As future teachers, we discuss many issues related to teaching. So what are the issues of teaching in this millennium? Many aspects of teaching have stayed the same, yet with the year 2000 quickly approaching, we face new issues. We have decided that four important facets of teaching include classroom community, expanding the literary canon, literacy and language, and evaluation.
CLASSROOM COMMUNITY: As students ourselves, we have been exposed to many types of classrooms. We have our preferences, and we feel that the classroom should reflects the students that it houses. Atmosphere is a crucial part of the classroom community; to involve them in learning, it should focus on their lives and experiences and help them make connections between the classwork and the "real" world. The community needs, then, to be democratic and one where students help to create and enforce the rules of a peaceful and productive classroom. Through collaborative creation of the classroom, students will be experiencing and learning from having both freedom and responsibility. Trust, respect for all the voices and experiences in group work and classroom discussion are also integral parts of what we believe a cooperative classroom community. EXPANDING THE CANON: As teachers of the millennium, we believe a wide variety of texts should be included in the classroom. Although we do think that the classics are important and necessary, we want to have texts that help students make connections to their own lives and their world. We believe in integrating texts that focus on a changing world; this includes multicultural aspects and regendering our "traditional" curriculum. LITERACY AND LANGUAGE: To combat aliteracy and illiteracy, we must create a print-rich classroom. Our classrooms would include many genres and forms of writing--subjective and objective. To expose our students to various forms of language and genres, cooperative group work would encompass literature circles, self-selected readings, and writing projects that would allow students to explore composition in many different modes such as personal, narrative, expository, and collaborative response to both writings and readings. EVALUATION: Grading product is not the primary focus of a progressive teacher; however, evaluation is still required in our educational system. Therefore, we conceptualize grading as a reflection on the process, not the product. Therefore, in short, evaluation stems from our philosophy; through creating a student-centered classroom with a multitude of reading and writing opportunities to expand their understandings of themselves and literature, we will be facilitating life-long literacy, making the classroom a place for sharing, growing, and reflecting.
the hopeful and optimistic teachers--Bobbi, Gabrielle, and Sandy :)
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