Inclusive Environment

Goal for Fall semester 2024:  My new goal for this area is to learn how to tailor to the different learning needs of my students. I have come to learn that there are many different styles of learners, I want to ensure that I am fully educated on what works best in regards to teaching and the overall classroom environment for these students.

How I will accomplish this: I will begin by having a discussion with my mentor teacher about the students within the classroom.  Through this discussion I hope to learn about the various styles of learners that are within my current practicum and how I can better support them. For example if a student is a visual learner, I will ensure that all of my lessons have visuals, such as assignment examples.

Relevance: Every student learns differently. As a future educator I believe that it is crucial to understand the different learning styles so that I know how to best support my students so that they are provided with fair opportunities to excel within school.

Time Frame: Ideally, I will learn about the various learning styles present within my practicum classroom before my five week teaching block. By doing this, by the time that I am taking on more of a teaching role from November to December, my lessons will contain aspects that are suited to all styles of learners.

Growth: This goal went well! I find that creating an inclusive environment is something that comes naturally but does also require knowledge/research regarding the supports/resources available and knowing your students likes, dislikes, strengths, weaknesses, and more. Within my classroom, right from the beginning I established relationships with all of my students. I took this information and created my classroom support plan. This plan helped me to support my students as best as I could as well as create trusting and positive relationships with them.

***Link to classroom support plan***

Goal for fall semester 2023: My new goal for this competency is to focus on a more culturally inclusive environment. Through my first field placement I was able to view the way my mentor teacher ensured every culture was respected and how she promoted equality. I saw things such as the celebration of black history month and children's books available to the students that were pertinent to different cultures. I would like to learn about how I can ensure I promote each culture equally.  Whether that be through lessons, answering questions, or resources that are provided in the classroom (i.e. books).

How I will accomplish this: This will be accomplished through learning about the different cultures present within my field placement. Once I have a basic understanding of the cultures, I will implement them in the classroom by bringing in different books or planning lessons surrounding them (with permission from my mentor teacher). My ultimate goal is to honour cultural diversity and promote an intercultural understanding within the classroom (Alberta TQS 1.f.).

Reflection of Achievement/Progress: Within my field placement there was a student that did not speak nor read english. This posed a challenge for the delivery of lessons. We explained to other students that this particular student may need to copy certain aspects of their work, mainly writing prompts. Every student loved to help with this. In certain cases my mentor teacher or I would write prompts for this student to copy as well. My mentor teacher and I also learnt basic phrases in the students first language so when asking something we didn't always have to use google translate. Although this is not directly fostering a more culturally inclusive environment, it helped this student to feel included in all lessons as well as taught the other students how to support those who do not understand. This student would copy other students writing prompts (with permission) as well as write in their first language.

https://www.mentalup.co/blog/what-are-the-learning-styles

My goal for this competency is to understand the different learning styles present within the classroom.

1. I will discuss the different learning types present within the classroom with my mentor teacher.

2. I will deepen my understanding of the different learning styles by finding two sources from the MRU library that breakdown the different styles.

Similar to my goal under the assessment competency, I will monitor my success of this goal based by my knowledge. Ideally, I will be able to list the different styles and describe each one at least at a basic level.