Kerstin Comproski February 24, 2011

EDU 280 Philosophy

I believe that being a teacher in a public school in America, you are faced with many narratives/gods which you need to address and accept. Therefore, I think I will need to be open and understanding of the fact that my students will all have their own separate narratives/gods which they worship. These narratives will all be thrown into one classroom and be expected to cooperate with each other, which I will have to facilitate. As far as personal narratives of my students such as religion, sex and race I hope to make all of my students narratives welcome in my classroom. However, as an English teacher, I hope my students are able to find some form of narratives within the texts we study. I believe the purpose of teaching is to encourage students individual creativity and personal achievements. I find English to be an ideal subject to explore ones creativity because the topics range a great deal. One student may relate to The Catcher in the Rye while the other relates to Hamlet. Regardless, if I am able to allow students to make connections between their own lives and the texts or strategies were covering, I think Im doing my job. Public schools should aim to create students who can actively participate in society yet have their own individual path, students who have the knowledge to further their education or go into a particular trade. As teachers, we must give our students more than vocabulary words and more than the basic information geared towards passing a test. We should be teaching our students to help them apply each subject to their own life and interests. As Erik Erikson discusses, we will be teaching our students during their adolescent years when they are facing much identity confusion. Therefore, we need to reach out to them and give them the tools and

education which will mold to whichever identity they find fit for themselves. In order to do this we must have much patience, tolerance and compassion. We will be faced with students who push their boundaries and those crying for help. I hope to be someone my students can go to if they need to confide in someone, but I also plan to set strong ground rules in my classroom. The way we teach becomes public because our students will mirror what they learn in our classrooms in how they participate in the real world. It has often been questioned what rights teachers have in teaching other peoples children. I believe teaching can often be misconstrued by some as parenting. Granted, teachers have an impact on their students but I think we have to be careful not to force opinions on our students, especially regarding certain narratives they worship at home. We are not parenting our students, we are teaching them about our subject matter and encouraging them to further their education. However, when teaching, we may not notice certain values or perspectives we are introducing to our students which differ from the ones they have at home. In some situations, I think the introduction to these values and perspectives is necessary. I am not passing judgment on certain parents, but I want my students to be aware of all interpretations of the world and be able to make their own decision on how they view things. Due to restrictions at home, some students may only be given the view which their parents have on some issues; forcing them to conform to the person their parents believe they should be. It is not my business to tell someone elses child what to believe, but I see nothing wrong with providing students with information on controversial issues which exist in our world, but I need to be careful so as not to overstep my boundaries and intervene on their parents territory. Overall, as Neil Postman stated, Without a narrative life has no meaning. Without meaning, learning has no purpose. Without a purpose, schools are houses of detention, not

attention. Ive mentioned that I believe the purpose of schools should be to promote students individual creativity and success. This may lead to each student having multiple narratives, but as teachers I will aim to be open to all of my students narratives. Education is not something I want to force upon on my students. For those students who dont want to be at school, I will need to engage them enough to pass standardized tests and keep the grades needed to graduate. However, for students who want to learn, I dont plan to limit them to the amount they can learn or to the subjects they can learn. I will do my best to incorporate novels which touch on multiple topics in order to reach each students interest and assign projects and assignments which are applicable to the multiple ways one student can learn. In order to prevent our public schools from being detentions, we must broaden our content to topics relevant to adolescents and what theyre going through. Thus, we will engage them because the content will be relatable. At the end of the day, my main hope is to intellectually challenge and encourage my students, while letting their individual narratives contribute to their creativity which will help them gain a sense of self and succeed in our ever changing world.