i really believe that every teacher has their own unique teaching formula. It took me a few years to hone mine but I feel like I have perfected my personal teaching formula!
Here’s exactly what I need to teach and to teach well.
- Discipline- for myself and the children. It is so important to be consistent with discipline and to be FAIR.
- Positivity- just be nice! You cannot demand respect you must earn it.
- Organisation and Structure- I need to stick rigidly to my timetable or I feel like my day is upside down. This of course isn’t always possible but when it is I thrive on it as do my class.
- Silence. I am all for the constructivism approach, but teaching multi-class means that one class needs to be self-directed enough to stay completely silent while I am teaching the other class a new topic.
- Confidence- I am by nature very quiet but my passion for teaching has enabled me to speak in front of crowded rooms full of teachers at my seminars, and I even presented in Pats a couple of years ago to over two hundred teachers. I would never dream of doing such a thing in ‘real’ life but when you are confident and passionate enough about something it is easy!
- Love. I think teaching would be a tough job if you didn’t love it. I love teaching, I love kids, I love having my own classroom, I love thinking of new ideas. I just love it. Did I use the word love enough there?!
- Enthusiasm- when you are mad into a topic the children follow suit, it is contagious!
- Understanding: Yes a child might have no homework done for the second night in a row but why? Rules of course need to be in place, but you can have two children in your class who require two very different sets of rules. Equity will always trump equality in my books.
I could go on but they are my main teaching beliefs! What are yours?!