Respect for the inherent value and dignity of each individual
Intellectual inquiry, discovery, and passion for life-long learning Acceptance and appreciation of diversity Compassion and service to society Student-centered education Collaboration and sense of community Promotion of interprofessionalism The Innovative Learning program reflects Touro University Values to a T. Students and staff have respect for one another. The staff values intellectual inquiry and the passion for life long learning. They appreciate diversity in their students and how they learn. All of their programs have a close tie to the community and only add value to the employers who hire their students. Touro has high expectations for their students and the quality of work that they are putting out. With the small cohorts the learning that is happening is student-centered. As a teacher it helps me to remember to provide the same learning environment for my students. All of these values ensure students are being the best possible student they can be both in an academic setting as well as in the professional. Each time I walked into my classroom I was compassionate and ready to survive my students. Working with my cohort and coworker promoted professionalizatism.
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What a journey! At the beginning of this Master's program when I heard that I would be creating my own website I was quite scared. I had no idea how I was going to accomplish that task. But somehow here I am with a finished project. A website that I am so proud of! I've worked so hard on this capstone project. It's still hard to believe that I created my own website. The topic that I choose was a little difficult to create a digital website for. My passion is for building strong relationship with my students is so important. I found it a little difficult to digitize my work. I am hoping that my capstone will still reach teachers who are looking for ways to build strong growth mindset students in their classroom. I will continue to create a 21st century learning environment in my classroom. I will remember how important it is to keep running action research in my classroom.
In my classroom I've used technology regularly and was able to learn a few new tools to use in the classroom. I've fallen in love with Adobe Stark to make great little videos. I've also learned so much from my Cohort and how they applied tech in their classrooms. I've seem them grow so much and look forward to using some of their techniques in my own classroom. I look forward to learning more about how I can implement technology in my classroom to assist my teaching. Sociocultural: The Learners in this study were 3rd grade general education student with the age range of 9-10 years old. Some students live at home with both parents, some live in between two parents homes or living with other relatives. 90% of students are on free or reduced lunch. 55% of the class are English Language Learners. Majority of them first language is Spanish. The majority of the students that attend this class do not have very much academic support at home from their families. Either parents are working or the concepts are to difficult for them to help their students.
Technical: The Learners in this study were 3rd grade general education student with the age range of 9-10 years old. Some students live at home with both parents, some live in between two parents homes or living with other relatives. 90% of students are on free or reduced lunch. 55% of the class are English Language Learners. Majority of them first language is Spanish. The majority of the students that attend this class do not have very much academic support at home from their families. Either parents are working or the concepts are to difficult for them to help their students. Informational: Students are also familiar with gamification and competition within the classroom through different online tools. Included were Quizlet Kahoot, and Quizizz. Students are also able to use video streaming services like Netflix and and YouTube. Class Dojo as a class management tool as well as, using their Mojo videos about growth mindset Evidence that Instruction is Appropriate as a Potential Strategy Teaching students how to persevere through difficult problems is a vital skill for our students to master not only academically but emotionally as well. Due to the population of these students, many of them are not equipped with the necessary tools to see failure as an additional opportunity to learn and will give up easily. The academic day is filled with reading, writing and Mathematics. With very little time to develop a positive growth mindset. Many teacher speak about “never giving up” and “keep trying” but miss the fundamental importance why it is important to do those things. I think that providing teachers with lessons plans and instructional videos on how to teach their students about growth mindset would greatly benefit students academic success. By connecting how a growth mindset can help then in the futures will increase a students motivation according to Clark. A students confidence grow with opportunities to redo assignments, lessons on having a growth mindset, and support from both their teacher and families. Relating to the ARCS instructional design. The audience that I am trying to reach is new teachers. Teachers who have been teaching less then 3 years. The reason I chose this group as my audience is because it is the group I relate the closest with. I think many new teachers struggle with how to implement a growth mindset in the classroom. As a new teacher there are a million different things that you are learning those first few years of teaching and for most building a growth mindset is not always top of the list. I am still a new teachers. June 2018 I will be finishing up my second year of teaching. In that short time I have learned a great deal but the one that sticks out the most to me is how to develop grit and perseverance in my students. I was constantly struggling with how I can keep my students going in difficult situations. I can only speak my own truth. My students would often just give up at any sign of difficulty. So I needed to figure out how to make them more gritty. How to celebrate their mistakes and see that learning is a process and failure is part of that process. But what is even more important is what we choose to do when we fail. Many of my students know failure all to well at such a young age that they believe they cant break that cycle. It is because of this that teaching students how to have a growth mindset is so important. I saw the most change in my students when I started incorporating growth mindset lesson into my class. Academics are important but my students were coming in with many barriers that were preventing the learning from happening. So my focus shifted to supporting my students more socially and emotionally first followed by academia. With this shift my students really began to thrive. Not in in the classroom but as individuals.
My driving questions has changed so much throughout this process. When I wrote my paper in the very first semester of this program my focus was on growth mindset and math scores. Then it some how turned into a possible digital badging and growth mindset. Then to how does motivational messages influence test performance in students and finally How does purposeful instruction on grit and perseverance influence students growth mindset. My focus has not changed in researching students growth mindset, but the process in which I look for research has. My audience is for new teachers trying to build a community of gritty students whole gladly accept any changellen thrown their way both academically and in life.
Never in a million of years would I have pictured myself as a teacher, let alone loving it!! Some how my passion found me instead of me finding it. I always knew that I wanted to work with children. As long as I could remember I wanted to be a child and adolescent therapist. I wanted to change the lives of children who were or are facing extreme difficulties. I wanted to be that person who helped change their lives. Taught them how to empower, love, and fight for themselves when they felt no one else did. I wanted to show them that they their circumstances do not define them. They could change the trajectory of their life. I wanted to show them that they defeat the odds that were stacked against them.
The reason this desire was and is so close to my heart is because I was one of these kids. I has so many odds stacked against me but some how I changed the path my life was "suppose" go. I grew up in a home diseased with poverty, drugs and abuse. But something inside of me at a very young age knew this was not the life that I wanted and there had to be more out there then "this". As I got older I always wondered why was my way of thinking so different then my families? What was it inside of me that wanted more? Why did I not follow suite and abuse drugs like my father did? It was questions like this that made me want to purse my degree in Psychology. I worked my butt off and became the first college graduate in my family on both sides. I received both my Associate and Bachelors degrees in Psychology. I was ready to take on the world as therapist. But, then life happened . As I was finishing my 2 semester of my bachelors I became pregnant with the worlds greatest blessing my daughter. I graduated with my bachelors when my daughter was 4 months old. With the new responsibly of raising a child, I needed to find a way to provide for my new little family. So I applied for a para-educator job at my local school district and got it. Wow what an experience! I fell in love with my job. When I think about the goals that I have when it relates to this program, I find myself all over the place. Before I even started the program by goal was very narrow minded. It was simply 'Get your Masters". As I moved through the program my goals began to change just as I did. I think my goal now is to inform teachers how to great a community of growth minded learners. To adapt out teaching practice to our students needs. How to teach failure as something to be celebrated rather than something to be ashamed of. I guess what my ultimate goal is to show students that with grit and perseverance they can accomplish the impossible. Those task that they think are impossible in the classroom. With the correct support from their teachers, family, and confidence in themselves they can indeed change the outcome of challenging situations. I wanted to further explore growth mindset because I noticed that many students simply gave up when things became difficult to them. How could I make a meaningful impact on how my students faced the world. I am finding it difficult to accurately express my goals for this capstone project because it is intertwined with so many different layers.
I am hoping that my cohort can help support me on my capstone project my giving my open and honest feedback on my work. I think it would very helpful to have more time to spend taking with them about challenges and successes that we are having on this journey. I hope that we all are able to complete this capstone project that we can all be proud of. |