Standard 7

Standard 7     Family, community, and professional partnerships in a diverse society 

Educators should view their students’ families as partners in their work.  They should understand that children’s academic success is fostered by strong communication, shared goals, and mutually reinforcing practices, and that children’s motivation and sense of well-being in the classroom is supported by the setting’s affirmation of the child’s home and culture.  Educators should define their professional responsibilities to include a commitment to their colleagues, their settings, their profession, and their communities.  They should be familiar with legal, ethical, and policy issues, and understand the importance of advocating for children, families, and themselves in a variety of professional, political, and policymaking contexts.

Educators have the responsibility of including the families of their students in the process of their education. When teachers and families are in communication with one another, they are able to share goals that they have for the student which will promote academic success. In addition, when teachers are in contact with families, they are given a view of what the family and home culture is like for the student. This adds to the classroom environment and can help the teacher provide the children with continuity that will be conducive to student learning. I believe it is also educator’s responsibility to be committed to her profession, workplace, and colleagues. Without this commitment, the teacher will find it difficult to truly involve themselves in their work and thus will negatively affect the people and community around them. When teachers are committed, they are able to use their colleagues and community as resources for success in their careers. One valuable way educators can prove that they are committed to their career is by being familiar with legal, ethical, and policy issues. This allows educators to be knowledgeable about the responsibilities they have as teachers. If teachers do not hold themselves accountable for knowing these important details, they are limiting themselves and missing opportunities where they can advocate for themselves, their students, and the families.

This standard is important to me as a prospective elementary educator, because I aim to learn about the families of my students so that I can work in a partnership with them. When teachers and parents are in contact and are working towards a goal, it is more likely to be met with group effort. The only way for this to happen is for educators to understand the laws and policies that accompany their job so that they can advocate for their students, the families, and themselves. This is important because sometimes obstacles can arise and educators should be equipped with knowledge of their profession in order to meet the needs of students and their families.

In the event that communication is lost or if there is a disagreement between the teacher and family, it is important for the problem to be resolved as quickly as possible. This can happen through open communication and the willingness to try new things. In Mary Cowhey’s book, Black Ants and Buddhists, she explained a conflict she had with a parent of one of her students. Cowhey states, 

Despite our positive home visit, I was beginning to think this parent didn’t like me. My philosophy of teaching and hers seemed completely at odds. For better or worse, we were stuck with each other, joined by her challenging son…I thought that maybe if she spent some time with us, she could see merit in my nontraditional teaching approach. Of course, as a first year teacher, I had no track record to support my odd ideas. I also thought if she could see her son in action, she might be able to give me some pointers on how to work more successfully with him. She agreed to come in one morning each week. She could see how challenging he was. She knew sign language and taught me some signs to use with him for staying seated and focusing on me. We developed incentives for not calling out. She was able to reinforce at home what we were working on in class, using the same language (Cowhey, 2006, p.194).

This example taught me how important it is to solve issues as soon as possible. Like any teacher, Cowhey wanted to see her student succeed and believed that it would be much easier to have the support of his family. By bringing the mother into her classroom and keeping an open mind, Cowhey was able to learn from the mother about what would help her son concentrate while in school.

            Open communication also helps parents and teachers solve problems that the child is experiencing. During my student teaching there was a nine year old boy in my fourth grade class who had severe anxiety. His father immediately came to me looking for strategies that could help relieve his son’s stress. This young boy had a difficult time getting off the bus in the morning without his father which was a strain on his father and on the boy himself. The boy, his father, and I created a plan which would help the boy reach his goal of getting off the bus and walking up to the classroom on his own. Artifact 7A shows some of the email conversions between the father and me. The plan went like this: The first week his father would ride the bus with him, and I would wait outside for the two of them. His father would walk him to me and I would then walk the boy up to the classroom. If the boy felt comfortable after a week of this, we would take small steps towards him eventually walking off the bus without his father to where I was standing. After that, we made a plan for him to meet me in the doorway of the school without his father. Having the plan helped the boy control his anxiety better and allowed him to enter the school feeling safe. Without this communication, his anxiety would have affected him negatively in and outside of the classroom. With the assistance of his father, I was able to see the progression my student made from a very nervous boy to one that was able to walk into the classroom and succeed academically because his anxiety was under control.

            When parents and teachers work as a team, the students in the classroom benefit. If educators take the time to get to know their students, they can learn what their students’ hobbies are, what their family cultures are like, and if the student has goals for him or herself. Every child has different beliefs and learns in their own unique way. To learn more about one of my students, I went to his family for information. Artifact 7B is what I sent home with one of my male students to learn more about his family. I knew that he was bilingual, because he attended English Language Learning (ELL) classes twice a week, but I was not sure of what language he spoke at home. When his parents responded, I learned that he spoke primarily Mandarin at home. I also learned that both of his parents were born in China which explained their strong cultural beliefs in the importance of schooling and respect of elders. I used what I learned through this short interview with his parents to support him academically by providing an early introduction to vocabulary words and literacy activities. Using my student’s family as partners in my work allowed me to gain information about my student’s culture and language that would inevitably help me plan lessons to meet the needs of this student. It is vital for educators to understand that each student’s family has their own story and that if the teacher uses the family as a resource, the classroom can be made into a diverse learning space.

            To make a classroom diverse it is important to recognize all of the cultures in it. I arrived at my pre-practicum during the second semester. Still hanging from the beginning of the year was a map of the world with tacks in different countries symbolizing where the students’ ancestors are from (Artifact 7C). Although I did not partake in this activity in the beginning of the year, I added a tack indicating the location of my ancestors, because I thought it was important that the students know what ethnicity and culture I associate myself with. It was interesting to learn about my students by asking them questions about their culture based on where their tack was on the map. Being in my pre-practicum classroom was a great opportunity to see how the teachers and students in the classroom brought their home lives into the classroom to create motivation and a sense of well being.

            Just like the classroom, the workplace is a diverse space where people come together with many different thoughts and ideas. When colleagues are put together, it is important that they are able to collaborate with one another to meet a common goal. One of the major common goals educators should share is to create a safe environment for all students to learn in. Steven Levy’s book, Starting from Scratch, shows when colleagues come together it promotes the growth and development of their profession and community. In his book Levy says,

I learned firsthand the transforming power of collaboration when Debbie O’Hara, a tutor in my class, and I went to a three-day conference together. In one of the activities we were asked to design the ideal classroom. Debbie and I went to separate corners of the room to dream, and when we met to share our vision, we were shocked to find that we had independently imagined the same ideal classroom (Levy, 1996, p. 40).

Levy’s quote shows that although he and Debbie did not communicate at first, they shared similar ideas about what the ideal classroom should look like. They then came together as a unit to create a classroom that they thought would work best for themselves and their students. Although collaboration is not always that easy, because people sometimes have very different ideas, it showed me how working as a team can create so many more opportunities than working alone.

While at my practicum, my supervising practitioner wanted to do a state project with the students. He was looking for the students to do research then create a PowerPoint presentation. Artifact 7D is the research I did to show the students what the expectations were for the project. We decided that I should go meet with the computer technology teacher to discuss ideas for the project. When I met with her, I brought up the idea of a PowerPoint. She explained that Keynote was a new program for Apple that is much more accessible for students to use. They would have the opportunity to use brighter colors, more interesting templates, and varying fonts. I agreed that Keynote sounded like a great form of presentation but also told her that I did not know how to use the program. She in turn offered to give me a demo on how to use the program so that I could teach my students. It is important for educators to look to colleagues in order to learn new things. I believe that keeping an open mind is one of the major responsibilities of educators, because without an open mind, it would be nearly impossible to grow and develop further in the profession.

As an educator it is very important to be familiar with legal, ethical, and policy issues. On August 31^st, 2011, before school started for the students, my supervising practitioner and I went to a Brookline Public School District meeting. There we discussed policies within the school district and how the population of Brookline is increasing rapidly. After that meeting, we went back to the school for an all staff meeting. At this meeting, we talked about confidentiality, Individual Education Plans (IEP), the insurance of complying to plans indentified under Section 504 of the Rehabilitation Act (504 plan), and the rules of the school. From this experience, I was able to learn about legal, ethical, and policy issues that all educators need to be aware of. When teachers are aware of these issues then students and their families are protected. Their learning style, disabilities, and personal information cannot be disclosed unless there is reasonable cause.

There is only one subsection of standard seven that I believe that I have not completely achieved. 7.6—“Understand importance of advocating for children, families and themselves in a variety of professional, political and policy-making contexts” is an important piece of the standard, because educators have the responsibility of advocating for themselves, students, and families. One way I plan to eventually meet this standard is by keeping complex notes on all of my students including what happens inside the classroom and on the playground. I believe it is important for all educators to pay attention to student development in all developmental domains. During my student teaching experience, I did keep detailed notes on children in the class. Through observation I was able to see what things certain children found easy while others found to be difficult. For example, one of my students was very strong athletically but found math to be challenging. When I discussed this with my supervising practitioner, he informed me that this student indeed had a learning disability in mathematics. It is an educator’s duty to advocate for students that need that extra support. There are many students that are not on IEPs or 504 plans but may need more practice in a certain area. Teachers should be aware of their students’ needs so that extra help can be given if needed.

As a student studying to be an educator, it is my responsibility to learn more about advocating in political and policy-making contexts. Although I do have some more learning to do there are many things that I do well. One of the things I do well is take observational notes. I notice when students find something challenging, and when things are not challenging enough. I feel as if I am an intuitive person and I know that the combination of collecting data and intuition will help me advocate for my students and their families in the future.

References

Cowhey, M. (2006). Black ants and buddhists, thinking critically and teaching differently in the primary grades. Portland, ME: Stenhouse Pub.

Levy, S. (1996). Starting from scratch one classroom builds its own curriculum. Portsmouth, NH: Heinemann.