EDCI 5825 Week Six

I really enjoyed and benefited from reading the blogs of my peers, especially the "Good Teacher" post from last week's EDCI 5065 class.  While all of us had our own definitions of what makes a good teacher, common themes existed throughout our group.  Most of us mentioned how our own values play a huge role in the way we teach, how we are role models for our students, how we need to be inspiring and encouraging, how we need to value the backgrounds and needs of each individual, how learning should be meaningful and purposeful.  It is essentially important that we stimulate interest and elicit emotional responses from our students to optimally engage them in lessons (the idea of hot cognition).  Most importantly in my opinion is the notion that our attitudes define how our students perceive us, and how we perceive them: that modeling positivity and optimism have a tremendous impact on the classroom.  Kaitlyn's "Good Teacher" post describes this perfectly:


"A smile is a curve that often sets things straight. A good teacher always smiles because she wants to show that she is content to work with her students. Positivity. Optimism. She achieves the objectives for the day and provides a purpose for learning. She connects the curriculum with the students experiences in order to make the material relevant. "