culture, and leaves room for modification for specific student needs and practical
wants. It also challenges students because it will be a yearlong project that will force them to use
time management skills to meet the project needs. I will hope to allow them a large amount of
leeway regarding when and how their project gets done, but this can easily be changed
depending on developmental level, as I understand for some students of certain ages or those
with developmental disabilities, to handle such a large task alongside their own school work will

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not be feasible. I will work to adapt it to their differing needs, whilst still maintaining the
integrity of the work.
As I understand it most students do this particular assignment later on in their
classroom experience, but I want to write this now so that I can have something to reference
while learning and see how I change as I go along. I have some experience in the classroom
setting already, working with developmentally challenged sixth graders in a math and science
classroom and am pulling from that experience as well as my own memories of what school was
like in creating my teaching philosophy.
Bibliography:
New Jersey Professional Standards for Teachers Alignment with InTASC NJAC 6A:9C-3.3
(effective May 5, 2014). (2014, May 5). Retrieved from
http://www.state.nj.us/education/profdev/profstand/teacherstandardscrosswalk.pdf